Once upon a time I had an article about why exactly English is the language of international communication. Among the reasons were the intelligibility of English to speakers of many other European languages, as well as the enormous political, historical and cultural influence of English-speaking countries. Most of this influence comes from the United States of America.
But let's imagine that the United States suddenly disappeared from the map of the world. They just evaporated, along with all their political, economic and cultural influence. Let's omit all other problems that will arise in the world. Let us think about what language in this case could become the language of international communication.
So that my reasoning is not entirely unfounded, let's highlight the criteria for a new international language. First, it must be a language with a large number of people speaking it and the countries where it is spoken. Secondly, this language, like the countries where this language is official, must have a great political, economic and cultural influence for people to want to learn this language. Finally, this language must be easy enough to learn so as not to torment the world's population. What kind of languages could they be?
Chinese
The Chinese language could be an excellent contender for the role of the language of international communication. It is the native language of 1.3 billion people worldwide. Several hundred thousand more have been fluent in Chinese since childhood. And given the political and economic influence of China, even now many are trying to learn Chinese in order to cooperate with Chinese companies. And with the disappearance of the United States, China is likely to become the second pole of influence opposite Russia.
But the Chinese language has several significant problems. Firstly, Chinese is too difficult to learn due to tones, hieroglyphs and so on. Secondly, the closed nature of China makes it difficult to exert a cultural influence on the world consciousness. And finally, you still need to understand which of the Chinese dialects to speak. Because of all this, people really don't want to learn Chinese.
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Arab
With Arabic, the situation is about the same as with Chinese. A large number of speakers (300 million), huge political and economic influence on the world stage. But at the same time, the Arabic language is very difficult to learn. And I would even call the cultural influence negative, since in the world with the Arabic language people in general have negative associations for various reasons.
Russian
In the event of the disappearance of the United States, the Russian language will be one of the main contenders for the title of the global one, especially if the second political pole is not found. It has many native speakers around the world (260 million) and is slightly simpler than Chinese or Arabic. But if there is a second pole, then the Russian language may remain no more than the language of Eastern Europe and Central Asia.
The problem is that the Russian language also has very little cultural influence in the modern world. Yes, our classics are known and loved all over the world. But Russia practically does not export new cultural content. Because of this, not many people voluntarily want to learn Russian.
Spanish, Portuguese and French
I decided to parse these three languages together, because the situation is almost the same. They are all pretty easy to learn. They are quite common in the world: French in Africa, Spanish and Portuguese in Latin America. They make enough cultural influence in the world. And they all carry some political weight. In general, they have everything necessary to become the languages of world communication.
But a little of this. And of these languages, in my opinion, only Spanish has a real chance. French and Portuguese are too weak.
German
Against the background of other languages, the candidacy of German looks very weak. It is spoken in only 6 countries within Europe. Although these countries have political and cultural influence, it is clearly inferior to the other languages listed. Why did I decide to talk about him too?
This will be just my personal opinion, but I think the German language is very functional. It will be easy to learn for the majority, since it has many different features inherent in the languages of different groups, while it is not very difficult either. And the formation of meaning in German is very convenient.
Japanese
"And what is Japanese doing here?" - you ask. Indeed, Japanese is not very common. Japan has little political or economic clout. And the writing of the Japanese language takes a huge number of hours to learn.
But Japan is one of the top producers of cultural content in the world. If the United States disappears, most likely the Japanese will become the main cultural influence. And people will want to learn Japanese themselves. So the Japanese language has every chance.
English
Yes, if the United States disappears, English will most likely remain the global language. There are many more countries with large English-speaking populations, political, economic and cultural influence. Only England, Australia and Canada are worth something.
But if we imagine that English has disappeared completely, then, in my opinion, either Japanese or German will become the global language. Well, or Russian in the case of a unipolar world.
What language do you think could become global? Write in the comments.