Linguistic Darwinism

Only the strong survive.  A chant that evolutionists have held to since the theories of Charles Darwin became wide spread.  Darwin’s theory of evolution explains the transition from single cell organisms to the complex beings that we are now.  But can his theories of natural selection and evolution be applied to things other than life.  What about applying his theories to the evolution of language that is happening in modern society?  Today, we are seeing languages die out at an unprecedented rate and English taking over as the dominant language of the world.

By a rough estimate, one language is lost every 2 weeks (Burton, p.127).  This happens as peoples die out and civilization moves further into the places that it seldom touched just years ago.  This dying out of languages can be easily seen as a natural selection.  The languages that are inefficient and not recognized by many people are losing their use in many places, and being replaced by, in many cases, English.  But is this a good thing? 

I would say yes.  Not an emphatic yes, but I think it is positive none the less.  With English becoming the dominant language in the world it is opening up new avenues of communication that did not exist before.  It is allowing people who may have once been cut off from modern society to get in touch with what the world is becoming.  I think that the trend of English as an international language will help unify the world in the future.

However, there are negatives to this.  I have heard that the Eskimo’s have over 100 words for snow.  How many does the English language have?  One (that is if you don’t count the slang that has been concocted by skiers and snowboarders).  But that means that if that language dies out those ways of describing every different type of snow are lost.  There are many languages that have words with no English translation.  So as English becomes the lingua facta, these words are lost. 

If you subscribe the Darwin’s theory of evolution though, perhaps these words will not be lost.  I could see that as many of these peoples start speaking English they will adapt it and meld it with their native languages, evolving English to suit their needs.  This evolution of the English language can be seen in many places where this has already happened.  So if only the strong survive, they must also adapt and grow, and this is what I envision for the future of the English language.