1.2.3. Economic reasons
Dominating and even participating in world economy needs
mastering the language of the economically dominant (Derbel, 2004). The main
language of the United States of America, which is dominating and monitoring
world economy, is English, which means that taking part in international
business depends on knowledge of English (Phillpson, 1992). For this reason, a
lot of money has been spent on learning this language. It seems from this
perspective that the dominance of the US after the Second World War resulted in
the dominance of English in the modern history. This saying could be
illustrated by Graddol's claim that «the story of English in the
20th century has been closely linked to the rise of the US as a
superpower that has spread the English language alongside its economic,
technological and cultural influence»
(Graddol, 1997, p. 8). Within the context of a globalised
capitalist world economy, governments and individuals found no way but to
learn, teach, and use English in order to live and to prosper. Therefore, the
economic reasons are either internal or external.
The internal ones are those related to the attempt of the
governments in the world to promote the mastery of English among its economy
agents for the sake of integration in world economy (Derbel, 2001). In the same
vein, Phillipson (1992) illustrates this claim when he argues that «the
discourse accompanying and legitimating the export of English to the rest of
world has been so persuasive that English has been equated with progress and
prosperity».
The external ones are those related to the British and later
on the American attempts to spread English in order to make English the
language of world economy for the sake of more and more economic, political,
and ideological dominance.
At the level of economy, Tunisia is very much connected to
Europe and mainly France more than English speaking countries (Bahloul, 2001;
Derbel, 2001). Importation and exportation could determine which language to
promote which determines also the language to be favoured by students.
However, apart from the internal and external economic
reasons, there exist some practical reasons, which strengthen the importance of
the value of English and legitimate the claim that the world is increasingly
depending on this language (Graddol, 1997).
1.2.4. Practical reason
The practical reasons are in relation with what English offers
to its individual learners, which create the extrinsic motivation to learn it.
Gardner (1985) differentiated between «extrinsic» and
«intrinsic» motivation (qtd in Liu, 2007).
In a study that concerned the Chinese context, Meihua Liu
mentioned that extrinsic (or instrumental) motivation refers to the fact of
learning a language for the sake of gaining a tangible reward. Therefore, it is
linked to some external forces like learning English in order to succeed in
education, avoiding a punishment, to pass the TOEFL, qualifying for a job,
achieving a higher social status, getting a rise in salary, or studying in an
English speaking country (Liu, 2007). This kind of motivation differs from
intrinsic motivation as a driving forces in learning. Intrinsic motivation
refers to the forces that urge the learner to learn a particular language and
that are coming from inside them (ibid). Instead of being related to material
gains, they are related to the desire of the learner to learn a second or
foreign language for the sake of being part of the speech community that speaks
that language or out of fascination towards its culture (ibid).
The practical reasons, then, are related to the presence of
English everywhere and for this reason, it seems extremely important to master
it. In fact, with English comes the promise to those who will master it to
succeed in life, as it will allow them to gain access to knowledge in all
domains especially in fields connected to science and technology. Table 2 below
includes a list although not exhaustive of the fields where English is used.
Table 3: Major international domains of English (Graddol,
1997, p. 8)
1. Working language of international organisations and
conferences
2. Scientific publication
3. International banking, economic affairs and trade
4 Advertising for global brands
5 Audio-visual cultural products (e.g. film, TV, popular
music)
6 International tourism
7 Tertiary education
8 International safety (e.g. `airspeak', `seaspeak')
9 International law
10 As a `relay language' in interpretation and translation
11 Technology transfer
12 Internet communication
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The variety of domains listed in the table above illustrate
the fact that in order to read a scientific article, to use technological
products, to look for research information, to have access to studies about the
world's phenomena, mastery of English is needed. It is especially required to
communicate and participate in trade with Europe and America, but also
important even to enjoy popular music and films produced predominantly in
Hollywood in English. It is also crucial for young people to participate in
youth culture; to enjoy watching world television, to use computers and video
games, and a huge variety of other activities for which English is required. In
brief, English is a necessity for inclusion in any domain today.
These facts concern any country in today's world including
even former colonies of France such is the case of Tunisia. Actually,
observation of the Tunisian context implies that the above-mentioned reasons
for the spread of English are the most applicable in Tunisia (Derbel, 2001).
The claim is so as an expected increasing awareness that is going to be
measured in the analysis of data collected from the questionnaire, exists among
Tunisians and especially students about the value of English in their lives
today's and in the near future.
All the explanations mentioned within this section suggest the
various reasons elucidating the spread of English around the world. Such a
spread could not be understood as the exclusive result of one of the reasons
because all of them complemented each other to create the situation of this
language today. This situation generated conflicting perspectives to the
worldwide domination of English, which is going to be the concern of the third
section of this chapter.
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