If we took a look at how people in Europe communicated just one hundred years ago, we would be very surprised to find out that English was hardly used outside the United Kingdom. The language most commonly used between people of different nationalities, and particularly the aristocracy, was French. In fact, French was the language of diplomacy, culture and education. However, that is not the case nowadays. English has replaced French as the international language of communication. Today, there are more people who speak English as a second language than people who speak it as a first language.
There are many reasons why English has become the language of international communication. Britain’s colonization of many parts of the world had something to do with it, but it is mainly due to America’s rise to the position of major world power. This helped spread popular American culture throughout the world bringing the language with it.
But is it good that English has spread to all parts of the world so quickly? Language specialists seem to be divided over this issue. There are those who claim that it is important to have a language that the people in our increasingly globalized world have in common. According to others, English is associated with a particular culture and therefore promotes that culture at the expense of others. Linguists have suggested “Esperanto”, an artificially put-together language, as a solution to international communication problems but without success. So English will continue being the world language until some other language, maybe Chinese, which is the most widely-spoken native language in the world, takes over as the world’s international language instead of English.

Dear Fred,
I am very sorry that I was unable to attend your birthday party last Saturday afternoon. I had been looking (26) to your party for weeks and I would definitely have gone to it if I had not (27) a terrible cold on the evening before the party. When I woke up late Saturday morning, I felt really weak. I didn’t even have enough strength to get out of bed by myself. Around 11 a.m. mother came to my room to see why I hadn’t come out for breakfast yet. When she saw how pale my face looked, she was very (28) . She immediately went to the bathroom, got a thermometer from the medicine-chest and came back and took my temperature. When she found that I was (29) a temperature of 40oC, she immediately sent for the family doctor. After the doctor had seen me and given me an injection and some medicine, he advised me to stay in bed for the next few days and so although I very much wanted to celebrate your birthday with you, I could not. I hope that you and all your guests enjoyed yourselves at the party. I’ll visit you as soon as I’m (30) and about again.
Yours sincerely,
Martin