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To: Ciexyz
English is the language of the Internet, international commerce, and popular entertainment (films and music)

you're somewhat right about the language of the Internet, but not completely -- Chinese and even Russian are taking hold with newer releases that are unicode compatible. You are more or less correct about international commerce, though it is French in Francophone west Africa and Spanish in Latin America and Arabic in the Middle East when they trade among themselves

you are wrong about popular entertainment -- I was surprised when I moved to Poland last year that many Poles didn't know some common American movies, cartoons etc. that for us is common cultural knowledge -- they have their own films in their own languages

And friends in India point out that they make the most movies -- in fact they have several "hollywoods" in different langauges: hindi, tamil, oriya, marathi, konkani, telugu, malayalam etc. -- and these are surprisingly popular in Russia and the Middle East and South-East Asia.

16 posted on 10/16/2011 2:20:08 AM PDT by Cronos (http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2787101/posts?page=58#58)
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To: Cronos
Let me add that many native English speakers (Americans, British, Australian etc) wrongly assume that since much of the World speaks English that they are in a better position to understand the rest of the World or that the Anglo-Saxon Worldview is predominant.

As a second language English speaker I can tell you there is a difference between speaking English and thinking in English. We might speak excellent English, but we don't think in English, some of us think in Swahili, Hausa, Hindi etc.

That is why it is extremely foolhardy to suggest, for example, that the Americans and Indians share the same values simply because many Indians speak English.

It's also true that Americans vastly overestimate the reach of Hollywood. In Africa for example, Nigerian movies rule. Most Africans don't know who Brad Pitt is but are emotionally connected to Nigerian actors. In the Gulf states and South Asia, Bollywood rules. Latin American telenovelas have a cult following in places as diverse as Russia, Mexico and much of Africa (I grew up watching "The Rich also Cry").

20 posted on 10/16/2011 4:31:40 AM PDT by AfricanChristian
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