005. TED: Jay Walker on the world's English mania

Jay Walker on the world's English mania

 

Let's talk about manias.

Let's start with Beatle mania: hysterical teenagers, crying, screaming, pandemonium¹.

Sports mania: deafening crowds², all for one idea - get the ball in the net.

Okay, religious mania: there's rapture³, there's weeping, there's vision.

 

Mania can be good.

Mania can be alarming.

Or manias can't be deadly.

 

Ther world has a new mania. A mania for learning English.

 Listen as Chinese students practice their English by scriming it.

 

I will change my life.

I don't want to let my parents down.

I don't ever want to let my country down.

Most importantly... I don't want to let myself down.

 

How many people are trying to learn English worldwide? Two billion of them.

 

A t-shirt, A dress.

 

In Latin America, in India, in Southease Asia, and most of all in China.

If you are a Chinese student you start learning English in the third grade, by law.

That's why this year China will become the world's largest English-speaking country.

 

Why English? In a single world: Opportunity.

Opportunity for better life, a job to be able to pay for school, or put better food on the table.

Imagine a student taking a giant test for three full days.

Her score on this one test literally determines her future.

She studies twelve hours a day for three years to prepare.

25 percent of her grade is based on English.

It's called the Gaokao, and 80 million high school Chinese students have already taken this grueling ⁴test.

The intensity to learn English is almost unimaginable, unless you witness it.

 

Perfect! Perfect!

I want to speak perfect English. I want to speak perfect English.

I want to change my life!

 

So is English mania good or bad?

Is English a tsunami, washing away other languages?

Not likely.

 

English is the world's second language.

Your native language is your life.

But with English you can become part of a wider conversation:

a global conversation about global problems, like climate change or poverty, or hunger or disease.

 

The world has other universal languages.

Mathematics is the language of science.

Music is the language of emotions.

And now English is becoming the language of problem-solving.

Not because America is pusing it, but because the world is pulling it.

 

So English mania is a turning point.

Like the harnessing of electricity in our cities or the fall of the Berlin Wall,

English represents hope for better future --

a future where the world has a common language to solver its common problem.

Thank you very much.

 

http://www.ted.com/talks/jay_walker_on_the_world_s_english_mania.html

 

1. 대혼란Pandemonium broke out when the news was announced. [본문으로]
2. 귀가먹먹할 정도의 소리를 내는 군중 [본문으로]
3. 황홀 Charles listened with rapture to her singing [본문으로]
4. 녹초로 만드는 [본문으로]