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English is the predominant language of the [[United States of America|United States]], [[The United Kingdom|Great Britain]], and other former members of the [[British Empire]]. Due to the enormous political and economic influence of the these nations, English functions as the world's major international language.

English is the predominant language of the [[United States of America|United States]], [[The United Kingdom|Great Britain]], and other former members of the [[British Empire]]. Due to the enormous political and economic influence of the these nations, English functions as the world's major international language.

In its origins, English is a member of both the Germanic and Romance language families, and owes some of its structure to each.  This is largely due to the conquest of Saxon-speaking [[England]] by [[French]] speaking Normans in 1066 AD.  Since that  time, English has continued to grow and evolve, borrowing thousands of words from other languages, among them [[French]], [[Latin]], [[Greek]], and [[Spanish]], as well as generating new words of its own.  In large part as a result, English has one of the largest lexicons (vocabularies) of any world language, and is particularly rich in [[synonym]]s and near-synonyms.  It is the primary (native) language of approximately 400 million people worldwide, as well as a secondary, or learned language of 600 million more.  There are estimated to be nearly one billion people currently learning English.

In its origins, English is a member of both the Germanic language family, but with significant influence from [[French]], a Romance language.  This is largely due to the conquest of Saxon-speaking [[England]] by [[French]] speaking Normans in 1066 AD.  English owes some of its structure (its system of auxilliary verbs, for example) to French.  In terms of the lexicon, Old English words are a minority, though they predominate when one looks at the most commonly-used words), whereas words from [[French]] are more numerous, followed by [[Latin]], [[Greek]], and other modern languages.

 

Since that  time, English has continued to grow and evolve, borrowing thousands of words from other languages, among them [[French]], [[Latin]], [[Greek]], and [[Spanish]], as well as generating new words of its own.  In large part as a result, English has one of the largest lexicons (vocabularies) of any world language, and is particularly rich in [[synonym]]s and near-synonyms.  It is the primary (native) language of approximately 400 million people worldwide, as well as a secondary, or learned language of 600 million more.  There are estimated to be nearly one billion people currently learning English.

The term "English" may also be used to refer to a person from the United Kingdom born in the country of England.

The term "English" may also be used to refer to a person from the United Kingdom born in the country of England.

[[Category:Languages]]

[[Category:Languages]]