Esperanto - I was expecting it to be brought up...
and it's probably a serious alternative, IF it were discussed unbiased.
So you seem to agree that language is the expression of cultural identity, and efforts must be made to preserve local language(s).
Language is the EXPRESSION of cultural identity - not cultural identity in itself <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/question.gif" alt="" /> Or would anybody deny that there are 'cultural differences' (however they may be defined - that was another thread) between, let's say, Americans (US), British, Australians, Canadians (except Quebecois? <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/winkwink.gif" alt="" />); or French and Quebecois, for that matter; or Germans, Austrians and Swiss (German speaking); or Spanish, Middle and South Americans - and that's only the European origin side of it.
So would cultural identity really be lost, if expressed in another language? Mind you, I am not advocating to abolish all languages safe one! But languages are a living and evolving matter. None of our languages - I really postulate NONE - is the same as 500 years ago (or 300, or even 100 years ago). Languages have become extinct (some forcibly through oppression), and languages have changed and are changing. So do cultures.
I speak three languages and a handful of German dialects rather fluently - none of which is my Mother's tongue (That would be Czeck) - all of them for coincidentally having lived in the respective areas. And I ask myself - and you - why is it OK to be taught second languages in school like English, French, Spanish, German, Russian - but no effort is made to globally agree on a common second language? Esperanto, if nobody wants to concede a 'winner', which is a stupid chauvinistic attitude anyway IMO. Why is it impossible to agree on a single official language in the European Union (The USA had solved the question at one time, it being a close call between English andf German at the time). Pragmatically it would appear logic, so the offense taken and the resistance is emotional?
What would be the loss in a compulsory universal language, as second language? And why are the arguments always on the losses, and not on the benefits?
