Words of warning

Unesco unveils its first comprehensive database of
endangered tongues
Current data from the Ethnologue organisation (www.ethnologue.com) puts the number of languages spoken in the world at 6809. That's right, there is approximately one language for every million people in the world. English is just one.
Yesterday, Unesco announced that 2500 languages are under threat of disappearing worldwide. This means that the number of languages spoken may drop by more than a third.
The reason for this drop is, quite simply, money.
Everywhere around the world, young people leave rural areas and move toward cities in search of employment. In Krakow, where the majority of inhabitants don't come from Krakow, this is very obvious. However, although the rest of Poland may disagree, Polish is spoken in Krakow, too, and so the economic rural immigrants can more easily assimilate. In India or Brazil, where tribal languages are used in day-to-day communication in villages, people are moving to the city and picking up one of the more common languages. They generally stay in the city, and reject their native language in favour of their new language.
The effect on the 'dropped' language is, of course, devestating, but what of the effect on the new 'target' language?
I speak English every day. I speak to my family, my colleagues and friends, and to clients. Depending on the relationship, I alter my language. This is normal, we all do it in every language. However, the English I use when I speak to a group of people who mainly use English in business isa different version. In fact, it is not a regional dialect at all. This 'Offshore English' has developed as a direct result of non-native speakers communicating in a common, foreign, language. Offshore English is not 'bad' English, it is just a simpler form and more rigid structure than sloppy but aesthetic natural English. Why should a native speaker change his or her way of speaking? One of the answers, again, is money. One case study mentioned on www.usingenglish.com is of a contract to provide flight simulators to South Korea, where a French company won the contract because the buyers found it easier to understand the English spoken by the French that the English spoken by the British company.
For me, though, another reason for doctoring my language in a conversation is for the simple efficiency of having everything I say understood! I find people generally polite, and Polish people more polite than most. A result of this is that, if I were to ask a Pole "are you heading down for a one and one after the flicks?". They may answer in the positive, rather than admit they had no idea what a one and one or a flick is (and nor should they. A 'one and one' is Dublin slang for fish and chips, while 'the flicks' is common slang for the cinema). I am also aware of using 'false friends', words which sound similar but have a different meaning. For example, 'actually' in English does not mean 'aktualnie' in Polish. My language is noticably different when I speak exclusively to non-native speakers of English, one might say I am showing deference by speaking their language. Number 6810, perhaps?