Correspondence
English: the lingua franca
of scientific research
I read with interest the comment
by Anne Roca and colleagues in
The Lancet Global Health.1 Does it
make sense, however, to cry for the
exclusion of French from global health
research? What about the exclusion
of Portuguese, Arabic, or any of the
estimated 7000 languages spoken
today? Translating every piece of
good research in all possible written
languages is not feasible. This is
why a lingua franca emerged, so that
researchers from various linguistic
backgrounds can communicate
freely. Languages follow a Darwinian
process of evolution, in which the
fittest languages survive and the weak
languages die. As a result of many
historical events, English is the current
lingua franca of science, as were Latin
and Greek in their time.
My experience as the managing
editor of an international journal
is that accommodating multiple
languages in a scientific journal is not
easy and the incentives for publishers
to do so are not many, since there is no
shortage of material in English. A good
example is the official WHO Bulletin,
which publishes its content in all the
official languages of the organisation,
and has the corresponding financial
and staffing means to do so.
When we established the Pan
African Medical Journal in 2008, we
committed to publish content in
English and French, the two most
widely spoken official languages on
the continent. We are struggling to
sustain this commitment because it
comes at a cost ranging from hiring a
full-time medical translator, increasing
subediting linked to French (close to
one-third of the manuscripts in English
by French native speakers are returned
for language editing), to adapting
the publishing platform to properly
provide multi-language content. We
have thus always advocated that those
organisations which are interested in
promoting the use of French, such as
www.thelancet.com/lancetgh Vol 7 September 2019
the International Organisation of La two decades and has, in the process,
Francophonie, should take steps such widely expanded its researchers’ timely
as working with journal editors to access and contribution to scientific For the International
support dual-language publication. knowledge. Organisation of La
Francophonie see https://www.
Publishing in English for non-English RK is the founder and managing editor of the francophonie.org/welcome-to-
speakers is not easy, but the reward Pan African Medical Journal and declares no the-international.html
competing interests. The French version of this
far outweighs the challenges—it is Correspondence is in the appendix. See Online for appendix
clear that work published in English
Copyright © 2019 The Author(s). Published by
is accessible to many compared with Elsevier Ltd. This is an Open Access article under the
French or another language. Our CC BY 4.0 license.
journal’s statistics show that articles Raoul Kamadjeu
in English are accessed 70% more raoul.kamadjeu@panafrican-med-
than those in French, and limiting journal.com
the circulation of a journal’s content Pan African Medical Journal, Park Suites Building,
by design in this manner would be a Nairobi 38583–00100, Kenya
disincentive for any publisher. 1 Roca A, Boum Y, Wachsmuth I. Plaidoyer
For Africans in general and African contre l’exclusion des francophones dans la
recherche en santé mondiale.
researchers specifically, the choice Lancet Glob Health 2019; 7: e701–02.
of a language should be dictated by 2 English to become official language in Rwanda.
pure self-interest. Moving to English- 2008. https://www.npr.org/templates/story/
story.php?storyId=97245421 (accessed
speaking Africa opened my eyes to the July 15, 2019).
immense inequities in the access to
training, scholarship, sponsorship, and
funding opportunities between people
in the francophone and anglophone
parts of Africa. It pains me even more
when I travel to Portuguese-speaking
Africa and witness how difficult it is
to access new knowledge and training
opportunities and to bring in good
experts because of the language
barrier. Policy makers should mandate For the Bulletin of the World
that the languages of education are Health Organization see
https://www.who.int/bulletin/en/
decided by the need to promote
equitable access to information,
knowledge, and skills. I still cannot
comprehend why some countries in
Africa stubbornly stick to a language
that (1) was imposed on them by the
brutal process of colonisation and
(2) severely restricts their access to
knowledge.
English will remain, for the foresee­
able future, the lingua franca of science
and technology. Policy makers in
Africa should be pragmatic and ensure
that their populations are equipped
to benefit from, and contribute to,
research by adopting English as the
language of education. This change is
not merely a wish—at least one country
in Africa has done it; Rwanda2 was able
to transform the linguistic landscape
of its education system in less than
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