全新主题大学英语读写译教程4-4【DOC精选】.docVIP

Unit Four Of Language Section A Pre-reading Questions: 1. Which language is the most popular in the world today? Why do you think so? 2. What do you know about the history of English? 3. Which do you think is more likely for the future of English, continue to be the world language or fall into decay? By now you’ve probably gone through many tests which were designed to see how much English you know. Now it’s time to check how much you know about English. English Present and Future 1 It was observed by that remarkable twelfth-century chronicler Henry of Huntingdon that an interest in the past was one of the distinguishing characteristics of humans as compared with the other animals. The medium by which speakers of a language communicate their thoughts and feelings to others, the tool with which they conduct their business or the government of millions of people, the vehicle by which has been transmitted the science, the philosophy, the poetry of the culture is surely worthy of study. It is not to be expected that everyone should be a philologist or should master the technicalities of linguistic science. But it is reasonable to assume that a liberally educated person should know something of the structure of his or her language, its position in the world and its relation to other tongues, the wealth of its vocabulary together with the sources from which that vocabulary has been and is being enriched, and the complex relationships among the many different varieties of speech that are gathered under the single name of the English language. 2 Influences at Work on Language 3 The diversity of cultures that find expression in it is a reminder that the history of English is a story of cultures in contact during the past 1,500 years. It understates matters to say that political, economic, and social forces influence a language. These forces shape the language in every aspect, most obviously in the number and spread of its speakers, and in what is called