Changing Horizons in Geography Education - HERODOT Network ...

orders of the European Union there are also further languages which have so farremained unconsidered, such as Turkish, Russian or Albanian. It can thus be easilydemonstrated that we live in a Europe of immense linguistic variety.This diversity has had an important influence on European culture. In the areas ofstress between east and west as well as north and south, there were times, in whichexisting languages became replaced by the language of the “conquerors” and/orwere complementary to and enlarged by the language of the immigrants. In the firstcase this followed strength as measured by the power of the stronger one. In thesecond situation, better communication and integration was ensured by adjustment.Evidence of the impact of these times are for example the numerous borrowings fromthe French language, which are possessed by most European languages.The conquest of England by the Normans in 1066 had a special influence on theEnglish language. The use of French by the aristocratic upper-class led to the factthat numerous French words took their entrance into the English language system– and thereby also their behaviour was connected and accordingly maintained. Thisinfluence, especially in the vocabulary, was so meaningful that the French linguistClaude Hagege could prove that the current existing influence of English on Frenchis far smaller and therefore he speaks of a positive “leaning word commercial balancesheet” of the French language (c.f. Hagège, 1996a; 1996b).Various identities are connected with the linguistic component. This is shown forexample in the efforts at autonomy of some European regions which point themselvesout by the special meaning of their regional language(s). Thus some regions exist inwhich both the official national language and the regional language are to be founde.g. on traffic and direction signs. Or as a further example: neighbouring languagesi.e. the languages of the respective direct neighbour can contribute to the regionalidentity of humans in a border region (Finger, 2001).Based on these examples it becomes clear, how much special influence a languagehas on identity. The variety of language is a special characteristic of the Europeancultural unit and so the existing cultural characteristics of Europe would not beconceivable without this linguistic diversity. For sure there is the necessity of avehicular language because one cannot expect that each person in Europe couldunderstand or even speak all languages. Not for nothing are there working languages,for example in the context of the committees of the European Union (English, French,occasionally German).Altogether European-wide and far beyond that, an increasing dominance ofEnglish as a lingua franca is shown. Past HERODOT conferences showed this andas a result communication and cooperation between scientists became easier. But atthe same time the dominance of English as lingua franca leads to a constant declinein the learning of further foreign languages in nearly all countries all over Europe.It seems to be like the idea that knowing the English language ensured Europeanwideunderstanding. But why should specifically geographers then be able to speakmore than only English?255