Talk:Languages of the European Union
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[edit] Switzerland now in the EU?
I'm curious as to why the map for German Comprehension has been updated to include Switzerland. Aryaman (☼) 18:14, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
[edit] 23% of Italian population can speak Spanish?
Where does this figure come from? In the EU survey the foreign languages most spoken in Italy are English (29%) and French (14%), so where is the figure for Spanish? (I'm Italian and it sounds quite odd to me that Spanish is more widespread than French here..). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.222.26.178 (talk) 20:08, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
- Good question. As you say, the survey listed as "source" doesn't mention Spanish in Italy at all. —Angr If you've written a quality article... 20:15, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
I think that it is true. A lot of Italians can understand Spanish. Perhaps, a lot of Italians can speak a mixture of Spanish-Italian, and of course, to understand the language. Babelia.
No I can assure you it is not true. It is true that us Italians can understand a bit of Spanish if spoken slowly, the same way we understand a bit of French if spoken slowly so communication between Spanish, French and Italian speakers is possibile to a minimum level even without having studied the language, but this data are about *true* knowledge of the language at a basic level of fluency at least, and French is much more studied in Italian schools. Anyway I saw the data have been corrected with the right ones. Easyboy82 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.222.26.174 (talk) 09:38, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Chinese migration one of the sources
http://www.migrationinformation.org/Feature/display.cfm?ID=144 --Atitarev (talk) 22:46, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
[edit] 62% of Portuguese population can speak Spanish?
This is wrong, someone should correct those figures or show source. - Fernao, 20.2.2008 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.67.80.185 (talk) 20:30, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- A source should definitely be added, but in fact I don't find the claim particularly unlikely, keeping in mind it means they can speak Spanish as a foreign language (not their native language!). —Angr If you've written a quality article... 20:38, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
It's highly probable that a big part of the population claims to understand and even speak spanish, since the language is similar, althought spaniards don't usualy do the same claim. Although is totally untrue that spanish is widly teatched in Portugal. Until a few years ago it was not even a possible choice in highschool, only recently in some border towns it was made available. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.196.175.91 (talk • contribs) 00:44, 20 March 2008 I think that it is true. In Portugal a 62% of population can understand Spanish or more people. Other thing is speaking the language fluently, but to understand the language is very easy for Portuguese people. Babelia.
[edit] Regional and minority languages
Is not the Regional and minority languages now somewhat of a mess? The Euromosaic study is now seriously out of date, and anyway was at best seriously misleading - in many cases not covering regional or minority languages that are currently recognised by member states (the langues de France and Scots in Scotland and Ulster Scots in Northern Ireland to cite but several dozen examples). We also have Bulgarian and Romanian references, and Manx. This section now seems far adrift from fact - at the very least it should list regional and minority languages that are recognised by the member states. Man vyi (talk) 18:15, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
Seems like that. Anyway, 80% of the population in Slovenia and 70% of the population in Bulgaria can understand and speak Central South Slavic language and its dialects( CSS language or Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian language). Cheers.24.86.127.209 (talk) 07:09, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Regional and minority languages /2
This section is indeed a mess. Estonian (the official AND main language of Estonia, also one of the EU's official languages) is not listed at all, and instead of this, the article mentions that Latvian (the official language of Latvia) is spoken in Estonia. This information is absolutely incorrect and misleading, as Latvian is spoken by perhaps 0.5% of Estonian population. Janark (talk) 11:37, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
- But the Euromosaic study cited does indeed include Latvian as a minority language in Estonia. In what way is it incorrect? Have you a source that provides contradictory evidence? Man vyi (talk) 14:32, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Does a Spanish map make sense?
The number for spanish are higly overrated, spanish is not a lingua franca in EU, it would make more sense to have a map of Russian. Anyway, if spanish as a map, why not portuguese? It's the 3rd european language more spoken in the world, and due to big immigrants comunities has significant expression in France, UK, Andorra (not EU, I know) and Luxembourg. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.196.175.91 (talk • contribs) 00:44, 20 March 2008
- The four maps feature the contents of the adjoining table: English, German, French and Spanish, but I see no reason why there should not be other maps for other languages. If you think Russian and Portuguese should also be there you can create those maps and add them to the article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.101.146.127 (talk) 19:40, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
No, according to the source, the number of Spanish speakers is much smaller. E.g France the source says 13 % Spanish speakers, the article says 32. What a joke, I'll delete the map and change to correct figures. Aaker (talk) 22:17, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Irish speakers
Do 540,000 really speak Irish on a daily basis? Although this statistic appears on the website of the Irish embassy, it is a considerable exaggeration of the CSO's [1] figures (450,000 in education and 55,000 outside of education) and completely contradict those of the Wikipedia article on Irish, which states just over 85,000 Luke w (talk) 00:32, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Mandarin and other Chinese speakers
Can somebody provide figures on Chinese language usage in EU, Mandarin and dialects? --Atitarev (talk) 14:11, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
- They'd be almost the same as the number of Chinese immigrants. Aaker (talk) 18:27, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Language maps
Why all the bilingual areas of Ireland, the UK (Wales...) and France (Brittany, Corse, Alsace...) are shown as 100% native speakers and the Spanish bilingual areas are shown as over 50% of native speakers?
There should be some consistency between all maps.--Té y kriptonita (talk) 20:22, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
- Because those languages are not official and much less spoken than the regional languages of Spain. But honestly, I don't think we need the Spanish map nor having Spanish in the table since it's very little spoken outside Spain. Some idiot (excuse my language) added a map based on false figures (which s/he also added to the table) so I had to correct it. Aaker (talk) 21:23, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
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- I am sorry, but how can you say that Irish or Welsh are not official?! or that all these languages are less spoken than the Spanish languages? I appreciate you have amended an error but the new map is not consistent with the rest. --Té y kriptonita (talk) 20:14, 29 May 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Catalan and Valencian are 2 languages.
In the subarticle of 'Regional and Minority languages' you don't mention Valencian language, but just Catalan. If Serbian and Croatian, which are basically a same language-can be mentioned separately, then that way should be Catalan and Valencian languages as well. Greetings,24.86.127.209 (talk) 05:15, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
- There's more consensus (in the world generally, not just on Wikipedia) that Serbian and Croatian should be treated as two separate languages than that Catalan and Valencian should be so treated. —Angr 05:31, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
[edit] What is the 3rd paragraph trying to say?
To me this third paragraph in the introduction does not make sense, it needs rewriting.
"It should be noted that according to statistics the plurality of EU citizens speaks German, while the absolute majority can understand English and speaks German, English, French or Italian as mother languages."
Can someone rewrite this paragraph. I'd do it myself but I'm not sure what is trying to be conveyed. --203.220.171.56 (talk) 13:42, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
