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Nowadays, the English language is the language of business, science,

technology, the media and communication in general, so it serves as a lingua

franca in many countries. Geographically, English is the most widespread

language on earth. In fact, people who speak English fall into 3 groups. The

1st one is those who have learned it as their native language. The next group

consists of those who use it as a second language in a society that is mainly

bilingual. Finally, the 3d group includes those who use it for a practical

purpose (either for business or education).

However, the emergence of English as a world language is a relatively recent

thing. Some 6 or 5 centuries ago, the situation was quite different. For

example, in Shakespeare’s time only a few million people spoke English.

Through the centuries, as a result of various historical events the English

language was established as a mother tongue outside England.

In my opinion, there are several reasons why English has become a dominant

language. First of all, it is the simplicity of form. English is an analytical

language, one more characteristic of this language is its flexibility and the

openness of its vocabluary. 70% of the English vocabulary are loan words and

only 30% of the words are native.