ESP - English for Specific Purposes

ESP (English for Specific Purposes)

I have chosen the subject ‘ESP (English for Specific Purposes)’ because I believe that English will someday be the universal language of the world and will be the language that people speak while performing specialized tasks that cause them to interact with people from other countries. 

Today much of the worlds banking and finance is done in English as can be seen by watching the international stock exchanges and the method in which international companies transact business. Individual transactions may be completed in the native tongue, but when it is time to transmit the complete file of transactions to other countries English is the common language.

Due to the many medical and scientific breakthroughs that have occurred in recent years, some of the medical/scientific fields have chosen English as their common language. This summer I had the opportunity to have as a houseguest a student from a leading university in Turkey. He was in the United States to attend an annual scientific conference that was attended by over 30,000 scientists, researchers, teachers and students whose area of interest is psychiatry. I had the opportunity to attend one of their sessions and to listen to some of the participants talk about their work. While many of the participants were from English speaking countries, the participants from many of the countries where English is not the native language gave their presentations in English. I asked my visitor why the speakers had learned to speak English rather than have an interpreter or someone else give the presentation and he said that most foreign universities require that all teachers and students have a basic knowledge of English as part of their entry requirements so the students can practice in class so they have few problems when they work in the international community. 

Aviation is another area where English is required to be spoken during certain activities. While working for a police department in Florida I was temporarily assigned to the security division at the airport. This assignment offered me the opportunity to observe the activities in the air traffic control tower. While many of the fights were domestic some of them were from foreign countries in Europe and South America. When I had time I would listen to the air traffic controllers and the pilots discussing takeoff and landing procedures and exchanging information. All of the conversations were in English and I was told that all international flight crews had to know how to be able to speak English so they could communicate with the air traffic controllers at all airports receiving international flights. This was a standard set by the international organization that governs international aviation. 

As can be seen by these few examples, English is becoming the universal language in many specialized fields and areas of employment. While the peoples of the world will always learn their native tongue for family and cultural reasons, English will be the language of choice when a common language is needed for difficult negotiations or the transmission of specialized data between people who speak different languages. We are already seeing the use of English in these fields and many more. This is a major reason why I chose to improve my English skills so I can pass my knowledge on to others who will use it to better relationships in today?s tumultuous world.