English language & literature

How many people speak English worldwide?

English is one of the most widely used languages in the world. Recent estimates suggest that over 337 million people speak English as their first language, with possibly some 350 million speaking it as a second language. America has the largest number of English speakers - over 226 million speak the language as a mother tongue. English is an official language in India, alongside Hindi, and some 3,000 English newspapers are published throughout the country. English is also the favoured language of the world’s major airlines and international commerce. Over 80 per cent of the world’s electronically stored information is in English and two-thirds of the world’s scientists read in English. English is an official language, or has a special status in over 75 of the world’s territories.

If the rest of the world isn’t talking English, they’re borrowing English words to add to their own language: the Japanese go on a ‘pikunikku’ (picnic), Italians program their computers with ‘il software’, Germans talk about ‘ein Image Problem’ and ‘das Cashflow’ and Czechs say ‘ahoy!’ for ‘hello’ - a greeting traditionally used by English sailors, which is interesting as there’s no sea in the Czech Republic!

Facts

These are interesting facts...

1 What is the difference between the United Kingdom and Great Britain?

The United Kingdom is made up of the countries of England, Scotland,

Wales and Northern Ireland. Its full name is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Great Britain, on the other hand, comprises only England, Scotland and Wales. It is the largest island of the British Isles. Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic form the second largest island.

The Isle of Man and the Channel Islands are not part of the United Kingdom. They are largely self-governing with their own legislative assemblies and systems of law. The British Government is, however, responsible for their defence and international relations.

In this site the term ‘Britain’ is used informally to mean the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

8 What are ‘GMT’ and ‘British Summertime’?

GMT or ‘Greenwich Mean Time’ is the local time of the 0 degree meridian that passes through Greenwich in London, from which the standard times of different areas of the globe are calculated. Thus it is the standard time for Britain, and a basis for other time zones in the world.
Summer time or BST (British Summer Time) runs from the end of March to the end of October (the last Sunday in each month), when clocks are advanced one hour ahead of GMT to gain maximum use of daylight hours.