Whenever I've given a lecture on the future of English, the question I am most frequently asked is ‘Will Chinese take over from English as the global language?’. With China's economy continuing to grow fast, whilst those of the west slow down in recession, China has been rising up the world economic rankings and has overtaken other economies faster than predicted. It seems no time since it overhauled the UK economy to become the world's number 4 (2005), and then Germany (2007) to become number 3. During the summer of 2010 it edged past Japan to become the world's second largest economy. It may take another 20 years to overtake the US economy in absolute size, though it may already have become the world's largest exporter (overtaking Germany), and has already overtaken the US in energy consumption. Next year, China is expected to take over from the US as the world's largest manufacturer – a position the US has held since it overtook the UK in the late 1890s.

The use of English loanwords in different languages has been discussed from various perspectives by several scholars (e.g. Takashi, 1990; Kay, 1995; Takashi Wilkerson, 1997; Smead, 1998; Friedrich, 2002). Although this phenomenon has been regarded as enriching and/or creative by some (e.g. Crystal, 2003; Friedrich, 2002), it has encountered opposition in many parts of the world. Phillipson (1992: 7), for instance, views it ‘as a phenomenon that has offended users of other languages for more than a century.’ He explains how some governments (in France and Slovenia, for example) have adopted measures to prevent the use of loanwords from English. This issue of whether or not the incorporation of loanwords is offensive to the borrowing language became a topic of much debate in Brazil after Projected Law #1676/1999, which aims to limit the use of foreign words (mainly from English) in Brazilian Portuguese (hereafter, BP). As Rajagopalan (2005) explains, many popular movements, politicians, and traditional grammarians have expressed concern that BP is ‘under an imminent threat from English’ (101).

Several linguists (e.g. Faraco, 2001) have opposed the proposition, based on issues such as linguistic prejudice and the lack of language expertise of the proponents and supporters of the projected law. Still, the proposition was approved by the Brazilian Senate in 2003. It now awaits further approval by the Chamber of Deputies before a final decision is made. One possible way of investigating whether loanwords are offensive to BP is to approach it from a linguistic perspective. Hence, in the present study, I explore the issue of borrowing by BP speakers through a linguistic analysis of loanwords from English that are currently used as slang in Brazil. The definition of slang used here is that proposed by Eble (1996: 11): ‘an ever changing set of colloquial words and phrases that speakers use to establish or reinforce social identity or cohesiveness within a group or with a trend or fashion in society at large.’

Most popular discussions of varieties of English in Appalachia (USA) focus only on vernacular dialect features, suggesting that these hallmark characteristics are common for ‘true’ mountain folk (Dial, 1972). Naturally, the reality of the dialects in this region is more complex and subdued than the stereotype. While traditional features, such as a-prefixing (e.g. she is a-working), have played a role in the region, most stereotypical, Appalachian dialect features are fading from usage today (Hazen, 2006). Appalachia is a long region divided into numerous sections. Depending on the sources consulted, the regional divisions are quite staggering in their differences. For some, the region of Appalachia can stretch as far north as New York and as far south as Mississippi, including parts of 13 states (Appalachian Regional Commission). Other definitions limit the geography to a much smaller range (Wolfram & Christian, 1976). Aware of this problem, we have chosen to focus on one region universally accepted as part of Appalachia: West Virginia. Geographically, the state fits entirely within the boundaries of all definitions of the region. Likewise, West Virginia also fits the socio-economic profile most commonly associated with Appalachia. To provide the most comprehensive picture possible, we present a brief overview of English in West Virginia, followed by an empirical examination of 10 dialect features. The import of this empirical investigation is that the West Virginia vernacular of the twenty-first century has changed from its roots at the beginning of the twentieth century.

Prescriptive analyses of English grammar no doubt post-date the introduction of the printing press to England in 1476, but not by much. As soon as the dissemination of standards for written English became practicable, self-appointed experts working in every area from religion (Bishop Robert Lowth, for example) to science (including Joseph Priestley, the discoverer of oxygen) published their personal recommendations for improving the English language, and the tradition has flourished ever since, even after the advent of linguistics and descriptivism. Best sellers like TV newsman Edwin Newman's Strictly Speaking (1974) and A Civil Tongue (1975), along with film and Broadway critic John Simon's Paradigms Lost (1980), have been followed by an array of more recent prescriptive mass-market guides for the grammatically unwashed, perhaps most entertaining among them, Lynne Truss's popular Eats, Shoots & Leaves (2003), but also Dennis Baron's Guide to Home Language Repair (1994), Patricia O'Conner's Woe Is I (2003), Bill Walsh's Lapsing into a Comma (2000) and The Elephants of Style (2004), and June Casagrande's Grammar Snobs Are Great Big Meanies (2006) and its encore Mortal Syntax (2008).

The English language has fast become a global language. In Asia, from the far steppes of Mongolia to the beaches of Thailand, to the shores of the Caspian Sea, English print, music, and along with language, Western values, have spread and multiplied. New technology and media, especially the Internet (Crystal, 1996/2003), have helped carry English to people of all nationalities and economic classes. But many scholars feel that the rise of English is connected with the downfall of indigenous languages (Fishman, 1996; Crawford, 1996; McCarty, 2003). Minority languages face extinction as English rides the wave of increasing globalization (Romaine, 2001). Since 2007, Newsweek, The China Daily, and other international media sources have been citing English as the language of economic success in China. Adherents of English claim that it brings positive social change, economic opportunities, consumer goods, and new technologies (Castells, 2001). Such materialistic temptations cause some minority youth to discount the value of their languages and traditions. In Native America, for example, a small minority of Native Americans youth may feel that exchanging, dismissing, or even abandoning their native language and culture for English and a Western lifestyle represents progress and success in the form of material goods and a modern lifestyle (Crawford, 1996; McCarty, 2003). Similarly, in China, English is viewed as the language of economic success by many young Chinese. Opponents of the rise of English view the language, and its underlying cultural messages, as imperialistic. Phillipson (1992) accuses ESL educators of making a negative cultural impact upon unsuspecting indigenous peoples all over the world. Skutnabb-Kangas (2000) asserts that English can be used as a tool by Western nations for global dominance.

The term ‘idiom’ can refer to two types of fixed expressions. First, in a narrow sense, idioms are ‘expressions whose idiomaticity is semantic; typical expressions are kick the bucket, spill the beans etc. Second, idiomaticity is a formal property of expressions and is more or less equated with the fixedness of form; for example, by and large’ (Stathi, 2006: 27). It is more common, as Moon (1997: 46) says, for idioms to refer to ‘multi-word items which are not the sum of their parts: they have holistic meanings which cannot be retrieved from the individual meanings of the component words.’ Idioms are thought to be ‘relatively frozen and to have severe grammatical restriction’ (Moon, 1997: 47), and so it might be generally taken that they do not permit any lexical or syntactic modification, but they have greater possibilities of modification than might be expected. There are many idioms with different structures in the English language; I have chosen the idioms with the syntactic structure V + the + N. In this paper I will try to show the degrees of modification, the possible reasons for their modifications and the significance of the definite article by using the British National Corpus (BNC) and Webcorp, a web concordancer.

Despite a large and growing literature on Hong Kong English (HKE), few studies have been conducted on its emerging language features, particularly its grammar or vocabulary. According to Gisborne (2009), studies on HKE to date have focused on language attitudes, code-switching, learner errors, and the local accent. A quick review of the research on vocabulary reveals that even those studies with a specific lexical focus have tended to be fairly limited in scope, focusing on borrowing, politicized expressions and localized vocabulary. Additionally, by their nature, these studies have tended to only cover vocabulary items that are unique and obviously have a different meaning in the local setting. In particular, there is a noticeable dearth of in-depth studies on semantic shift, in particular extensions or adaptations of meaning for simple words or phrases which are taken for granted as being at the common core of English varieties throughout the world. This kind of usage is more likely to cause comprehension difficulties than the more-often studied borrowings or coinages, simply because it might not be apparent to either a native speaker or a Hong Kong speaker that there is a difference in meaning when it comes to the Hong Kong terms used, and therefore there is a greater potential for misunderstanding.

Euphemisms have no doubt been used ever since the birth of languages, and surely constitute a linguistic universal. We are all aware of them and we all use them when it is desirable to avoid drawing attention to the less pleasant aspects of daily life such as the need to empty one's bladder or bowel. They are respectful in that they show concern for the feelings of our fellow human beings; the more delicate the social situation and the more unpleasant the subject matter we refer to, the more careful we must be in selecting a euphemism for the purpose. Perhaps the most painful fact to deal with socially is the death of someone known to the person we are addressing, and for this purpose the English language puts a copious word-hoard at our disposal.

The mysteries of exotic China arise not only from its voluntary isolation from the modern world during some of the most formative and progressive decades, but from an inability or unwillingness of the west to understand Chinese logic and thinking. The west views China with western eyes and judges China according to western standards. The west asks some seriously ignorant questions about China, such as: What is the culture of China? What do the people of China think? What do the people of China eat?

To fully comprehend the absurdity of these questions, simply invert them, as Chinese college students regularly do in their English classes that are taught by foreigners: How is the culture of America? How do the people of America think? How do the people of America eat? Each populace assumes that the other is a mono-culture. This thinking also carries over into the area of lingua franca. The west assumes that all Chinese people speak Mandarin or Cantonese and have a common written language. China actually teaches that one must learn ‘Standard British English’ or ‘Standard American English’ or ‘Standard International English.’ In addition to Mandarin and Cantonese, China has 55 minority languages and an uncounted number of localized dialects such as Shanghainese, Wuhanese, and many others. There are at least three written Chinese languages, not just one, for example, traditional Chinese, simplified Chinese and pinyin.

In ET102 (June 2010), Geoffrey K. Pullum poured scorn on the book The Elements of Style by W. Strunk and E. B. White, saying it had a ‘vice-like grip on Americans’ view of grammar and usage' and that ‘almost everything they say on that topic is wrong.’ Elements is a fairly short book, containing 85 pages of advice on writing, presenting some of it in a way you could describe as rules of usage. Pullum thinks that many Americans go further and treat it as holy writ. I should like to defend Elements here and to attack Pullum's critical method. Some ET readers may be surprised by this, as in 1992 I wrote ‘The vital principle is that there are no rules of correct usage. The basis for choice is aesthetic, not technical, and since language rests on convention, there is no authority that can justify your preferences.’ I stick to that. How, then, am I going to defend Elements without seeming to contradict myself? I think the answer is in what I went on to say: ‘That does not mean you should not make linguistic judgements: you should, but on grounds of quality, not of correctness.’ (Who Controls the Language?, ET31, July 1992.)