The importance of language

Sir,

In response to Kosta Pavlowitch’s thoughtful article entitled ‘The importance of language in a globalised world’, (Sunday Mail, October 5).
It is certainly true to say that, “The danger of English is not its dominance, but its impoverishment, both among its native speakers who see no incentive to go beyond their own language, and among its global cohorts who parrot a truncated form of Microsoft English (US).”

There is a way for people to speak their own national or regional languages, and a neutral one in addition. I refer not to English but to Esperanto, of course. It really is time that Esperanto was taken more seriously.

Bill Chapman,
Conwy, UK

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.