A review of foreign-language teaching in relation to the predominance of English in Europe and in the world at large.

The theme of a conference of the Association of Departments of Foreign Languages (part of the Modern Language Association) in 2000 was the future of language teaching and learning. My discussion here is based upon remarks made in Phoenix.

Perspectives on an emerging variety on the mainland of Europe, from commentators in Sweden, Austria and England.

A discussion of the nature and productivity in Internet vocabulary of the prefix e- as in e-mail. I decided to pursue my own analysis of the prefix e- and some observations on the productivity of e-, the variety and nature of the vocabulary taking this prefix, the frequency and distribution of e- prefixed words in texts, the exploitation of words already beginning with e or other prefixes for punning or other creative effects, and, to a lesser extent, the appearance of other Internet-related one-letter prefixes (primarily i-, but others as well).

A status report on a controversial and much-maligned area of technological research and development.

Machine Translation does not often make the headlines, though it can happen. In the non-English-speaking world, at least, the last time the spotlight briefly fell on this normally unexciting activity was in September 1998, at the height of the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal. The report on the case by the Independent Council, Kenneth Starr, containing an account of the President's intimate dealings with Miss Lewinsky, was placed on the Internet and to satisfy the morbid curiosity of surfers everywhere was immediately translated into the world's major languages using the free translation software available on a number of WWW sites. The results, not surprisingly, were laughable. A capable human being would have had a hard enough time translating such a potent combination of technical and colloquial English: the MT applications were quite out of their depth. The silliest gaffes appeared in newspapers and everyone agreed that the on-line MT programs were useless; the subject was soon forgotten.

An analysis of naming patterns among ethnic-Chinese Singaporeans.

The study of names (or, to give it its Sunday name, onomastics) has not always been accorded high academic prestige and is often thought of as a non-specialist's hobby horse. The fact that most books on naming in bookshops seem to address only prospective parents who need to name their child also does not give the study a high standing. In the university context, this is not something that receives a lot of attention, except within semantics and philosophy where the status of names (as opposed to other words) has been discussed; and within the history of English where place names are studied in relation to their etymology. In this journal, though, attention has been given to commercial names (Banu & Sussex (2001), McArthur (2000)) because of interesting instances of hybridisation involving English and other languages.

Following his article ‘Global English invades Poland’ (ET50, Apr 97, Vol 13.2), the author explores the comparable impact of English on advertising in a second Eastern European nation.

Global English continues its unchecked spread, not only as the second language of choice for more people than any other, but also as an infiltrator whose words creep into the fabric of other languages through such avenues as film, television, popular music, the World Wide Web, advertising and youth culture.

Comment: Euro-evolution?, Tom McArthur; Usage 1: Klamp Santouits – buttered or battered?, Michael Bulley; Usage 2: Following Langscape..., Grahame T. Bilbow and Li Lan; Usage 3: Its time for a sound change, Mary Blockley; Review: The dictionary and the disk, Paul Pauwels; Post