If you ask people to name the one person who had the greatest effect on the English language, you will get answers like "Shakespeare," "Samuel Johnson," and "Webster," but none of these men had any effect at all compared to a man who didn't even speak English—William the Conqueror.

Before 1066, in the land we now call Great Britain lived peoples belonging to two major language groups. In the west-central region lived the Welsh, who spoke a Celtic language, and in the north lived the Scotch, whose language, though not the same as the Welsh, was also Celtic. In the rest of the country lived the Saxons, actually a mixture of Anglos, Saxons, and other Germanic and Nordic people, who spoke what we now call Anglo-Saxon (or Old English), a Germanic language. If this state of affairs had lasted, English today would be close to German.

But this state of affairs did not last. In 1066, the Normans led by William defeated the Saxons and began their rule over England. For about a century, French became the official language of England while Old English became the language of peasants. As a result, English words of politics and the law come from French rather than German. In some cases, modern English even shows a distinction (区别)between upper-class French and lower-class Anglo-Saxon in its words. We even have different words for some foods, meat in particular, depending on whether it is still out in the fields or at home ready to be cooked, which shows the fact that the Saxon peasants were doing the farming, while the upper-class Normans were doing most of the eating.

When Americans visit Europe for the first time, they usually find Germany more "foreign" than France because the German they see on signs and advertisements seems much more different from English than French does. Few realize that the English language is actually a Germanic language in its beginning and that the French influences are all the result of one man's ambition.

There is a disease sweeping (迅速传播) the world today is killing far more people than any other, including AIDS and SARS. That disease is obesity. The World Health Organization (WHO) stated that of the 56. 5 million (death) per year around the world, over 50 percent (cause) by diseases connected unhealthy diets and lack of exercise, and that many of these could have been prevented (full). In the face of these (shock) statistics, the WHO announced plan to fight obesity. It invited governments around the world (join) in the campaign to encourage its citizens to adopt a sensible diet and to take up some forms of physical activities. As part of (it) plan, the WHO asked governments to consider the bad effect of food advertisements on (encourage) people to eat unhealthy food.