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Europeans & languages- EU survey | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Philological Room |  | |
| iguanamon Pentaglot Senior Member Virgin Islands Speaks: Ladino Joined 5263 days ago 2241 posts - 6731 votes  Speaks: English*, Spanish, Portuguese, Haitian Creole, Creole (French) | Message 1 of 7 30 June 2012 at 2:37am | IP Logged | |||||
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Your taxpayer's Euros at work. The EU has just released a survey relating to European languages: The Eurobarometer June 2012 European Languages Survey pdf It's 149 pages and I haven't finished it yet but there are loads of language related charts and statistics.
Extracts: "The EU encourages all citizens to be multilingual, with the long-term objective that every citizen has practical skills in at least two languages in addition to his or her mother tongue. This survey has been undertaken with the overall objectives of understanding European citizens’ experiences and perceptions of multilingualism. As well as spoken ability, the study examines the level of understanding and use of other languages, learning behaviour, attitudes towards learning or improving language skills, perceptions of the most useful languages, views on EU policy in relation to language use and the role that translation has." More tidbits: "- In accordance with the EU population, the most widely spoken mother tongue is German (16%), followed by Italian and English (13% each), French (12%), then Spanish and Polish (8% each). - For the majority of Europeans their mother tongue is one of the official languages of the country in which they reside. - Just over half of Europeans (54%) are able to hold a conversation in at least one additional language, a quarter (25%) are able to speak at least two additional languages and one in ten (10%) are conversant in at least three. - Almost all respondents in Luxembourg (98%), Latvia (95%), the Netherlands (94%), Malta (93%), Slovenia and Lithuania (92% each), and Sweden (91%) say that they are able to speak at least one language in addition to their mother tongue. - Countries showing the most notable increases in the proportion of respondents saying that they are able to speak at least one foreign language well enough to hold a conversation, compared to data from the previous edition of the Eurobarometer survey, are Austria (+16 percentage points to 78%), Finland (+6 points to 75%), and Ireland (+6 points to 40%). - In contrast the proportion able to speak at least one foreign language has decreased notably in Slovakia (-17 percentage points to 80%), the Czech Republic (-12 points to 49%), Bulgaria (-11 points to 48%), Poland (-7 points to 50%), and Hungary (-7 points to 35%). In these countries there has been a downward shift since 2005 in the proportions able to speak foreign languages such as Russian and German. - Few countries show a noticeable increase in the proportion of respondents able to speak at least two foreign languages, with the most marked being in Italy (+6 percentage points to 22%) and Ireland (+5 points to 18%). However nine Member States show a significant drop of more than 5 percentage points: Belgium (-16 percentage points to 50%), Hungary (-14 points to 13%), Bulgaria (-12 points to 19%), Poland (-10 points to 22%), Portugal (-10 points to 13%), Malta (-9 points to 59%), Luxembourg (-8 points to 84%), Denmark (-8 points to 58%), and Estonia (-6 points to 52%). - Countries where respondents are least likely to be able to speak any foreign language are Hungary (65%), Italy (62%), the UK and Portugal (61% in each), and Ireland (60%). - The five most widely spoken foreign languages remain English (38%), French (12%), German (11%), Spanish (7%) and Russian (5%)." EDIT: The pdf report is also available in French and German here: Eurobaromètre Rapport Spezial Eurobarometer Bericht Edited by iguanamon on 30 June 2012 at 1:49pm 11 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| tanya b Senior Member United States Joined 4779 days ago 159 posts - 518 votes Speaks: Russian | Message 2 of 7 30 June 2012 at 3:13am | IP Logged | |||||
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I am struck by the fact that "only" 39% of English respondents are proficient in 2 or more languages, making them way way ahead of the US, the country they are most often compared with on this forum. And yet by EU standards, they are considered linguistically backward.
What percentage of respondents in England are actually citizens? I'm sure many English bilinguals are of Pakistani descent, along with Arabs and Eastern Europeans. Welsh and Gaelic speakers are just a drop in the bucket. Why are there so many trilinguals in Latvia and Lithuania, but significantly fewer in neighboring Estonia? Edited by tanya b on 30 June 2012 at 3:27am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Globe-trotter Triglot Newbie Netherlands Joined 4598 days ago 29 posts - 44 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, German Studies: Thai | Message 3 of 7 30 June 2012 at 12:06pm | IP Logged | |||||
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The United Kingdom has many languages, such as Irish, Gaelic, Scots, Welsh, etc. Also,
London, for example, is the sixth French-speaking city of Europe. I don't see your statistics for the Baltic states. Estonia and Lithuania have 52%, while Latvia has 54%. Edited by Globe-trotter on 30 June 2012 at 12:17pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Medulin Tetraglot Senior Member Croatia Joined 4669 days ago 1199 posts - 2192 votes Speaks: Croatian*, English, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Norwegian, Hindi, Nepali | Message 4 of 7 30 June 2012 at 4:42pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Too bad Croatia was not included in this report, we will be joining the EU in 366 days. The 2005 report included Croatia (as well as Turkey), for Croatia the results were:
49% speak English 34% speak German 14% speak Italian 4% speak French 4% speak Russian 2% speak Spanish http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_the_European_Union #Knowledge German has seen a drop from 2005 because more German than French speaking Turkey and Croatia were not included in this report. So, you have to read between the lines, there was no absolute drop, only a relative drop because of this, different methodology. Edited by Medulin on 30 June 2012 at 4:56pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Марк Senior Member Russian Federation Joined 5057 days ago 2096 posts - 2972 votes Speaks: Russian* | Message 5 of 7 30 June 2012 at 5:10pm | IP Logged | |||||
The problem with all that statistics is that people just claim they speak this or that language, if they have learned it somewhere (usually at school), that's why there are so many French speakers in the UK, for example. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| iguanamon Pentaglot Senior Member Virgin Islands Speaks: Ladino Joined 5263 days ago 2241 posts - 6731 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Portuguese, Haitian Creole, Creole (French) | Message 6 of 7 30 June 2012 at 5:17pm | IP Logged | |||||
I saw this on the BBC website a month ago. The number of French speakers listed in the UK isn't just down to school leavers with A levels. London, France's sixth biggest city Edited by iguanamon on 30 June 2012 at 5:19pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| schoenewaelder Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5561 days ago 759 posts - 1197 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: German, Spanish, Dutch | Message 7 of 7 30 June 2012 at 6:40pm | IP Logged | |||||
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One of the things that really surprised me when I started language learning, and continues to surprise me, is how little concrete support the EU gives to actual language learning. I really can hardly think of a single thing that they could do that would be more useful generally, and for European integration in particular.
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