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Global Bilingualism Overview

Bilingualism refers to the ability to use two or more languages. It has existed throughout human history but is more prevalent in some countries like Canada, Belgium, and Switzerland where it is assumed that every citizen is bilingual. Bilingualism can be official, involving the recognition and use of two languages in government documents and dealings, or personal involving an individual's ability to speak two languages. There are no precise global statistics on bilingualism due to varying definitions but it is present in specific minority language communities within countries and sometimes uniformly throughout a population as in Paraguay. Bilingualism also exists in certain occupations and social classes and is affected by the degree of contact between language groups as seen in Belgium. Nations differ in their

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38 views1 page

Global Bilingualism Overview

Bilingualism refers to the ability to use two or more languages. It has existed throughout human history but is more prevalent in some countries like Canada, Belgium, and Switzerland where it is assumed that every citizen is bilingual. Bilingualism can be official, involving the recognition and use of two languages in government documents and dealings, or personal involving an individual's ability to speak two languages. There are no precise global statistics on bilingualism due to varying definitions but it is present in specific minority language communities within countries and sometimes uniformly throughout a population as in Paraguay. Bilingualism also exists in certain occupations and social classes and is affected by the degree of contact between language groups as seen in Belgium. Nations differ in their

Uploaded by

Olya Braga
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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1.

1 Bilingualism in the World


Bilingualism is having the ability to use two or more languages. It is a phenomenon that has existed
since the beginning of language in human history. Two or more, regularly used languages is a rather
special language phenomenon restricted to a few countries such as Canada, Belgium, or Switzerland,
where, presumably, every citizen is bilingual. Bilingualism is divided into: Official bilingualism
refers to the policy adopted by some states of recognizing two languages as official and producing all
official documents, and handling all correspondence and official dealings. It is distinct from personal
bilingualism, the capacity of a person to speak two languages.
1.2 The Extent of Bilingualism
It is an interesting fact that no precise statistics exist concerning the number and distribution of
speakers of two or more languages in the nations of the world. This can be accounted for partly by the
fact that there is no widely accepted definition of the concept of bilingualism.
Bilingualism is also present in specific areas of some countries where linguistic minorities are
concentrated.
Bilingualism in some countries is spread throughout a population, as in Paraguay, where
Guarani-Spanish bilingualism is found in all areas.
Bilingualism is also common in certain occupations. Many diplomats know and use several
languages on a regular basis. Bilingualism may also vary according to social class. For example, all
members of the aristocracy in Czarist Russia were bi-lingual in Russian and French.
Finally, bilingualism is affected by the degree of contact between two language groups; in
Belgium for example, there is every day contact between Flemish and French speakers.
1.3 National Patterns of Bilingualism
An approach proposed by Mackey is to compare the number of languages in the world to the number
of countries. If there are about as many languages as there are nations, it will indicate that bilingualism
is not such an important phenomenon after all. Mackey points out two factors that modify this
statement somewhat, however. First, some languages are numerically more important than others
are in fact, eleven languages are spoken by as many as 70 % of the world's population. The second
factor qualifying the "many languages but few countries" statement is that some languages (are
spoken natively in several countries, and others are restricted to very specific areas
1.4 The Origins of Bilingualism
Groups of people may become bilingual for a number of different reasons; among these are the
movement of the group for political, social, or economic reasons that is to say migration; political
federalism and nationalism; trade and commerce, military invasions and colonization and cultural and
educational factors
One officially monolingual nation that has a high percentage of bilinguals is Paraguay. There two
language spoken there: Spanish, which is the official language of government business, and Guarani,
which is the national language, used on various public occasions, in the media, and so on. About 90%
of the population in Paraguay use Guarani as a first language and about 60% speak Spanish. The
division of functions between Guarani and Spanish has maintained the high degree of bilingualism:
Guarani is the language of the rural areas, of the home, emotions, and friendship, whereas Spanish is
the language of public occasions, of the schools, the army, and official matters.
Finland is a bilingual country according to its constitution. This means that members of the Swedish
language minority have the right to communicate with the state authorities in their mother tongue. All
Finnish communities and towns are classified as either monolingual or bilingual. In bilingual
municipalities, all civil servants must have satisfactory language skill in either Finnish or Swedish.
The school subjects are not called Finnish or Swedish, it depends upon the pupil's mother tongue.
Although in some municipalities Swedish is the only official language, Finnish is the dominant
language in most towns and at most employers in Finland.

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