IT IS everywhere. Some 380m people speak it as their first
language and perhaps two-thirds as many again as their second. A
billion are learning it, about a third of the world's population
are in some sense exposed to it and by 2050, it is predicted,
half the world will be more or less proficient in it. It is the
language of globalisation—of international business, politics
and diplomacy. It is the language of computers and the Internet.
You'll see it on posters in Côte d'Ivoire, you'll hear it in pop
songs in Tokyo, you'll read it in official documents in Phnom
Penh. Deutsche Welle broadcasts in it. Bjork, an Icelander,
sings in it. French business schools teach in it. It is the
medium of expression in cabinet meetings in Bolivia. Truly, the
tongue spoken back in the 1300s only by the “low people” of
England, as Robert of Gloucester put it at the time, has come a
long way. It is now the global language.  How come? Not because
English is easy. True, genders are simple, since English relies
on “it” as the pron