People say "English is the global language," but do we use it that way? Most of the pages on the worldwide web are written in English, but are they written in a way that can be understood by a worldwide audience?
Our company focuses on promoting and refining the use of English as a tool for global communication. We feel that native speakers of English need to become more responsible about the global role of our language. This means speaking and writing English more clearly so that it can be understood throughout the world.
Most of our work is dedicated to helping people learn to speak and write "Global English." In particular, we show you how to globalize your English document or speech by streamlining its syntax and by freeing it from idioms that are specific to your own culture. In general, we help native speakers become more aware of the perceptions of non-native speakers of English. Whatever your situation is, our company is ready to help you.
The fact that English is spreading around the globe seems to clash with the fact that many companies are translating their documents into a greater number and variety of languages. A late 20th century trend (especially in the production of software manuals, marketing materials, and web sites) was to "localize" the translation of a document.
The term localization means modifying a translation to fit a local culture's patterns of language usage. For example, a training manual being shipped to Argentina might be published in a special Argentinian Spanish edition. A localized manual is vernacular: It speaks to the audience in a familiar style, with local idioms.
In contrast, globalization (or "internationalization") refers to editing a document before translating it. This means making the original English text clearer so that it will be easier to translate into a wide variety of languages. Although the original document may seem clear to a native English speaker, it probably contains idioms that cannot be easily translated.
Localization is very important for international marketing. Marketing depends on appealing to popular tastes, and this means using a language and style that consumers can identify with. In 1998, Apple Computer introduced the iMac in 140 countries, localizing their marketing materials into more than 50 languages and dialects.
Obviously, localization is expensive. The key question is not "Is it costly?" but rather "Is it cost-effective?" Costs naturally rise as a document is localized into more and more languages and dialects. Eventually, there will be diminishing marginal returns: The extra market share represented by adding more languages will not generate enough revenue to make localization into those languages profitable. In the United States, more than 98% of the population can be reached by translating a document into 20 languages.
Human beings speak nearly 7,000 distinct languages. Among these, 347 languages each have over 1 million native speakers, including 83 languages that have over 10 million. Even if a document were translated into all 83 of the largest languages, about 20% of the world's people would still be left out. It's reasonable to assume that there will always be non-native speakers who need to use the English version of a document that accompanies a globally marketed product.
Written English that is intended for international distribution can be as brief as a few short phrases printed on the packing box of a television to highlight the new features. Or it might be a complete document, ranging from a small pamphlet that explains how to use a musical keyboard to a large manual that explains how to maintain and repair a commercial aircraft. In any case, the text should be written in clear, globally understood English.
Localization and globalization are complementary processes rather than an either-or choice. A document that will be widely disseminated should be globalized by an editor before it is given to the translators who will localize it for target markets. One way to understand the complementarity from the viewpoint of users is: Localization appeals to empathy by incorporating tacit aspects of a specific culture, while Global English aims for general accessibility by making text as explicit as possible.
For information about the importance of Global English for disseminating knowledge worldwide via the web, read about The Limits of Localization in the Universal Web section of our web site.
To understand some of the practical aspects of globalizing a document into clear Global English, go to the page about editing in the Yankee English Services section of our web site.
For information about the 20 languages most frequently spoken in American homes see Table 1 of US Census Brief issued October 2003.
For information on the number of speakers of various languages worldwide, visit Ethnologue.
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