I'm currently doing an online course with Futurelearn about the EU. We're at week 2. It's presented by the Catalan University in Barcelona and it's pretty good. Lots of interesting contributors, lots of good ideas. I've even been able to explain my views on where Scotland stands in the recent EU referendum. But there's a problem. The main presenter is, I think, Catalan. He's presenting in English and his grasp of English is excellent. The only problem is...
...Once upon a time when I had responsibility for EU funding in my local authority, I was pleased to be able to help the Social Work Department to host a pan-European conference. It was obvious that all the participating groups had been working hard and doing great social projects and it all went well till the morning that the Greek group decided to do their presentation in English with no visual aids or Powerpoints, just two women reading their notes in English with dense Greek accents and with the emphassEEss all wrong. All the time. I think I lasted ten minutes before I started wondering: Did I ask the boss to come to this? Please. No. Anything but that. They went on for about 25 minutes. Then we had coffee. I thanked them for their presentation. They told ME how much they had enJOYed the proJECT and HOW much they had learnèD.
On the Futurelearn course I'm following, I see a claim that English is the lingua franca of the EU. And I need to ask: Is there an academic English developing that I don't know about? Because if it is, it needs to be better than the crap I'm hearing and reading now.
Myself, I'd rather use French as the working language of the EU. Maybe it's all those years of the Académie Française, but with French I know we'll be dealing with a language that is sharp, accurate and less open to 'foreign' interference. Less likely to adopt b*llsh*t foreign words. More likely to insist on clarity of meaning.
It doesn't have to be French, of course. Just offer up other languages where clarity is the big word.
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