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World's Most Widely Spoken Languages
| Native Speakers | Bi-lingual Speakers | |||||||
| Rank | Language | Primary | Rank | Language | Primary | Secondary | Total | |
| 1 | Chinese* | 937,132,000 | 1 | Chinese* | 937,132,000 | 20,000,000 | 957,132,000 | |
| 2 | Spanish | 332,000,000 | 2 | English | 322,000,000 | 150,000,000 | 472,000,000 | |
| 3 | English | 322,000,000 | 3 | Spanish | 332,000,000 | 20,000,000 | 352,000,000 | |
| 4 | Bengali | 189,000,000 | 4 | Russian | 170,000,000 | 125,000,000 | 295,000,000 | |
| 5 | Hindi/Urdu | 182,000,000 | 5 | French* | 79,572,000 | 190,000,000 | 269,572,000 | |
| 6 | Arabic* | 174,950,000 | 6 | Portuguese | 170,000,000 | 28,000,000 | 198,000,000 | |
| 7 | Portuguese | 170,000,000 | 7 | Arabic* | 174,950,000 | 21,000,000 | 195,950,000 | |
| 7 | Russian | 170,000,000 | 8 | Bengali | 189,000,000 | 189,000,000 | ||
| 9 | Japanese | 125,000,000 | 9 | Hindi/Urdu | 182,000,000 | 182,000,000 | ||
| 10 | German | 98,000,000 | 10 | Japanese | 125,000,000 | 8,000,000 | 133,000,000 | |
| 11 | French* | 79,572,000 | 11 | German | 98,000,000 | 9,000,000 | 107,000,000 | |
| Ethnologue (SIL), 1999 | ||||||||
French is still taught as a second language in many
countries replacing Latin as a foreign language
requirement. Spanish is becoming the most popular second language in the U.S.
Many students
promptly forget their French or Spanish and cannot be properly classified as
bilingual.
French speaking Canadians worry that French will become a
cultural
artifact. Five times more French
speaking immigrants go to the U.S. than to Canada. Children of immigrants
historically abandon
their ancestral language and it is typically totally lost by the third
generation. Assimilation is seen
as the road to success.
Some argue that the U.S. will cease to be dominated by
English speakers by 2050. Don't bet on it.
The U.S. is a huge language killing machine. Even English is being replaced
daily by a new international
version incorporating neologisms and foreign words at an incredible rate.
Asians and the rest of the world are learning English as
a second language for purely economic
reasons. Americans see no need to learn any language, especially difficult
languages like Chinese,
Japanese, and Korean. So that leaves English, or variations thereof, as the
language of business
AND diplomacy.
| * "Chinese" for this chart is composed of the total of the following SIL designated languages: | |||||||
| Mandarin | 836,000,000 | ||||||
| Xiang | 36,015,000 | ||||||
| Hakka | 34,000,000 | ||||||
| Gan | 20,580,000 | ||||||
| Minbei | 10,537,000 | ||||||
| total | 937,132,000 | ||||||
| * "Arabic" for this chart is composed of the total of the following SIL designated languages: | |||||||
| Egyptian | 42,500,000 | ||||||
| Algerian | 22,400,000 | ||||||
| Moroccan | 19,542,000 | ||||||
| Saidi | 18,900,000 | ||||||
| Sudanese | 16,000,000 | ||||||
| North Levantine | 15,000,000 | ||||||
| Mesopotamian | 13,900,000 | ||||||
| Najdi | 9,800,000 | ||||||
| Tunisian | 9,308,000 | ||||||
| Sanaami | 7,600,000 | ||||||
| total | 174,950,000 | ||||||
| * "French" for this chart is composed of the total of the following SIL designated languages: | |||||||
| French | 72,000,000 | ||||||
| Hatian Creole French | 7,572,000 | ||||||
| total | 79,572,000 | ||||||
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