Languages of Australia

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Although Australia has no official language, it is largely monolingual with English being the de facto national language. It is also home to over 200 indigenous languages, as well as relatively recent arrivals besides English.

Contents 1 English 2 Indigenous languages 2.1 Australian languages 2.2 Tasmanian languages 2.3 Torres Strait languages 3 Pidgins and creoles 4 Other minority languages 5 External links

[edit] English

Main article: Australian English

[edit] Indigenous languages

[edit] Australian languages

Main article: Australian Aboriginal languages

There were about 250 languages spoken by Indigenous Australians prior to the arrival of Europeans. Most of these are now either extinct or moribund, with only about twenty languages still being learnt by new generations.

The languages with the most speakers today are Arrernte, Kala Lagaw Ya, Tiwi, Walmajarri, Warlpiri, and the Western Desert language.

[edit] Tasmanian languages

Main article: Tasmanian languages

All the indigenous languages of Tasmania are extinct today, and little reliable information about them was recorded.

[edit] Torres Strait languages

Main article: Torres Strait Island languages

Two languages are spoken on the islands of the Torres Strait, within Australian territory, that do not follow the general pattern that Australian Aboriginal languages do: Kala Lagaw Ya and Meriam Mir. Meriam Mir is considered to be a Papuan language, while Kala Lagaw Ya is generally thought to be an Australian language that has gained Papuan-like features due to language contact.

[edit] Pidgins and creoles

Two English-based creoles have arisen in Australia after European contact: Kriol and Torres Strait Creole. Both are spoken in the Northern Territory and Queensland.

Broome Pearling Lugger Pidgin was a pidgin used as a lingua franca between Malays, Japanese, Vietnamese and Aborigines on pearling boats.

[edit] Other minority languages

Many new languages have been brought to Australia by post-colonisation immigrants.

In the 2001 census, 2,843,851 Australians reported speaking a language other than English at home, including 50,978 speakers of Indigenous languages. Other languages were:

Chinese (all): 371,357 Other or unspecified: 363,062 Italian: 353,605 Vietnamese: 278,236 Greek: 263,717 Cantonese: 225,307 Arabic: 209,372 Mandarin: 139,286 French: 93,593 Spanish: 78,878 German: 76,443

Macedonian: 71,994 Croatian: 69,851 Polish: 59,056 Turkish: 50,693 Serbian: 49,203 Hindi: 47,817 Maltese: 41,393 Netherlandic: 40,188 Tagalog (Filipino): 39,643 Korean: 39,529 Indonesian: 38,724

Other Chinese: 36,764 Russian: 34,790 Japanese: 28,285 Persian: 25,238 Hungarian: 24,485 Tamil: 24,074 Portuguese: 23,688 Samoan: 22,711 Sinhalese: 20,600 Unspecified South Slavic: 14,606

Other languages spoken in Australia, according to Ethnologue, include Adyghe, Afrikaans (12,655 speakers), Basque, Western Cham, Estonian, Scottish Gaelic, Fijian Hindustani, Hebrew, Indo-Portuguese, Northern Kurdish (11,000 speakers), Cham, Latvian (25,000 speakers), Lithuanian (10,000 speakers), Cocos Islands Malay, Mambae, Assyrian Neo-Aramaic (30,000 speakers), Chaldean Neo-Aramaic, Nung, Piemontese, Pukapuka (140 speakers), Romanian, Traveller Scottish, Senaya, Slovenian, Sylheti, Tai Dam, Tongan, Turoyo (2,000 speakers), Unserdeutsch, Uyghur, Northern Uzbek, and Eastern Yiddish.

[edit] External links

• Ethnologue report for Australia