Unit 2 Activity 2 Read the passage and answer the questions.部分翻译

Who owns English?

谁拥有英语？

1

English is spoken by about 400 million people,mostly in the US, the UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. In Ghana,India and Singapore , English is used as a working language, for example, between bosses and secretaries and between doctors and patients,although there are other languages for everyday use.In China and many other countries,English is the. most important toreign language that children learn at school, because when they grow up, it will be quite possible for them to meet people from other countries. They will need a common language to communicate with each other. English is now used by nearly a quarter of the world's population,and anywhere you go in the world,there is a good chance that you will meet someone who speaks English.

1

大约有四亿人说英语，主要是在美国、英国、加拿大、澳大利亚、新西兰和南非。在加纳、印度和新加坡，虽然日常生活中人们也使用其他语言，但还是把英语当作一门工作语言来使用，例如，在老板和秘书之间，在医生和病人之间。在中国和许多其他国家，英语是孩子们在学校学习的最重要的外语，因为当他们长大后，对他们来说很可能会遇到来自其他国家的人。他们将需要一门通用语言来相互交流。英语现在被将近四分之一的世界人口使用，无论你去世界的哪个地方，都极有可能会遇到说英语的人。

2

The reason why English is spoken everywhere is that in the nineteenth century, English became the language of world trade.And in the twentieth century,the US spread English to the world through newspapers, television and films. It is now the common language for international travel, science, iridustry mclastrij, and recently, information technology and the Internet.

2

备地都说英语的原因是，在19世纪，英语成为了世界贸易用语。在20世纪，美国通过报纸、电视和电影将英语传播到世界各地。它现在是国际旅游、自然科学、工业以及近年来的信息技术和互联网的通用语言。

3

It is also important to know that English has borrowed many words from other languages, for example"restaurant" from French,“zero”from Arabic,"piano" from ltalian,and "tofu" from Chinese.

知道英语从其他的语言中借用了很乡单词也是重要的，例如，res-taurant来自法语，zero（数字零）来自阿拉伯语，piano来自意大利语，tofu来自汉语。

4

Will the importance of English last? As China continues to grow,many people think that Chinese will become as common as English by the middle of the twenty-first century, More and more schools in Europe are teaching Chinese as a foreign language,together with some Europen languages. However,most people still think that English will be used most around the world, at least for the next twenty or thirty years.

4

英语的重要性会一直持续吗？随着中国的不断壮大，很多人认为，到21世纪中期，汉语将会变得和英语一样普遍。越来越多的欧洲学校在教一些欧洲（国家的）语言的同时，也教授汉语这门外语。然而，大多数人仍然认为，至少在未来二三十年，英语仍会是世界各地使用最广泛的语言。

5

So who owns English? The answer is everyone who speaks it-the British, the indians and the Chinese all help make it a rich language.Even though we speak different types of English，we are all part of an international club．oWe all own English．

5

那么，谁拥有英语呢？答案就是每一个说英语的人——英国人、印度人和中国人共同将英语变成了一门丰富的语言。尽管我们说不同类型的英语，我们都是国际俱乐部的一部分。我们都拥有英语。