Re: Who were the Aryans?

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On 17 Nov 2003 23:21:18 -0800, [EMAIL PROTECTED] (L D) wrote:

>----- Original Message ----- 
>From: "John F. Eldredge" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>>  English is the
>> most-widely-spoken in the world today; most of its speakers don't
>> have British ancestry.
>> -- 
>> John F. Eldredge -- [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>This statement is somewhat misleading. English is the language of
>only the US, UK, Canada, Australia and New Zeland (and some very
>small
>countries). All these countries were colonized by the British, so
>their ancestery is significantly English.
>
>English is spoken widely in other countries like Netherlands,
>Germany, India, Japan etc. However in none of these countries it is
>the first language, for example the percentage of Indians who can
>speak English is about 2% (or so it was 25 years back, it could be
>more now).
>
>Also in the modern world due to global commerce English is
>spreading. Such commerce is unlikely to have existed during the time
>of the
>spread of the IE languages or been the cause of it.

I was pointing out the total number of English-speakers, whether as a
first or later language, as an example that a language can spread
well beyond its original ethnic group.  An example from the late
classical period would be Koine Greek, which became the dominant
trade language throughout the eastern Mediterranean, and at least
part of the western Mediterranean.  The spread of Islam carried
Arabic (as a liturgical language, and in some areas for everyday
speech) far beyond its original homeland.

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-- 
John F. Eldredge -- [EMAIL PROTECTED]
PGP key available from http://pgp.mit.edu
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