Arguing about English

Mark Liberman at Language Log points to a dustup (via Linguistic Mystic) regarding a post by a fellow San Antonian that says immigrants to the U.S. should learn English rather than catering to people that speak Spanish only. Whatever you view on this issue is, Liberman has a point that English owes its current existence to the presence of foreign words.

This 12-word slogan has the lovely self-refuting property that (according to the OED) all six of its content words are borrowed from other languages: petition from Spanish peticionar, modify from French modifier, native from French natif, language from French langage, include from Latin inclaudere, foreign from French forain.

I love the English language. Its complexities give it a majesty of expression that I'm not sure any other language can claim, and I don't know why anyone would refuse themselves the pleasure of speaking and reading it. That's the main reason why I think all immigrants should learn English when they come to the United States of America.