Forigien anime fans find it hard to understand Japanese anime when i is untranslated. If only we could speak Japanese, then we could understand Japanese anime. However we can't. There is so much confusion in this. I once read in my history books that Qin of China made his citizens speak only one language and write only one language to unify China. The Romans required that all peoples within thier empire speak latin. So I think everyone in the world should speak that good old anglo-saxson latin mixed english. So anime in Japan would be easily understood by the world.

I also think that there should be a universal language. Not only for anime. When you on vacation to a differnt country or somewhere far away you don't understand everyone.Asking where the rest room is can become a problem. Anglo-saxson would work for me. I read the lord of the rings and elvish is based off that language.

Just like music. Even I can't understand all anime music that I have (except those that are instrumental or those already in English such as Naruto's Wind), but I still manage to appreciate it. Everybody can say that music is a universal language.

So far, attempts in developing a universal language, such as Esperanto and Interlingua, were only successful to some extent, and a universal language, especially for all of us using the internet. But that will be hard because there are still some people who are "isolated" from the rest of the world, and consider that different regions of a country have different dialects of the same language (such as the Kansai dialect in Japanese).

Well, it's not really fair to say that about anime, since anime and anime music is mad for Japanese. But I get your point; and I totally agree with you on a universal language.
Ever since I was a little kid and first learned that other languages exist, I have thought it would be good to have a universal language that everyone can understand.
Technically, English is supposed to be the universal language, but many people still don't know English or can't speak it very well.
At any rate, it would be nice to have a DIFFERENT universal language that everyone would uphold and teach to their children.
Although English would be a worth canidate since it's very popular, it's not fair to the other languages that exist and to the people who dont' naturally speak English or don't know how.
Therefore, I think it should be an entirely new language, or we should revive a dead language like Latin to use.
That would be fair to all people, as no one speaks Latin so their is no favortism towards one country or language.

It wouldn't be non-favouritism to revive Latin as a universal language, since several European languages, English included, have descent from, or influences from, Latin. Wouldn't that be unfair to those who speak languages derived from other families? :P
It's not going to happen because it would take too much effort to create a language that everyone's happy to use as a universal tongue, it would probably be impossible to create one that is as easy to learn regardless of your mother tongue. English is so permeated into modern cultures that the nations that would really benefit from a universal tongue (because they deal with speakers of other languages so much) already make do with English as a common language anyway. Or you can just learn those languages you need to deal in for whatever reason...

Furikuu

It wouldn't be non-favouritism to revive Latin as a universal language, since several European languages, English included, have descent from, or influences from, Latin. Wouldn't that be unfair to those who speak languages derived from other families? :P
It's not going to happen because it would take too much effort to create a language that everyone's happy to use as a universal tongue, it would probably be impossible to create one that is as easy to learn regardless of your mother tongue. English is so permeated into modern cultures that the nations that would really benefit from a universal tongue (because they deal with speakers of other languages so much) already make do with English as a common language anyway. Or you can just learn those languages you need to deal in for whatever reason...

Well, yes, but it would be much easier than taking an existing language or creating a brand new language.
I think also that it's not something we could do NOW, but it's definitely something for us to think about for future generations. If Latin or some other language was introduced into the school systems early enough everyone could learn it without major difficulties (it's a proven fact that young children pick up languages much easier than adults).

But yeah. I definitely agree with you on what your opinion. I find it kind of sad though...that we can't all agree on one language to use as a universal language, besides English *Frowns*

Xday11

Forigien anime fans find it hard to understand Japanese anime when i is untranslated. If only we could speak Japanese, then we could understand Japanese anime. However we can't. There is so much confusion in this. I once read in my history books that Qin of China made his citizens speak only one language and write only one language to unify China. The Romans required that all peoples within thier empire speak latin. So I think everyone in the world should speak that good old anglo-saxson latin mixed english. So anime in Japan would be easily understood by the world.

It's easy for you to say because you already know the language =|

I don't think a universal language would be such a good idea; different languages have their roots in different cultures. If we were to create a univeral language, what would happen to those cultures? ...

To those who complain about not being able to understand other languages like Japanese, how about you stop being lazy and just learn the language? =\

That'd be a hell of an achievement; not only would it be difficult to spread a language throughout the entire world, but people are proud of their mother tongues and the cultures tied to them. Not only that, humans as a general tend to be pretty stubborn. Would a nation give up such a rich part of their history, when those individuals that chose to can merely learn the language for themselves? Personally, I'd doubt it. I myself am bilingual, and I've found it lets one in on both cultures these two languages come from. That global diversity can sometimes be more rewarding than a set uniform standard.

I don't think a universal language would be such a good idea; different languages have their roots in different cultures. If we were to create a univeral language, what would happen to those cultures? ...

There are just too many languages and so much confusion. It is just better if we only have a one world order. The common tounge to speak to anybody anywhere.

I dont think that a universal language would be a good idea......if we all spoke the same language....traveling wouldnt be as great as it is now.....sure....we would understand each other better, there would be no confusion, etc.....but traveling wouldnt be as great as it is now.....there would be no exotic locations such as thailand, japan, etc.....half of the experience is not really understanding whats going on and relaxing at the same time...also there is something enchanting (for lack of a better word) about listening to songs in other languages...for example...when i first heard 1000 words (FFX2) in japanese i thought it was the nicest and most relaxing song ever......but when i heard it sung in english i was like "what the hell is she singing about!!? this song is retarded"......plus, can you imagine what it would take to get there....imagine all the people you would have to "re-educate", or silence in order to have this universal understanding of speach.....lol...all of this just because someone can't understand japanese anime...sheesh...:P

I believe that the United Nations actually tried to institue an universal language a few decades ago. It was a horrible failure because no one was actually willing to learn it. The problem is that there is that it wasn't anyones home language, and you can't actually force people to give up all of their languages and traditions for a globalism when you can't even get people to stop shooting at each other. And in anycase, a language is an essential part of a person's ethnicity and culture, it would be rather unreasonable to expect people to give it all up. Of course learning a universal language doesn't necessary mean that you would have to give up your native language, but I think that in the end there's just no real way for it to work without at least discouraging use of traditional languages.

I agree that an universal Earth language would be nice but I don't see it happening anytime soon. It's a part of peoples' culture and life.
I would be interested in a good translator program. Translate spoken or written words to your native tongue. Your very own "fansub crew" in a hand-held computer with optional earpiece. Text or audio translation.
I would buy one if the translation was good.

Xday11

I don't think a universal language would be such a good idea; different languages have their roots in different cultures. If we were to create a univeral language, what would happen to those cultures? ...

There are just too many languages and so much confusion. It is just better if we only have a one world order. The common tounge to speak to anybody anywhere.

...Confusion? It's not as 'big' a problem as you make it out to be. Take a chance - learn another language. Don't force other cultures to conform to your own because it's convenient for YOU.

Good point, learning other languages isn't so bad, in fact, it can be fun sometimes (except when you're studying Spanish and Japanese at the same time like I am ~_~). However, yes, that would be convenient if there was one universal, standardized world language that everybody can use to communicate with everyone else in the world, but asking for something as convenient as this oversimplifies the issue of communication and language problems around the world (see posts above on what I mean).

However, a universal language is beginning to develop and take hold in our midsts -- English. While not regarded as the most spoken language in the world, it is indeed an international language, and the most spoken and studied second language in the world. So, technically, you can say English is slowly becoming a "universal" language that we can use to communicate with just about anybody else in the world. It's still quite a far ways to go to be dubbed as a "universal" language, but for what we have now, it's about as close as we can get for the time being. :)

Xday11

Forigien anime fans find it hard to understand Japanese anime when i is untranslated. If only we could speak Japanese, then we could understand Japanese anime. However we can't. There is so much confusion in this. I once read in my history books that Qin of China made his citizens speak only one language and write only one language to unify China. The Romans required that all peoples within thier empire speak latin. So I think everyone in the world should speak that good old anglo-saxson latin mixed english. So anime in Japan would be easily understood by the world.

i really dont think we need to understand anime as a language, but more as of the characters and the characteristics of the characters and what the symbolize