Brexit: the referendum

Okay, so what is with this suggestion that English could be removed as an official language of the EU? I have seen it argued here already but it seems that there is some idea that each country gets one language that can be nominated as an official language and with Ireland choosing Irish and Malta choosing Maltese that English will be nobody's nominee.

http://www.politico.eu/article/english-will-not-be-an-official-eu-language-after-brexit-senior-mep/

My guess is that some MEP has simply been a bit confused. And that if any changes were to happen it would require the unanimous vote of all the remaining countries.
 
angrysoba said:
Okay, so what is with this suggestion that English could be removed as an official language of the EU? I have seen it argued here already but it seems that there is some idea that each country gets one language that can be nominated as an official language and with Ireland choosing Irish and Malta choosing Maltese that English will be nobody's nominee.

http://www.politico.eu/article/english-will-not-be-an-official-eu-language-after-brexit-senior-mep/

My guess is that some MEP has simply been a bit confused. And that if any changes were to happen it would require the unanimous vote of all the remaining countries.
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Why would it be important if the UK is no longer a member ?

Maybe Ireland and Malta's bluff will be called and one of them will have to pick English instead.
 
angrysoba said:
Okay, so what is with this suggestion that English could be removed as an official language of the EU? I have seen it argued here already but it seems that there is some idea that each country gets one language that can be nominated as an official language and with Ireland choosing Irish and Malta choosing Maltese that English will be nobody's nominee.

http://www.politico.eu/article/english-will-not-be-an-official-eu-language-after-brexit-senior-mep/

My guess is that some MEP has simply been a bit confused. And that if any changes were to happen it would require the unanimous vote of all the remaining countries.
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Even if that is the rule the Irish or Maltese would quickly change their nomination I'm sure. I'm not even sure if everyone in Ireland's contingent can speak Gaelic and ditto Maltese for Malta.

If it supposed to be a threat its not a very strong one because I doubt many Brits will care what language is spoken in meetings they won't be attending anyway :)

Incidentally Welsh is a co-official language apparently along with Catalan. Not quite sure what that status confers but it would probably be sufficient for the Irish or Maltese.
 
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The Don said:
Why would it be important if the UK is no longer a member ?

Maybe Ireland and Malta's bluff will be called and one of them will have to pick English instead.
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What one official language is used in Belgium? Dutch or French or German? And Luxembourg? Luxembourgish or French or German?

Why does Malta need to pick English "instead" of Maltese? Can it not choose both?
 
Craig B said:
What one official language is used in Belgium? Dutch or French or German? And Luxembourg? Luxembourgish or French or German?

Why does Malta need to pick English "instead" of Maltese? Can it not choose both?
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Dutch is the official language of Dutchia, German Germanskovia and French Frenchuania. So Belgium should have chosen Klingon just to mix things up.
 
I always heard the French was supposed to be the official international language years ago. Many countries speak French in the same way that English is often the second language of the country. For example my MIL was Lebanese and spoke French, Egyptians also spoke French. So that's how I interpreted the discussion. France was saying, "Well if England isn't going to be involved, why not go to French?" Many European countries already speak French.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_territorial_entities_where_French_is_an_official_language

http://www.nationsonline.org/oneworld/european_languages.htm
 
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Some sort of cost estimate of the translation of a massive number of legislative documents would be interesting.
 
truethat said:
I always heard the French was supposed to be the official international language years ago. Many countries speak French in the same way that English is often the second language of the country. For example my MIL was Lebanese and spoke French, Egyptians also spoke French. So that's how I interpreted the discussion. France was saying, "Well if England isn't going to be involved, why not go to French?" Many European countries already speak French.
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Because virtually every Euro politician of note already speaks good/great English but not necessarily French. They'd be mightily pissed at having to learn another foreign language to a decent level when they're already proficient in a language common to them all.

Then there's all the other major countries with which they deal whose first language or main alternate language is English and will remain so.

hth
 
Skeptic Tank said:
Any group which abandons xenophobia will cease to exist as a result of doing so. Only a matter of time.
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By definition, yes. What group is what it was at all times in the past? The constant of the universe is change. Learning is change.

The asset of real long term value, other than land, is knowledge. Any group that isolates itself or artificially limits free flow of knowledge or inquiry will lose in the long run, economically, militarily, artistically. Free inquiry is richest when there are many different voices competing. Variety is increased in heterogeneous settings, which offer multiple perspectives.

New York City, London, Paris, Singapore, Hong Kong... global powerhouses. Cosmopolitan.

Vanilla is a great flavour, provided it is not the only one.
 
Francesca R said:
However according to Eurostat it is at the same level (the post tax GINI index anyway) in the rest of the EU as in the UK on average, with Germany, France a bit lower, Scandinavia lower still, and southern Europe higher, and the Baltics higher still.

On that measure at least the UK does not stick out as particularly unequal in Europe.
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As I say, it's a widespread phaenomenon, and I imagine there are a lot of places where people would make the same kind of self-harming protest vote given the chance. Thatcherism became the fashion well outside the Anglo-American world, especially privatisation, of course. It's that humungous transfer of assets from public to private ownership that has most to do with rising inequality and the rentier economy.

It'll all end in tears, mark my words.
 
Archie Gemmill Goal said:
Even if that is the rule the Irish or Maltese would quickly change their nomination I'm sure. I'm not even sure if everyone in Ireland's contingent can speak Gaelic and ditto Maltese for Malta.

If it supposed to be a threat its not a very strong one because I doubt many Brits will care what language is spoken in meetings they won't be attending anyway :)

Incidentally Welsh is a co-official language apparently along with Catalan. Not quite sure what that status confers but it would probably be sufficient for the Irish or Maltese.
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It seems there are some procedures for submitting languages to be used as official languages. There are 24, and it seems Malta and Ireland submitted Maltese and Irish respectively.

Welsh and Gaelic have some other status but not official language of the EU.
 
Quite a good blogpost about the difference in values of the two camps:

http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/personal-values-brexit-vote/
For me, what really stands out about figure 2 is the importance of support for the death penalty. Nobody has been out campaigning on this issue, yet it strongly correlates with Brexit voting intention. This speaks to a deeper personality dimension which social psychologists like Bob Altemeyer – unfortunately in my view – dub Right-Wing Authoritarianism (RWA). A less judgmental way of thinking about RWA is order versus openness. The order-openness divide is emerging as the key political cleavage, overshadowing the left-right economic dimension. This was noticed as early as the mid-1970s by Daniel Bell, but has become more pronounced as the aging West’s ethnic transformation has accelerated.
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I honestly thought that the referendum result would result in a victory for the Remain vote. Even Farage was publicly quoted the night before as saying he thought Remain had the edge. The Remain side was always supported by the business elite, and by the left wing liberals and Blairite liberals and Putin and Assad haters in parliament. ITV and Channel 4 TV was biased for Remain. but the Sun newspaper late in the day opted for Brexit which might have made a difference. My own particular area voted 62-38 to remain, rather like Scotland, but many of the more rural areas of Gloucestershire and Somerset, like Taunton, voted to leave. Rather surprisingly Southampton and Plymouth voted to leave.

I don't know if this will make any difference to all the cuts and closures and creeping privatisation of the NHS and snoopers charter. What can you do about it?
 
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angrysoba said:
Okay, so what is with this suggestion that English could be removed as an official language of the EU? I have seen it argued here already but it seems that there is some idea that each country gets one language that can be nominated as an official language and with Ireland choosing Irish and Malta choosing Maltese that English will be nobody's nominee.

http://www.politico.eu/article/english-will-not-be-an-official-eu-language-after-brexit-senior-mep/

My guess is that some MEP has simply been a bit confused. And that if any changes were to happen it would require the unanimous vote of all the remaining countries.
Click to expand...

But there is talk of this in most pubs and cafes in Brussels over the past week and seemingly there have been a number of request from constituents to their MEPs to have it raised in the EU parliament.
 
Apart from English, there's another major language that might be used as the official one among the Languages of MaltaWP. Italian was an official language there until 1934.
Today, 66% of the Maltese population can speak Italian, and 8% of the population "prefers" to use it in day to day conversation. Although Italian has since been replaced by English as the official language, it is still used and is spoken commonly in certain professional workplaces. The percentage of speakers today, 66%, is in fact much greater than when the language was actually official, in 1931, when only 14% spoke it (...)

... Recently the Maltese government has pinpointed the possibility of reinstating the Italian as an official language of Malta.​
 
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