By Varan Satchithanandan ’12, Commentary Editor

The International Baccalaureate Programme ensures that Newark Academy student’s test papers will be sent around the world. A teacher in Auckland, New Zealand may find a stack of essays from Livingston, New Jersey on his or her desk come grading period. This goes to demonstrate how English truly is a multinational creation, the world’s lingua franca. No other language enjoys the same level of global proliferation. However, there are many different forms of English in the world, the two major types being American and British English. While in years past the world has relied primarily upon the Queen’s, American expressions are becoming increasingly common.

Former Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Kwan Yew believes that American English will prevail as the dominant form, due to the ubiquity of U.S. media. Singaporean schools have taught British English since the country’s independence, but the former PM encourages educators to teach students to be able to recognize, and even speak American English. The very nature of the English language and the world, however, makes this a difficult task.

English is a language that is constantly evolving, with new expressions and words coming, not from bureaucrats and intellectuals, but regular people. It has always been a democratic, populist language. With his Proposal for Correcting, Improving and Ascertaining the English Tongue (1712), Jonathon Swift tried to regulate English, but this attempt resulted in failure.  English is, by nature, a language whose nuances are contingent upon location. Even at Newark Academy the English language is manipulated in text and instant message conversations.

Despite arguments that it is more useful to speak American English than British English, a convincing argument against the full-scale adoption of American English is, ironically, the propagation of English as a general language throughout world. It is true that American media is widespread, but British schooling has been in place for centuries in many areas in the Eastern hemisphere. Media comprehension is not, in itself, an argument for the adoption of a dialect. Furthermore, English is no longer bound by the borderlines of countries. India, China, and numerous other countries are adopting forms of English to communicate with the world. Phrases once unique to American English have been ingrained across the pond, and vice-versa.

English has become the language of pragmatism. As Newark Academy students, striving to become global citizens, we must emphasize clarity in our speech and writing – even if it means borrowing expressions from around the world.