World English

A Study of Its Development

This text traces the history of English language spread from the 18th to the beginning of the 21st century, combining that with a study of its langauge change. It links linguistic and sociolinguistic variables that have conditioned the evolution and change of English, putting forward a new framework of language spread and change.

World English, however, owes its existence to the fact that some 80% of its
approximately one-and-a-half to two billion users are bilingual (or multilingual) (
Crystal, 1997; World Englishes, 1998: 419). Since the existence of World English
results from the process of language spread as macroacquisition - second
language acquisition (SLA) by speech communities - bilingualism necessarily
occupies a central role in the study of World English. In refocusing its study from
the global, often ...