(Fwd) Re: Linguistic imperialism

[Marcus Kit Petz]

------- Forwarded Message Follows -------
From:          Self <MAN-SCG-FS2/MPETZ>
ate:          Tue, 20 Feb 1996 13:49:50 -0700
Reply-to:      Joe Laferriere <josephl at CCIT.ARIZONA.EDU>
From:          Joe Laferriere <josephl at CCIT.ARIZONA.EDU>
Subject:       Linguistic imperialism
To:            Multiple recipients of list TAXACOM <TAXACOM at CMSA.BERKELEY.EDU>

>. We forget that there are more people
>who speak Chinese than English, yet very few Americans take the time to
>learn it.

Is trhis  true? There are certainly more people who can write Chinese
(as there is a universal character system). However the non mutually
inteligible dialects may mean that there aren't more people who
actually speak a comprehensible form. You could write English using
Chinese Characters - that we don't use such a system is an accident
of history.
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