應用型大學英語綜合教程:5:學生用書 節選

PARIS - It happens all the time: during an airport delay: the man to the left, a Koreanperhaps, starts talking to the man opposite, who might be Colombian, and soon they are chatting away in what seems to be English. But the native English speaker sitting between them cannot understand a word. They don't know it, but the Korean and the Colombian are speaking Globish, the latest addition to the 6,800 languages that are said to be spoken across the world. Not that its inventor, Jean- Paul Nerriere, considers it a proper language. "It is not a language, it is a tool," he says. "A language is the vehicle of a culture. Globish doesn't want to be that at all. It is a means ofcommunication." Nerriere doesn't see Globish in the same light as utopian efforts such as Kosmos,Volapuk, Novial or staunch Esperanto. Nor should it be confused with rough Algol （forAlgorithmic language）. It is a sort of "English lite": a means of simplifying the language and giving it rules so it can be understood by all. The main principles of Globish are a vocabulary of only 1,500 words in English （theOED lists 615,000）, gestures and repetition. Grammar will be dealt with in the next volume, "Decouvrez le Globish" （Discover the Globish）due next month. ……