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Current Weather
in Barbados:
General: Barbados
is an independent island nation in the western
Atlantic Ocean, just to the east of the Caribbean
Sea, at roughly 13° N and 59° W. Located
fairly close to South America, Barbados is around
434 kilometres (270 miles) northeast of Venezuela.
Currency: The dollar
(currency code BBD) has been the currency of Barbados
since 1972. It is normally abbreviated with the
dollar sign "$", or alternatively "Bds$"
to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated
currencies. It is divided into 100 cents. The
Barbados dollar is pegged to the US dollar at
USD1= BBD2 since July 5, 1975.
Language: English,
a West Germanic language originating in England,
is the first language for most people in Australia,
Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, the United Kingdom,
and the United States. It is used extensively
as a second language and as an official language
throughout the world, especially in the Commonwealth
of Nations, such as in India or South Africa.
Modern English is sometimes
described as a world lingua franca. While Mandarin
Chinese – and perhaps Hindi and Spanish –
have more native speakers, English has considerably
more influence or geographical reach than any
of the three.
Over 370 million people speak
English as their first language. Estimates on
second language speakers, which includes foreign-language
learners, vary greatly between 200 million and
1.3 billion[citation needed], depending on how
literacy or mastery is defined. English is the
dominant international language in communications,
science, business, aviation, entertainment, and
diplomacy and also on the Internet. It has been
one of the official languages of the United Nations
since its founding in 1945 and is considered by
many to be on its way to becoming the world's
first universal language.
Modern English developed from
Old English, the language of Anglo-Saxon England.
Throughout the Anglo-Saxon period, written Old
English remained a highly synthetic language,
while spoken Old English became increasingly analytic
in nature, losing the old noun case system, with
a heavier reliance on prepositions and fixed word-order,
being evident in writings from the Middle English
period. It has been postulated that the development
of the language may have also been influenced
by a Celtic substratum. English borrowed many
common words (e.g. take, them, their etc.) from
Old Norse as a result of Viking settlements in
the Danelaw area of England during the 9th-11th
centuries AD. As a result of the Norman Conquest,
a large number of words entered into the English
lexis through Norman French, Latin and Greek.
The influence of the British
Empire is often cited as one of the primary reasons
for the language's spread worldwide. Following
World War II, the economic and cultural influence
of the United States increased and English permeated
other cultures, chiefly through development of
telecommunications technology. Because a working
knowledge of English is required in many fields,
professions, and occupations, education ministries
throughout the world mandate the teaching of English
to at least a basic level (see English language
learning and teaching) in an effort to increase
the competitiveness of their economies.
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