What language is the Common of our world?

[OblivionSiege]

Oops, didn't notice my kid was logged in instead of me,,,, Lucky it wasn't a stupid post.

 

[Barak]

While english comes the closest, it is in no way the common of our world. No race (no matter how you define race) has every single one of their members able to speak it.

 

[Turjan]

From what I have heard about which languages are most spoken around the world. I was suprised to find it is German (with English second). So I would have to vote for German.

As for the number of speakers, it ranks #11 (100 million native speakers, 22 million as a second language). I'm not sure where you got those numbers from.

As for English, it ranks as #4 regarding the number of native speakers and #2 overall. Nevertheless, I can see English as the only language that can be considered something like a lingua franca. French is still the international postal language, but it's only the official language in 30 countries with not much spread beyond that.

 

[Templetroll]

English - it will take words from any language that permit it to communicate about something it did not have an easy lexicon for. Especially American English speakers will no longer consider the language the word came from, it's just another word.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

While english comes the closest, it is in no way the common of our world. No race (no matter how you define race) has every single one of their members able to speak it.

That requirement sounds very campaign-specific.

 

[Torm]

I voted English, for many reasons already stated.

I'd also like to point out that the Common of Faerun is ALSO English, as proved in the D&D cartoon - the kids didn't have to learn another language, no one said anything about a translating magic, and, even if they had, there were several times when such magic would have been negated by things going on in the episode and they STILL understood everyone.

 

[Merkuri]

I work with a woman from China who says that although Mandarin is the most widely spoken language (as far as first languages) it's possible for two people fluent in Mandarin to not be able to communicate with each other at all. Technically, they both speak the same language, but the dialects are so different that the language becomes nearly unrecognizable. While it may be a very wide-spread language, it's so fractured as to be useless as a universal tongue.

English is quickly becoming a universal language, if it isn't there already. It's so easy for an American tourist to travel around the world because a lot of businesses and restaurants in most countries (particularly in Europe) speak English. So I vote English as the modern Common in the sense that it's used for trade.

It is not, however, an universal language that everyone speaks as their first language, as it seems Common is in most D&D worlds. Going by that definition, a modern Common doesn't exist.

 

[Radovarl]

Common

Quote by Whizbang Dustyboots (sorry, not sure how to quote yet)
Isn't that more a problem of the campaign settings instead of a problem with Common, as it's used in the core rules?
---------------------------------

Absolutely, although the 3.x core rules have reduced the number of languages in general to a somewhat ridiculous degree (see Expanded Psionics Handbook, now Githyanki and Githzerai supposedly speak the same language, Gith). I understand the reason for it, but still don't like it.

Campaign settings, however, really should strive to add a little more complexity to the situation, if only for cultural flavor. I mean, really, what is the chance that someone from Durpar (Forgotten Realms) speaks the same Common as someone from Waterdeep??? It's a pseudo-medieval setting, after all, so the sorts of mass-communication or travel technology that would permit consolidation of language are largely nonexistent.

I still say that if the real world has any equivalent, it's definitely NOT English, despite its prevalence in Europe. Europe has what, 10% of the world's population. Let's be a little less Euro/Amero-Centric, shall we?

 

[Arkhandus]

The concept of a Common language in D&D is no more absurd than the concept of each race in D&D having just a single language of their own. If all elves speak the same Elven language, and all goblinoids speak the same Goblin language, and all chaotic evil fiends speak the same Abyssal language, then I have absolutely no cognitive dissonance problems with all humans in D&D speaking a single Common tongue, and with that Common tongue being known by lots of other races too since humans are so widespread and populous in standard D&D settings.

Only in a few of my homebrew settings do I consider eliminating the Common tongue, such as my Rhunaria setting, where the races don't get along all that well most of the time and even humans themselves are pretty starkly divided.

 

[Turjan]

I work with a woman from China who says that although Mandarin is the most widely spoken language (as far as first languages) it's possible for two people fluent in Mandarin to not be able to communicate with each other at all. Technically, they both speak the same language, but the dialects are so different that the language becomes nearly unrecognizable. While it may be a very wide-spread language, it's so fractured as to be useless as a universal tongue.

At least in the People's Republic of China, Standard Mandarin with a fixed pronunciation is used as the language at school, on TV, etc. This means that, nowadays, most younger Chinese can speak and understand Standard Mandarin. That's also what my colleagues told me; they can converse in Standard Mandarin, although one of them comes from Shanghai and speaks Shanghainese at home. It's different for Hong Kong, though, where Standard Cantonese was spoken.