As themost widely spoken language, English has come into contact with every other major
language in the world, resulting in a steady exchange of vocabulary items between English
and other linguistic varieties. With regard to the lexical borrowing into English, however,
not all the languages have contributed evenly. For instance, approximately 7,500 French
borrowings adopted during the Middle English period are still used in present-day English
(Baugh and Cable 1978), and a sizeable number of French words have entered English
more recently. In fact, up to 98 per cent of thewords in English are of Indo-European origin.
‘This is unsurprising in view of the geographical and cultural distance between English
and non-Indo-European languages for most of the language’s long history’ (Stockwell and
Minkova 2001). It is obvious that only some of the remaining 2 per cent are from Chinese,
a member in the Sino-Tibetan language family.
As themost widely spoken language, English has come into contact with every other majorlanguage in the world, resulting in a steady exchange of vocabulary items between Englishand other linguistic varieties. With regard to the lexical borrowing into English, however,not all the languages have contributed evenly. For instance, approximately 7,500 Frenchborrowings adopted during the Middle English period are still used in present-day English(Baugh and Cable 1978), and a sizeable number of French words have entered Englishmore recently. In fact, up to 98 per cent of thewords in English are of Indo-European origin.‘This is unsurprising in view of the geographical and cultural distance between Englishand non-Indo-European languages for most of the language’s long history’ (Stockwell andMinkova 2001). It is obvious that only some of the remaining 2 per cent are from Chinese,a member in the Sino-Tibetan language family.
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