Forgotten vocab

Man gave names to all the animals/ In the beginning,long time ago. And the miracle of language enabled it. Long time ago,we already lived far apart across the wide world. With time,we drifted further apart. The animals,and everything else,were not called by the same names in the many tongues women and men spoke. Some languages began unbridgeably distant from one another; others assumed ever distinct personalities,despite common ancestors. As languages multiplied,others kept dying out,ceasing to be spoken. Every language would fragment,with a dominant dialect muscling out the rest to be the literary version. All that,were taught in school. If only we were taught more languages in school!With trade,travel,conquest,and trade again,we also came closer. If the world today is a global village,enabling instant communication across its geographical vastness,why wouldnt children in India learn Mandarin? Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao,quite a hit at Delhis Tagore International School,gifted books and audio-visual material for the Mandarin course to commence next year. Many schools the world over will also introduce or expand Mandarin courses. If thats an acknowledgement of the growing weight of the Chinese side of the equation,then the world will have to learn Chinese8230; sorry,Mandarin. Dutch sociologist Abram de Swaan says the world hasnt sunk into a meaning-less heterogen-eity of languages because most of us are multilingual,thereby providing cohesion and mutual understanding. Indians,inhabitants of the native land of multiple languages where Arabic,Persian,and even Turkish,were once spoken may easily expand their mental and linguistic horizons for one more.