In Hong Kong there is little of the economic gloom still prevalent in Europe and the USA. Universities, for example, are in a state of crisis in the UK, but are in a moment of expansion here, as undergraduate courses move from a three-year programme to four, and more teachers are being urgently recruited. Mainland China, and with it the Hong Kong economy, seems now to have brushed aside the worst of the global downturn, and is back on a trajectory of fast growth.

This is what I'm thinking about as I'm preparing for the second of two public lectures on The future of English in Hong Kong. My first lecture in November was relatively straightforward, looking at the changing global landscapes of English during the last decade or so. The next lecture is more challenging: examining the future place of English in Hong Kong as its economic and physical integration with mainland China deepens. Hong Kong is rapidly becoming trilingual, with Putonghua (or Mandarin as it is still more commonly known outside mainland China) establishing itself as the third language. Will it overtake English as the second language of Hong Kong? That is the question my next lecture will focus on.

The rise of China may be rebalancing the world, but it is counter-balanced, to some extent, by the parallel rise of India – destined to overtake China in the size of its population. The future of English in the world will be shaped in large measure by the complex play-off between these two new cultural, political and economic Asian poles. I had a reminder of the importance of India in November, when I acted as a judge in a national English debating competition in Chennai (still known in the world of airport codes as Madras). The event was organised jointly by the UK Institute of Ideas and the British Council and was held in one of India's most prestigious universities – Indian Institute of Technology, Madras. It was a remarkable event in many ways – and I see it was made the subject of a BBC ‘From our own correspondent' report. Debating Matters transcended the usual school debate format, allowing the younger generation to address some of the big Indian issues of the day in the company of leaders from business and the Arts. As well as the competitive debates, there was a ‘Question Time’, modelled on the BBC radio and television programmes. One of my co-panellists was the author Chetan Bhagat – merchant banker-turne-novelist who is now the best-selling English-language writer in India, so successful that some of his books (including One Night @ the Call Center) have been turned into films. Chetan Bhagat is no Salman Rushdie, but is almost certainly a more important figure as far as the development of the English language in India goes. Last year Time magazine listed him as one of the 100 most influential people in the world, joining other such artists as Ricky Jervais, Elton John, Banksy and Simon Cowell.

What is less widely appreciated, at least outside India, is ChetanBhagat's mission to help ordinary people, particularly in rural areas, to improve their English reading skills. His novels are the kind sold in supermarkets for just over one pound, and he takes great care to ensure the language is accessible. His sales figures demonstrate the growing audience for such English-language novels in India.

I last shared a platform with Chetan Bhagat at a conference in Delhi just over a year ago. One of his many memorable quips then was the best summary I've heard of what it is to be a middle class bilingual from north India today.

The Debating Matters event in Chennai was not just a challenge for the sixth formers from around India whose debating skills had allowed them to reach the finals, but also for me. I had been invited by the British Council to speak as ‘an expert witness' for the motion ‘The importance of learning English in India is overstated'. It was an opportunity for me to talk about some of the negative social and economic consequences of the new enthusiasm for English in India. But I faced a formidable debating rival in the form of Meena Kandasamy, a Tamil writer and poet who is a passionate advocate for English and its potential for liberating the low castes of India from poverty. I had prepared myself to lose the argument miserably against such an adversary, but fortunately no vote was taken – so as not to prejudice the contest between the debating teams which tackled the issues later. However, after questions from the audience, Meena Kandasamy retreated rather shocked at the apparently ‘casteist' attitudes of some of the audience, drawn from the elite English-medium schools who seemed less concerned about social justice than how they felt crowded out from jobs and university places by statutory quotas for the ‘backward castes'. India may be changing, but English still marks a sensitive social divide. Back in Hong Kong I set my ‘World Englishes' students an exam question: ‘In Indian development, is English best seen as a part of the problem or as part of the solution?' Hardly a fair question, since I don't know the answer myself.

Figure 1.

David Graddol argues in Chennai that the importance of English is overstated (Photo: Ilanthenral Kandasamy).

Closer home, it was the turn of the University of Macau in December to host the latest conference on ‘English in South East Asia'. It is the fifteenth such event, which has grown from being a regional event on local Englishes to an international conference on World Englishes held in South East Asia.

Perhaps this is an indicator of how the periphery has become more central in the world of English? As I look forward to 2011 I can see a number of key events relating to English are taking place in and around Hong Kong. In March, the British Council are holding their international education conference, Going Global, at the Convention and Exhibition Centre in Hong Kong (a building which was completed just in time to hold the ceremony for handing sovereignty back to China). International Education is rapidly becoming a synonym for English-medium education and the English segment of the specialised ‘language travel' business. In May there is the fourth ELF (English as a Lingua Franca) conference – the first time it has been held outside Europe. And in August, AILA (the International Applied Linguistics Association) is holding its triennial conference in Beijing.

But there has been one significant event, perhaps the event of the decade for anyone interested in the English language, which makes me feel very much stuck at the periphery. This is the exhibition on the history of English Evolving English: One Language, Many Voices at the British Library in London which opened on 12 November and lasts until 3 April.

If Heathrow had not been closed because of ice and snow before Christmas, I would be able to provide you with a first-hand report. As it is, I have to content myself for the moment with reading the enthusiastic reviews which have already appeared in the press and the blogosphere, where the exhibition appears to have met with universal delight.

For Alison Flood in the Guardian, a highlight was Jonathan Swift's Proposal for Correcting, Improving and Ascertaining the English Tongue.

Figure 2.

‘Evolving English’ at the British Library until April 3 2011.

The Sun, meanwhile ran the headline Why English is the world's best language. Actually, the article itself was a sober and informative one by Roger Walshe, Head of Learning at the British Library, who tells us:

Michael Rosen, writing for the Socialist Worker, was excited by the history of diversity:

David Crystal was the ‘lead consultant' for the exhibition, and the author of a new book which ties in with the exhibition. He tells us, via his blog,

I was struck by the response from writers from unrelated fields. Martin Fenner at PLoSBlogs (a Science and Medicine website) was attracted to the exhibits which document the rise of writing in science, including Robert Hooke's Micrographia – a remarkable treatise on images seen through a microscope, written – despite its title – in English.

The technology blog ReadWriteWeb seemed more interested in the facility for visitors to the BL website to record their own voices, and so add to the growing data on pronunciation patterns around the world. (You need to read a section of a Mr Tickle book.)

The Economist, meanwhile, like the Guardian, was fascinated by the works of some of the 18th century prescriptivists – including Henry Alford and Robert Lowth. The Economist has played a significant role in globalising (note the ‘s' spelling) British spellings, and its style guide is now used as a global reference. As any regular reader of the Economist knows, it appears compulsory for the anonymous contributors to the magazine to finish their articles with a knowing rhetorical flourish. Their piece on Evolving English was no exception.

I'm still musing on that one.