Talk:List of countries by English-speaking population

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Archive
Archives
  1. February 2006 to July 2007

Contents

[edit] By Percent?

Wouldn't it be better if it were sorted by percent rather than total number of people?

[edit] EU in lists

DSuser and I have drafted a complete analysis of why it would be a good or a bad idea to include the EU in lists of countries in some form (either directly in the list or as a special note outside the list). We'd kindly invite all editors who are interested in the EU and/or lists of countries to take a look at Talk:European Union/inclusion in lists of countries, read all of the arguments presented and then state their opinion on what a sensible compromise might look like. Thanks! —Nightstallion 09:15, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] UPDATE!

This section needs an update; Philippines has a bigger population now and the Census was way back in 1995.

[edit] India's Exaggerated (Tripled) Numbers

I just became aware of this page, after someone tried to include the unlikely statistic about India having the largest number of English speakers on the planet to the India page itself and immediately got pounced upon. I have no idea how the "sources" mentioned in the India ranking managed to generate their numbers, but one thing I am sure of is that they are not only unreliable, but grossly inaccurate. Here is the quote from one of the sources, David Crystal, author of Stories of English, a popular book about the English language. Crystal is writing (here) in the British newspaper, The Guardian:

“ "The population of India passed a billion, that's a thousand million, a couple of years ago, and is increasing at the rate of three per cent per annum. In 1997 an India Today survey suggested that about a third of the population had the ability to carry on a conversation in English. This was an amazing increase over the estimates of the 1980s, when only about four per cent or five per cent of the population were thought to use the language." ”
  • I fail to see how this would be possible ow this would be possible. Since most English speakers in India have learned the language and not picked it up, even if 100% of Indian children and teenagers were going to school in the 1990s (and we know that was hardly the case) and all were learning English, it wouldn't account for a jump from 5% of the population in the 80s to 33% in the 90s.
  • In reality the statistic is even more startling: according to the 2001 Census of India, only 64.8% of the population was literate in any language. This means that in excess of 50% of the literate population was able to use English.
  • While we are on the subject of numbers from the last Census of India (2001), some other numbers don't jibe with Crystal or India Today's numbers: The 2001 Census reports that a full 31.6% of the workers in India are cultivators, and another 26.5% are agricultural laborers, another 4.2% household industry workers, and finally the remaining 37.2%, "other workers." Since the cultivators and agricultural laborers live in rural India (which is not the bastion of English speakers) and account for 60% of the population, is it being suggested that the remaining 37.2 "other workers" and their families all speak English? Given that the "other workers" include, for example, the vast number of merchants and laborers of small-town India, which unlike their counterparts in big cities, don't speak English in great numbers, it is even more surprising.
  • Besides David Crystal is loose with his other statistics. If the population of India were increasing at the rate of 3% per annum, we would be seeing major famines. The population of India never touched the 3% per year mark during the entire 20th century. Here are the statistics of the rate of population growth for the 20th century from the Census of India official website. (The rates are decadal, so you (more or less) have to divide by 10 to get the yearly rate of growth). As you can see, around the time Crystal was writing his book, the rate was more like 2%. That may not seem like much of a difference, but when there are a billion people, a difference of 1% is 10 million per year. If Crystal is so off-base for his population rate numbers, why should we believe his English speakers numbers?
  • The only source that seems half-way reliable, is the Siemens report, which gave the numbers to be 64.6 million (English as a second language speakers) and 25.4 million (English as a third language speakers).

The bottom line for me is that the current state of this page is unacceptable. The page needs to be split into two pages: List of countries by population of speakers of English as a first language and b) List of countries by population of speakers of English as a second and third language. Such a division would give maximum information. (If people insist on having one page, then the statistics of India and other ESL countries, need to be revised.) I won't revert anything yet, but I want to hear from the people who have put this page together. In the meantime I will look up the academic sources on the subject. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 22:32, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Some sources that might be more reliable:

  • From the Census of India's eCensusIndia, Issue 10, 2003, pp 8-10, (Feature: Languages of West Bengal in Census and Surveys, Bilingualism and Trilingualism). In the state of West Bengal, where the literacy rate is 4% points higher than the Indian national average, the total number of English as second language (or third language) speakers (based on the 1991 Census figures) were 8% of the population. The total population was approximately 67 million and of these approximately 5,600,000 spoke English as a second or third language. The Government of India census statistics are very rigorous. (India has had a long tradition of both superb statistical institutions, like the Indian Statistical Institute, and superb statisticians like P. C. Mahalanobis and C. R. Rao, who while not necessarily involved in census statistics, nonetheless set a standard of rigor for such statistics.) If those statistics give a number of 8% for the state of West Bengal, where the numbers are higher than the national average, why are we believing a rag like India Today which stands exactly halfway between Time Magazine and People's Magazine, in reliability and rigor (and Time itself is no paragon). Fowler&fowler«Talk» 01:39, 15 August 2007 (UTC)
  • The TESOL-India (Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages)] site India: World's Second Largest English-Speaking Country specifically addresses this article and explains the difference between the 350 million number mentioned on this Wikpidedia page and the more plausible 100 million number:
“ "Wikipedia's India estimate of 350 million includes two categories - "English Speakers" and "English Users". The distinction between the Speakers and Users is that Users only know how to read English words while Speakers know how to read English, understand spoken English as well as form their own sentences to converse in English. The distinction becomes clear when you consider the China numbers. China has over 200~350 million users that can read English words but, as anyone can see on the streets of China, only handful of million who are English speakers." ”

Fowler&fowler«Talk» 10:57, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

  • From "India." Encyclopædia Britannica. 2007. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 15 Aug. 2007 India: The lingua francas: "English, a remnant of British colonial rule, is the most widely used lingua franca. It is, however, claimed as the mother tongue by only a small number of Indians and is spoken fluently by less than 5 percent of the population."

[edit] Needs an update

If you could see the Philippines, it has 45 mil English Speakers, 42 mil People who use it as a second language, but 27k native speakers? What? 45 mil-42 mil =3 mil. Please, you got the data of native speakers from 1995!

[edit] Have started the update

I have updated some of the positions in the table. As I have indicated above, the numbers of ESL speakers in India are around 100 million. The reliable sources, Britiannica, TESOL-India, and the Census of India give numbers around 100 million. The list is of "countries," so adding the European Union doesn't make sense; you could add it at the end, but not in the middle. Similarly, the list is of "speakers" and not "users" (which often refers to people who can read the alphabet, but not much more). I have therefore removed China from position 3 and moved it below Malaysia pending some reliable statistics on ESL speakers in China, which I estimate to be no more than 3 or 4 million. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 22:58, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Some questions:

[edit] Information sourcing, verifiability, reliability

The area of information sourcing, verifiability, and reliability is a difficult problem and that problem really comes to a head in list articles like this. I don't want to challenge this just now at e.g. WT:V, but I think that this article attempts to sidestep the WP:V guideline that, "Articles and posts on Wikipedia or other open wikis should never be used as third-party sources." Two possible reactions to this are "never say never" and/or WP:IAR. IMHO, in this particular case neither of those reactions is unreasonable. Still.....

Without belaboring things, let me point to one example of a problem. The current version of this article puts the U.S. population at 251,388,301 in a table column footnoted The population figures are based on List of countries by population. The wikipedia article mentioned in the footnote currently puts the U.S. population at 302,495,015. How many other figures are out of sync? I dunno. Are there any serious disconnects between the two articles? I dunno.

One possible improvement might be to adopt a scheduled synchronization policy and add "as of {last sync date}" to the footnote pointing to the source. That's easy, but doesn't feel right to me. An enhancement to this possible improvement might be to remove the tables which rely on List of countries by population to templates, and to have a bot update the templates. The tables in the templates could each have a bot-updated footnote saying something like: "The information in this table was extracted from List of countries by population as of {date & time}. See that article for the latest figures and for citations of supporting sources."

Note: see related discussion here. Perhaps these discussions should be consolidated on WT:V.

Comments? -- Boracay Bill 02:16, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

I like the idea of a bot updated footnote. Haven't read the discussion on WT:V and WP:V. Will do so when I can find some time. Thanks for initiating this discussion. Regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 05:08, 11 September 2007 (UTC)


I'd like to tack on a request that we should put a column to show the percent of a country's population speaks English. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.207.32.64 (talk) 01:10, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Where's Brazil?

Where's Brazil on the list? --189.33.220.38 00:01, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Reliability of supporting sources for recent changes

I've reverted this change. If I have it wrong, re-revert and please explain how I've got it wrong.

I'm not an expert in the subject matter here, but I've been following recent discussions about source reliability at WT:V. One wonders how the supporting source reliability stacks up in support of the assertion that India has 350M English-speakers (I'm not arguing that this assertion is untrue, I'm questioning the reliability of the source cited in support of this assertion). Also, does not the source cited in support of the assertion that the U.S. has only 251,388,301 English-speakers actually say that the U.S. has that many people who speak English at home? -- Boracay Bill 11:27, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

You did right to revert. Please see my post above here. The previous statistics for India and China were not accurate (as I explain there). Fowler&fowler«Talk» 05:02, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Nigeria's Pidgin English

Should we be including Nigeria's population when they're speaking Pidgin English? Isn't that a bit misleading? --seav 10:18, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

  • How different is it from standard English, considering the other groups we call "English speakers"? WilyD 13:11, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
As far as I am aware (and I'm sure I could find a reliable reference for this) Nigerian Pidgin is not a dialect of standard English. The numbers of speakers of Nigerian Standard English is less than 500 thousand, but I haven't been able to find a good source for it yet. See my query about it above. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 05:12, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
Does anybody really believe that there are more native speakers of English in Nigeria than there are in Ireland? "English as a first language, however, remains an exclusive preserve of a small minority of the country's urban elite, and is not spoken at all in some rural areas." The numbers are also suspiciously round. RandomCritic 19:45, 22 September 2007 (UTC)
The comment in the table for Nigeria does say, "Figures are for speakers of Nigerian Pidgin.", a source for the figures is cited in the comment (per WP:V), the cited supporting source does support the figures and does appear to be a reliable source. There may or may not be a valid argument to be made on either side of the question, "Should speakers of Nigerian Pidgin should be considered part of Nigeria's English-speaking population?" -- Boracay Bill 00:36, 23 September 2007 (UTC)
First of all, that note is _not_ present in the "List in order of native speakers", which simply and without comment claims that there are four million native speakers of English in Nigeria. This is not true. Second, the source cited is quite clear in referring to Nigerian Pidgin, as used by its native speakers, as a creole -- that is, an independent language wholly distinct from English, with its own grammar and vocabulary, as distinct from English as Kreyol is from French. The argument not only "may or may not be... made" that the speakers of NP should not be enumerated among English speakers, but is correct and should prevail. RandomCritic 18:08, 23 September 2007 (UTC)
This article is on my watchlist and I do keep an eye on it (hence this exchange), but I don't consider myself a primary contributer to it. Nevertheless, following WP:BB, I have removed the Rank column from the first table, made the table sortable by column, and removedthe second table entirely. I have also added a footnote to the table with a disclaimer about Nigerian pidgin. If there is strong feeling among watchers of this page that I have been too bold here, please revert the change and add a note to the second table that the data presented there comes from the source identified in the first table. -- Boracay Bill 02:11, 24 September 2007 (UTC)
I have reverted your edit. Ordering them according to rank, but (simply) not mentioning the rank, doesn't make much sense to me; in addition, it creates the potential for more trouble down the road, if people (for reasons unbeknownst) decide to change ranks or introduce new countries in the table. This page has been riven in the past by edits motivated both by nationalism and by "one book expertise," (i.e. based on someone reading one book, and then footnoting it everywhere.) It needs more constraints (like the rank column), not less. Similarly, the native speakers table is important. In addition to providing information, it serves as a touchstone for some healthy skepticism with regards the first list. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 11:09, 24 September 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Fowler&fowler (talk • contribs)

[edit] Native speakers in Germany & other non-ES nations

The figure for native speakers in Germany (272,000) is striking, especially since it doesn't include non-German NATO personnel, and it makes me think that similar proportions may be present in France, Italy, Netherlands, Japan, China and other major economies, for which we do not have comparable figures. It is possible counts are not done because of political sensitivities. Can anyone provide this data? Grant | Talk 11:25, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

I suspect that what we actually have for Germany is the number of citizens of predominantly English-speaking countries (the UK, Ireland, Canada, the US, Australia, New Zealand) registered in Germany, and that we are extrapolating from that the number of native English speakers. Since other countries aren't as obsessive about keeping track of who lives in them as Germany is, we're unlikely to have those statistics for other countries. —Angr 15:10, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

To talk about other ES members:

I really do think that the estimate of France is to high, nothing bad to be said about the French but the knowledge of English with French citizens is virtually of non existance. I couldn't find a proof of what has been said on the EU website can anyone provide me with evidence. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.210.35.4 (talk) 22:45, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Unranked EU entry

The introduction of the unranked EU entry in Wikipedia lists has been thoroughly discussed Talk:European Union/inclusion in lists of countries.

The most significant arguments for it´s inclusion in lists are:

a) Country like characteristics: Common market, common policies, common institutions, bodies, agencies, common EU legislation, a single budget financing projects in all member states. Its own budget to fund common programmes such as the European Union's programmes in agriculture, research and education. A common fund for trans-country infrastructure projects and for regional development. Election every 5 years and a European parliament as well as a EU court of justice, common currency Euro, EU-Day (holiday), EU-Licenseplate , EU-Anthem, EU-Citizenship, Schengen agreement, one representation of all 27 member states in WTO, Permanent G8 participant, Permanent UN observer. Common Policy Examples in the city of Berlin: The EU is financing infrastructure, education, social projects etc. In official press conferences and gatherings the national flag stands next to the EU flag.
b) already ranked in several other media and statistics like CIA WorldFactBook, IMF data sheet, Wikipedia List of countries by GDP (PPP) etc.
c) The significant degree of integrated policies leads to the necessity of the inclusion for comparative reasons. Because of the sui generis status, the 27 member states will remain as single entry and the EU becomes unranked.
d) Note that the inclusion of the EU is granted to its advanced sui generis status and can not advocate the inclusion of Opec, Nato, African Union, UN, Commonwealth, Arab League, Mercosur, NAFTA, ASEAN and others. The degree of a state-like-entity and its characteristics make this a singular case.

Lear 21 (talk) 19:08, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

The result of the the discussion you linked to was inconclusive. Please stop adding the EU to this list. This particular comment there is very telling: Perhaps if Lear would like to vandalise the pages again it might get people back. Otherwise there is no conclusion that can be drawn, except we disagree. - BillCJ (talk) 19:41, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


How about giving a nod to the EU like so in the lead in text:
  • Flag of Europe The European Union is a sui generis supranational and intergovernmental political body. The entity is composed of 27 member states. The total english speaking population of the territories of the 27 member states is 229,850,000 including 61,850,000 native speakers and 168,000,000 non native speakers. Crystal (2005), p. 109, UK and Ireland total. Non-native speakers: 2006 Eurobarometer survey. Covered EU citizens aged 15 years or more. EU is not ranked as it is not a country.
Zebulin (talk) 23:57, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

Arguments a)-d) remain. The Quote of user:Jlogan is a singular provocative opinion. BTW JLogan has voted for the inclusion. The vast majority has voted AND argued for it as well. Lear 21 (talk) 21:27, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

I don't know what to say. This is the first time I've seen a no-consensus discussion with no outcome used to enforce a POV. It's obvious all you will do is revert war to get your way, and I've no inclination to endure an RFC or ARBCOM against you right now. I'll drop it here for now, but in no way I am conceeding to any of your points. - BillCJ (talk) 23:19, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

Not my points for sure. The raised arguments are collected and approved by at least 13 editors. I´m rather re-enacting the decision. all the best Lear 21 (talk) 00:09, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

I've commented at Talk:European Union/inclusion in lists of countries. Additionally, I'll remark that there's a similar discussion going on at Talk:List of countries and outlying territories by total area which mentions the CIA World Fact Book: Preliminary statement on EU entry, which gives the Factbook's rationale for including an EU entry in their list of countries. I'm not saying that this article should (or should not) necessarily follow their rationale, but it's something to consider.
Also, I'm a bit confused by
Rank Country Total First language As an additional language Comment
— European Union 229,850,000 61,850,000 168,000,000 Native speakers: Crystal (2005), p. 109, UK and Ireland total.

Non-native speakers: 2006 Eurobarometer survey. Covered EU citizens aged 15 years or more. EU is not ranked as it is not a country.
I don't have access to Crystal (2005) and cannot check page 109 of that (though "UK and Ireland total" does make me wonder about it). I have checked Eurobarometer survey, and I can't find a figure in there for the number of First-language English speakers (I probably missed finding a figure which is in there somewhere). It does say that 38% of EUers listed English as a non-mother-tongue language known well enough to have a conversation. The CIA Factbook puts the EU population at 490,426,060, and original research computations based on that suggest that about (490,426,060 * 0.38 =) 186,361,903 EUers speak English in addition to a non-English mother tongue. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 01:17, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

The EU figures seem to derive from the Eurobarometer poll. It is the base of most of the European country entries in this list. Lear 21 (talk) 16:17, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] China?

Where's China besides Hong Kong on this list? Sseballos (Talk to Me) 01:43, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] The inclusion of pidgin and creole varieties complicates the issue

The table correctly annotates where pidgin and creole varieties of English are included in the figures, but this makes the figures very hard to interpret. The case of Surinam is particularly misleading. The figure is attributed to Crystal (2005:109) but I am really not sure why Crystal included it. The creole in question, Sranan Tongo, has a historical connection with English but I dont think anyone, least of all its speakers, would call it a 'variety of English' or a 'dialect of English'. There is absolutely minimal mutual intelligibility with any variety of English, and English is really a foreign language in Surinam, though no doubt there are a few first language speakers and quite a lot of people will have learnt it at school (Dutch is the language of education). Counting Surinam as a country with a high proportion of English speakers is simply wrong in my view. The situation in Jamaica and Trinidad, for example (other countries where a creole is the vernacular) is more complex because in those countries, English is the language of education, and the creole speakers themselves in many cases regard themselves as speaking English, even though linguists might call that into question.

84.43.96.30 (talk) 16:31, 7 December 2007 (UTC) MarkS

[edit] Gordon Brown

Does he really know how many people speak English in China?--200.138.43.245 (talk) 01:08, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Of course not. Some speech writer who hurriedly grabbed a sentence from David Crystal's outdated (and highly inaccurate) book.

See my discussion India's exaggerated numbers above.

  • This issue (and specifically this Wikipedia article) has been addressed by the organization, TESOL-India (Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages)] site India: World's Second Largest English-Speaking Country. Their web site explains the difference between the 350 million number mentioned on this Wikpidedia page and the more plausible 100 million number:
“ "Wikipedia's India estimate of 350 million includes two categories - "English Speakers" and "English Users". The distinction between the Speakers and Users is that Users only know how to read English words while Speakers know how to read English, understand spoken English as well as form their own sentences to converse in English. The distinction becomes clear when you consider the China numbers. China has over 200~350 million users that can read English words but, as anyone can see on the streets of China, only handful of million who are English speakers." ”
  • Here is also the article "India." Encyclopædia Britannica. 2008. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 20 February 2008 India: The lingua francas: "English, a remnant of British colonial rule, is the most widely used lingua franca. It is, however, claimed as the mother tongue by only a small number of Indians and is spoken fluently by less than 5 percent of the population."
I am reverting the edits by the IP editor to the last stable version of this article. Regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 09:14, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] UPDATE!!!

Update the Philippines natives speakers.... Its so outdated...1995?....I'm a native speaker and born in 1995....but I don't count because the poll was taken after my birthday

This should be updated when there is a reliable source of verifiable information to support the updated figure. The source cited in support of the current figure is supported by data from the Philippine census of 2000. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 02:34, 28 February 2008 (UTC)