According to Joseph Sung-Yul Park, "language is understood as a form of capital that is mediated through social power relations.
Bourdieu's theories on capital are effective in showcasing how various skills and resources gathered over an individual or group's lifetime will have different values and connotations depending on the situation and demographics.
When and where those resources are recognized and valued, often for the benefit or enhancement of the lives of the dominant social group, they can be converted into capital.
[6] For example, if someone speaks language X, they have easier access to the economic and social well-being in the X-speaking communities, which in turn may lead to their financial gain.
Because this sort of value brings intangible benefits to the speaker, it cannot be measured in terms of market prices.
This explains why individuals vary their linguistic expressions, such as register, to be appropriate to their current market, such as in a workplace, with family, or in education.
From the interviews, the researchers discovered that for all ten participants, learning English was an essential aspect of their integration into Canadian society.
As one of the participants described:"We have to make an incredible effort, like I did, to learn [English] and to speak it perfectly, to search, to study, to volunteer, to look for work.
"[11] By learning and speaking English, the immigrants in this study were able to acquire more linguistic capital, be perceived as being more competent, and establish themselves in Canadian society.
[3] Many South Koreans view the ability to speak English as a valuable commodity that better allows them to obtain university degrees and high-paying jobs.
Park provides a report from Korean technology giant Samsung's Economic Research Institute that states: "Individual workers can increase their competitiveness in employment, promotion, and self-development through improving their English language skills.
"[3] Parents in South Korea, according to Park, also go to great lengths to provide their children with the advantage of being able to speak English.
Enormous amounts of money are put forth by Korean parents to ensure that their children can learn English and have a greater chance of success in the future.
[13] Later in life, bilingual people reportedly have a five-year delay over monolingual individuals developing dementia, since some additional neural pathways are kept open and functional as a result of using two or more languages.
Today, nearly 1.39 billion people speak English according to the World Economic Forum, with its prominence over other languages highlighted through the geographic diversity of where it is spoken.
According to Arwen Armbrecht, Mandarin Chinese is the most spoken first language in the world, however its influence lags behind English due to its limited use outside of Mandarin-speaking nations.
"[17] The users of these social networks create online speech communities that stay away from the English-speaking internet but also hinder the integration of their language into globalized media flows.