That is exactly the opposite of what we are being told!
We are told that importing words from other languages / dialects endangers a language / dialect, and for it to survive it needs to be preserved and taught to people as it is.
The infiltration of English words and terms is a common concern in countries where other langauges are spoken. I read a year or two ago that France was concerned about English terms being used in technology, and was encouraging French terms to be used instead.
You know the way I take an interest in Cyprus. Well, when it comes to language, there are the same problems on both sides of the Green Line. In the South, there is concern for the survival of Cypriot Greek, because most people are now speaking the Standard Modern Greek that is spoken in Greece. And in the North, there is concern for the survival of Cypriot Turkish, because most people are now speaking the Istanbul Turkish that is spoken in Turkey. But, there doesn't seem to be any real interest at government level (on either side of the Green Line) in doing anything about it.
Here in Northern Ireland, concern for the survival of the Ulster-Scots language led to the establishment of an agency to promote it. And it has been very successful at doing so. To the extent that Ulster-Scots in Northern Ireland is probably spoken more than it's parent language Scots is in Scotland.
By the way, you know how I don't speak Irish. Well, because of that, it was only recently that I found out that, although they are spelt the same way, a lot of words are pronounced totally differently in Ulster Irish than they are in Connaught Irish or Munster Irish. And I found that out because I have started using a codename for my new main skating crush. When I did a Google search to find out if the codename actually meant anything in any language, by sheer coincidence it turned out to be the Irish word for something that is relevant to her!
(I should add, I was actually expecting to be told that it was a French word. But it turned out that it didn't mean anything in French). And when I went to find out how it was pronounced (because you know the way that Irish words are never pronounced the way you would imagine they are from looking at the spellings!), it turned out that in Ulster Irish it sounded like one of the syllables of her name, but it didn't sound anything like it in Connaught and Munster Irish!
The introduction of loanwords or neologism isn't a danger to a language, people no longer
speaking a language is. This is why minority languages die out - People are prohibited from speaking it, there is a small number of speakers (so majority languages are seen as more useful for general conversation) or for many more reasons. The end result is the same - People can't speak that language anymore, and when the last speakers die, so does the language.
And the French are not innocent here - They are so very protective of the French language, while simultaneously not only doing little to protect other native languages in France but actively making it difficult for these languages to survive by denying their historical prohibition and refusing to ratify the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages.
Back to loanwords and neologisms - Just think about the sheer number of words we have in English with very similar meanings (i.e. synonyms), and that are still being used today. The word "set" has up to 4900 (!) synonyms depending on the context. Words often have many multiple meanings (like "present" can mean something existing, being in a particular place, happening right now, to give or show something, to introduce someone on stage, and the same word also means gift). "Set", for example, has over 400 meanings according to Oxford English Dictionary.
English didn't die when it stopped having grammatical genders, it didn't die when the singular "thou" was replaced by the initially plural "you" and we still happily use Shakespearer's many (possible) neologisms - Gloomy, laughable, majestic, lonely, generous, frugal, critical, rant and so on.
Language is first and foremost a tool of communication, and it evolves with that need for communication. If you tried to describe our modern world with Latin, you'd soon run into trouble.
Now there are two options - Neologisms that conform to the standard of the language (like "l'ordinateur" for "computer" in French) or to use a loanword (like "computer", which comes from "to compute" which in itself is a Latin loanword ("computare")). Both are changing the language as it existed before.
Language is however also a huge part of people's identity - It shapes how we are perceived, which sounds we are able to make, and which ones we are able to hear. It even shapes our thinking, our understanding of the world and our ability to express ourselves. It connects us to our communities - family, friends, region, nationality - our culture and our history.
But just like language shapes us, we also shape language. And just like we, our history and our culture change, so does our language. And that is not a bad thing - Preservation and change are not enemies, they go hand in hand.
Or as I would express it: Take the good from the past, add the good from the present, and make it better for the future.
Don't forget the history of a language, a culture or a country, but don't hold onto it by all means, or you will end up being left behind.
That is honestly not bad advice for figure skating either, right?
Transparent always meant nothing to hide. "Sparks flying" could mean sparring, but could also mean intense attraction, and always needed to be inferred from context.
Now yer talkin’ the King’s English!)
