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From: oser@hep.uchicago.edu (Scott Oser)
Subject: Re: Emerging global language?
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Date: Sun, 4 Aug 1996 22:09:29 GMT
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In article <31F80D50.5F6B@nceltr.nceltr.mq.edu.au>,
	Ian Parker <iparker@nceltr.nceltr.mq.edu.au> writes:
>Does anyone have any ideas about the eventual convergence of languages 
>and the role of electronic media in the homogenisation of language?

I have heard that speakers of Scandinavian languages find it easier to
understand each other now than they did fifty years ago, due to the
converging influence of mass media.

Certainly electronic media has played a major role in slowing or
stopping the divergence of dialects (eg. the increasing
intelligibility of different Irish dialects), but this is not quite
the same.

Perhaps some Scandinavian speaker can comment on this.

Cheers,
Scott O.

