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Tai Lao
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Top language rankings by number of native speakers in the world

Dec 4, 2011 12:54 PM

http://web.archive.org/web/19990429232804/www.sil.org/ethnologue/top10 0.html

 

RankLanguage NamePrimary CountryPopulation
1CHINESE, MANDARIN [CHN]China885,000,000
2SPANISH [SPN]Spain332,000,000
3ENGLISH [ENG]United Kingdom322,000,000
4BENGALI [BNG]Bangladesh189,000,000
5HINDI [HND]India182,000,000
6PORTUGUESE [POR]Portugal170,000,000
7RUSSIAN [RUS]Russia170,000,000
8JAPANESE [JPN]Japan125,000,000
9GERMAN, STANDARD [GER]Germany98,000,000
10CHINESE, WU [WUU]China77,175,000
11JAVANESE [JAN]Indonesia, Java, Bali75,500,800
12KOREAN [KKN]Korea, South75,000,000
13FRENCH [FRN]France72,000,000
14VIETNAMESE [VIE]Viet Nam67,662,000
15TELUGU [TCW]India66,350,000
16CHINESE, YUE [YUH]China66,000,000
17MARATHI [MRT]India64,783,000
18TAMIL [TCV]India63,075,000
19TURKISH [TRK]Turkey59,000,000
20URDU [URD]

More languages in link above…

 

 

____________

Wo Tai Lao Le

我太老了

2616 Views   8 Replies   Latest reply: LTsFolly, Mar 8, 2012 11:38 AM
 
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    1. Tai Lao,
    Dec 4, 2011 1:08 PM   in reply to Tai Lao
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    This latest classification puts Spanish second only to Mandarin.

     
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  • Currently Being Moderated
    2. Tai Lao,
    Dec 4, 2011 1:21 PM   in reply to Tai Lao
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    Updated chart from the same site:

    http://www.ethnologue.com/ethno_docs/distribution.asp?by=size#3

     

    Table 3. Languages with at least 3 million first-language speakers

    1Chinese [zho]China311,213

    		Chinese, Gan [gan]China120.6

    		Chinese, Hakka [hak]China1730.0

    		Chinese, Huizhou [czh]China14.6

    		Chinese, Jinyu [cjy]China145.0

    		Chinese, Mandarin [cmn]China20845

    		Chinese, Min Bei [mnp]China210.3

    		Chinese, Min **** [cdo]China79.1

    		Chinese, Min Nan [nan]China1047.3

    		Chinese, Min Zhong [czo]China13.1

    		Chinese, Wu [wuu]China277.2

    		Chinese, Xiang [hsn]China236.0

    		Chinese, Yue [yue]China2055.5
    2Spanish [spa]Spain44329
    3English [eng]United Kingdom112328
    4Arabic [ara]Saudi Arabia57221

    		Arabic, Algerian Spoken [arq]Algeria622.4

    		Arabic, Egyptian Spoken [arz]Egypt1054.0

    		Arabic, Gulf Spoken [afb]Iraq103.6

    		Arabic, Hijazi Spoken [acw]Saudi Arabia26.0

    		Arabic, Libyan Spoken [ayl]Libya34.3

    		Arabic, Mesopotamian Spoken [acm]Iraq515.1

    		Arabic, Moroccan Spoken [ary]Morocco1021.0

    		Arabic, Najdi Spoken [ars]Saudi Arabia710.0

    		Arabic, North Levantine Spoken [apc]Syria1614.4

    		Arabic, North Mesopotamian Spoken [ayp]Iraq46.3

    		Arabic, Sa'idi Spoken [aec]Egypt119.0

    		Arabic, Sanaani Spoken [ayn]Yemen17.6

    		Arabic, South Levantine Spoken [ajp]Jordan96.2

    		Arabic, Sudanese Spoken [apd]Sudan616.8

    		Arabic, Ta'izzi-Adeni Spoken [acq]Yemen87.1

    		Arabic, Tunisian Spoken [aeb]Tunisia59.4
    5Hindi [hin]India20182
    6Bengali [ben]Bangladesh10181
    7Portuguese [por]Portugal37178
    8Russian [rus]Russian Federation33144
    9Japanese [jpn]Japan25122
    10German, Standard [deu]Germany4390.3
    11Javanese [jav]Indonesia584.6
    12Lahnda [lah]Pakistan878.3

    		Panjabi, Western [pnb]Pakistan762.6

    		Seraiki [skr]Pakistan313.8
    13Telugu [tel]India1069.8
    14Vietnamese [vie]Viet Nam2368.6
    15Marathi [mar]India568.1
    16French [fra]France6067.8
    17Korean [kor]Korea, South3366.3
    18Tamil [tam]India1765.7
    19Italian [ita]Italy3461.7
    20Urdu [urd]Pakistan2360.6
    21

    More in link above…

     
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  • Bill Hunt
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    3. Bill Hunt,
    Dec 6, 2011 10:47 AM   in reply to Tai Lao
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    I noticed that my "native language," Mississippian, does not make any of the lists. Guess that it's good, that I can also use a bit of US English, and sort of get by, with UK English (trying to remember to type "colour").

     

    Hunt

     
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  • LTsFolly
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    4. LTsFolly,
    Mar 7, 2012 5:33 PM   in reply to Tai Lao
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    What's the question and in what language is it?

    I know writers who are famous for expressing themselves in tongues that are not their native.

    Short of speaking the original lingua Franca in the Middle Ages or Esperanto (in the 60s), the most useful language for communicating ideas is US English (the language of the Internet IMHO).

     
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  • Kami Bambiraptor
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    5. Kami Bambiraptor,
    Mar 8, 2012 8:37 AM   in reply to Tai Lao
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    Interesting information, but nothing that I can see that really invites any sort of discussion. I suppose that if I were a Spanish speaker the ranking for Spanish might give me a warm fuzzy, but I'm not so it doesn't.

     

    As LTsFolly mentions, English is more useful, these days, as a 'lingua franca'; while it may not have the greatest number of first-language speakers, I read a while back that some 25% of the people in the world have a working knowledge of English. My partner used to joke that some people thought that if you spoke English slowly and loudly that, somehow, people would understand it. It was a joke 20 years ago, but somewhat sadly, it is quite possibly true today.

     
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  • LTsFolly
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    6. LTsFolly,
    Mar 8, 2012 8:45 AM   in reply to Kami Bambiraptor
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    Can you repeat that s l o w e r and in all CAPS?

     

    I know you could.
    How's your pianning?

     
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  • Kami Bambiraptor
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    7. Kami Bambiraptor,
    Mar 8, 2012 11:08 AM   in reply to LTsFolly
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    LTsFolly wrote:

     

    Can you repeat that s l o w e r and in all CAPS?

     

    I know you could.
    How's your pianning?

    I  C O U L D  ........T R Y....

     

    Really busy with music these days; my videos on YouTube have actually started earning me money in the last few months (lots of people trying to claim my stuff though, for a while & I've had to use a bat AND a wolverine to defend myself). It's only taken uploading 680+ videos & four years, but they say it takes a while to be an overnight success, or in my case, just making a little welcome cash. . A lot of the viewers of my panflute videos are from Romania, Chile and Peru, which is very nice for me so see.

     

     
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  • LTsFolly
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    8. LTsFolly,
    Mar 8, 2012 11:38 AM   in reply to Kami Bambiraptor
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    I would chill in Peru with a Romanian, but we'd probably speak more or less English.

     
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