The 2016 World Power Language Index (PLI) in the first week of December 2016 announced that English language is the most powerful language in the world. The index was published by World Economic Forum (WEF).
The Index ranked English first in the top 10 most powerful languages in the world. Hindi language was ranked 10th in the 2016 PLI.
Why English is most powerful?
- English language is the dominant language of three G7 nations (USA, UK and Canada).
- As per the WEF, the British legacy has given English a global footprint. It is the world’s lingua franca.
- Eight of the 10 global financial centres are English-speaking/proficient cities.
- Four of the 10 most competitive economies have English as an official language. The remaining six have high shares of English speakers and/or a high proficiency in English, with the exception of Japan.
The top 10 powerful languages in the world
| Rank | Language | Score |
| 1. | English | 0.889 |
| 2. | Mandarin | 0.411 |
| 3. | French | 0.337 |
| 4. | Spanish | 0.329 |
| 5. | Arabic | 0.273 |
| 6. | Russian | 0.244 |
| 7. | German | 0.191 |
| 8. | Japanese | 0.133 |
| 9. | Portuguese | 0.119 |
| 10. | Hindi | 0.117 |
Key facts
- The top six languages in the ranking are the official languages of the United Nations.
- The remaining four languages include the two other BRIC languages (Portuguese and Hindi), and the tongues of two economic heavyweights (Germany and Japan).
The basis for ranking the most powerful languages
- The Power Language Index uses 20 indicators to measure the influence on language.
- It measures the usefulness of a language to a representative human being.
- It is not meant to apply to any particular person with their own set of conditions, preferences and geography.
- The index is not a measure of the beauty/merit of a language or its associated culture(s).
.jpg){kind=logo}
Comments
All Comments (0)
Join the conversation