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8 The Linguist Vol/56 No/4 2017 www.ciol.org.uk FEATURES In the first edition of my Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language (1995), I collected estimates for English speakers in 75 countries where English has held a special place. It makes interesting reading to compare these totals with those in the second (2003) and third (2018) editions. There has been little change in the number of first language (L1) speakers: 377 million in 1995 compared with 388 million today. But there has been a huge increase in second language (L2) speakers: 98 million in 1995, 422 million in 2003 and 885 million today. For world use, I arrive at a total of just over 2.3 billion in the third edition – an increase on the most frequently quoted totals of 1.5 billion in the 1990s and 2 billion in the noughties. Increasing domination All statistics are guesstimates, based on a conflation of whatever sources can be found: no territory gathers precise figures about the number of its people who understand, speak, read or write English, or their attainment levels; and while the six stages of the Common European Framework are widely recognised, there is no information about the way these relate to mature usage throughout a society, whether in Europe or beyond. Repeatedly, websites about the use of English in a specific country give only vague descriptions such as 'widely spoken', 'chiefly used in cities' and 'few fluent speakers'. Anyone wanting to arrive at a first approximation has therefore to conflate information from whatever sources can be found. In my case, I combined what I could discover about the number of students studying English in secondary and higher education, occasional reports issued by such organisations as Eurobarometer, Euromonitor International and the British Council, visitor guides, the views of embassies, and the anecdotal impressions of people living in a country (now very common on the internet). I looked for no more than an affirmation of an everyday conversational level of ability, and I included English-based creoles and pidgins. If there was a range of estimates within a country, I went for the lower ones. And even if my conservative estimates are out by a few percentage points, they are nonetheless useful as an indication of growth, for I used the same criteria in each edition. Everywhere reports the same story: greater demand for English from the business sector, an increase in the numbers taking EFL (English as a foreign language) examinations, and a huge impulse towards the language from younger people, for whom it is the chief medium of entry into their cultural and digital world. Most linguistic debates end up as political, economic or cultural arguments, and this is certainly the case here. There is the 'outward- looking' argument: the 230 million EU citizens who speak English 1 make up only 10% of the world total, where English is unquestionably the dominant language of trade and technology, and likely to remain so for the foreseeable future. So if the EU wants to trade with the rest of the world it will have to respect global linguistic realities. Then there is the 'inward-looking' argument: the 230 million English-speakers represent 51% of EU citizens. Member states have made huge investments in English, and are unlikely to be willing to participate in EU affairs in another language, even if agreement could be obtained about which language that should be. The membership of Ireland, and official status of English in Malta, would, in any case, require the ongoing recognition of English as one of the EU's languages. As Marko Modiano writes: "When the dust settles, there is every reason to believe that English, because of its utility, will have the same role within the EU as it maintains today." 2 I agree with that, but would add that its linguistic character is likely to change. I would be surprised if all the British people working in the translating and interpreting departments of the European institutions were to leave. © EUROPEAN UNION / EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT