Re: English as a reputed world language

On Feb 9, 11:47 pm, "John Varela" <newla...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Thu, 9 Feb 2012 00:02:44 UTC, Peter Brooks









<peter.h.m.bro...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Feb 9, 1:09 am, "John Varela" <newla...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Wed, 8 Feb 2012 16:44:32 UTC, tony cooper

<tony.cooper...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Wed, 08 Feb 2012 15:02:15 +0100, Pablo <no...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Robert Bannister escribió:

America has meant North America and more specifically the United States
for a very long time now and in most countries of the world.

Most? I'm not saying that you're wrong, just that I'm surprised.

The statement that "most countries" understand "America" to mean just
the United States is rather meaningless.  If we want to determine what
"America" describes, we should consider what most people in most
English-speaking countries understand it to mean.  If we find some
people in some countries - or even most countries - using it to mean
all of North and South America, we haven't discerned anything except
that there are always some people who embrace an unsupportable
position.

When a Taliban exclaims "The Americans are coming!" does anyone here
think he's talking about the Argentines?

I don't know any Taliban myself, a lacuna that I probably should
remedy, so I'd bow do your superior knowledge - do the Taliban you
know speak English and say this?

You're not too good at rhetorical questions are you? See, that
wasn't a question that was intended to be taken literally. Need I
explain further?

I think that you do. What do you think wasn't literal about the
question?

You are not, I hope, trying to claim that the mindless yank fascism is
accepted as normal here - surely there are some decent human beings
who understand that, like us, the Taliban are actually human. Or, am I
wrong?
.

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