It should be noted that Sanskrit is one of six languages the Government of India has classified as classical, alongside Kannada, Malayalam, Odia, Tamil, and Telugu. Note this list varies again from those considered to be 'prominent' languages! Take a look at the percentage split for those who speak the most 'popular' of the official languages. The population of India is around 1.3 billion. Thus, making use of the Word List tool in the program AntConc (Anthony.
List of monolingual countries free#
Learning a new language? Check out our free placement test to see how your level measures up! Who speaks what century then, large waves of Spanish speakers entered the country as a result of. These are:Īssamese, Bengali, Gujarati, Kannada, Maithili, Malayalam, Marathi, Odia (Oriya), Punjabi Tamil, Telugu, and Urdu. Last year France recorded the sharpest drop in English proficiency of any European country, behind only Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Iran and Qatar globally. Being recognised by this Schedule also means that students in schools throughout India are entitled to sit any exams conducted for public service in the language of their choice.ĭespite this wide variety of official languages available to people, there is a shorter list of those which are considered the prominent languages of India. France The problem is not just that people don’t speak English, but that they are forgetting what they do know at a drastic rate. They are obliged to receive support from Government for development. Languages listed under this Schedule are entitled to equal representation on the Official Languages Commission. English stands on one side of it, and the rest on the other these are referred to as the Eighth Schedule languages, or those of the Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of India. Within those twenty-three there still is a further 'divide'. These languages belong to one of six language families: Austroasiatic, Dravidian, Great Andamanese, Indo-Aryan, Sino-Tibetan and Tai–Kadai. Here's your list (in alphabetical order):Īssamese, Bengali, Bodo, Dogri, English, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Kashmiri, Konkani, Maithili, Malayalam, Marathi, Meitei (Manipuri), Nepali, Odia, Punjabi, Sanskrit, Santali, Sindhi, Tamil, Telugu and Urdu. India has a grand total of twenty-three official languages. It is interesting to note that only 36% of native French speakers live in Europe, a powerful indication that while French is indeed a European language, its future is global and its status is impacted by the same global forces that have led to the rise of English.Photo via Flickr Languages in India by numbers Learn more in: Language Endangerment in Africa 6. This is a common feeling among learners in monolingual classes. We’re all the same, so there’s nothing to talk about. Here are a few of the main reasons why this can happen and some ways to address the problem. However, vertical multilingualism is present even in these countries as social services require English and/or French. While some monolingual classrooms are vibrant, chatty places, others can be quiet and awkward. Lesotho and Rwanda are such examples, where Sotho and Rwandan are predominantly used, respectively. Just as English benefited from the synergy of multiple forces in the 20th century, French may benefit from the synergistic effect of a globalized francophone culture in the 21st century. Monolingual societies are relatively rare in the world, especially in Africa.French is predicted to become the most widely spoken mother tongue in Europe by 2025 and the most widely spoken mother tongue in the world by 2050. French is Europe’s second most widely spoken mother tongue with over 77 million speakers, after Germany (around 100 million), but ahead of English (around 61 million).French is unusual in that it often exists alongside other languages in multilingual contexts.As a result of population growth, the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie estimates that the number of French speakers will rise to over 700 million by 2050, 80% of whom will be in Africa.
French is one of the very few languages spoken all over the world, ranked the sixth most widely spoken language after Mandarin Chinese (over a billion speakers), English, Hindi, Spanish and Arabic.
There are currently over 300 million French speakers worldwide.