37 million people speak Ukrainian natively; a further 15 million speak it as a second language
4 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Catalan has six dialects: Alguerese, Balearic, Rousellonese, Central Catalan, Northwestern Catalan and Valencian
4 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
87% of Peruvians speak Spanish natively, with the country being home to five distinct versions of the language
4 year(s) ago
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Amit
Fact
4 year(s) ago
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The Icelandic language has remained so true to its origins that 12th century texts can still be read by school children today
4 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Many of the languages spoken in Peru are unclassified due to the lack of interaction between the communities that speak them and the rest of the world
4 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Iceland is ranked as the hardest of the Germanic languages for English speakers to learn
4 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
The Amazon rainforest is home to around 40 languages, which include more than 100 variations
4 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Norway is home to two official languages: Norwegian and Sami
4 year(s) ago
1
1
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Argentina is the only country in Latin America that is classed as having a "high aptitude" in the English language
4 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
The most frequently used letters in the French language are E, A and S
4 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Just 5% of Portuguese speakers live in Portugal
4 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
The Philippines is home to between 120 and 187 languages, depending on how you classify them
4 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Southeast Asia is home to 655 million people, who between them speak almost 800 languages
4 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Malaysia is home to 137 living languages
5 year(s) ago
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94% of Indonesians speak Bahasa Indonesia, but just 20% speak it as their primary language
5 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
There is plenty of debate among linguists as to which languages should and shouldn't be included in the Nilo-Saharan language group
5 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
The Zulu language has been spoken in Africa since the 14th century AD
5 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
The four main language groups in Ethiopia are Semitic, Cushitic, Omotic and Nilo-Saharan
5 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Japan is known as the land of the rising sun - Japan and Nihon, which the Japanese call their country, both mean 'where the sun rises'
5 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Arabic has around 14 words that describe the different stages of falling and being in love
5 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Despite the country being home to 250+ native tongues, English and French are the official languages of Cameroon
5 year(s) ago
1
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Tomedes
Ehtiopia is home to 86 indigenous languages
5 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Tanzania is home to 126 languages, making it the most linguistically diverse country in East Africa
5 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Zimbabwe holds the world record for the most official languages, with 16
5 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Catalan has more similarities with French and Italian than it does with Spanish
5 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
The most spoken language in Europe (including both L1 and L2 speakers) is English
5 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
1 in 5 Russians doesn't speak Russian natively. However, most of these individuals do speak it as a second language
5 year(s) ago
1
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Tomedes
Zulu is the most commonly spoken language in South Africa, where 24% of people speak it at home
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Romanian is the only Romance language to have prevailed in Eastern Europe
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
The most spoken indigenous language in South America - and the third most spoken overall (after Spanish and Portuguese) - is Quechua
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Swahili is the most spoken language in Africa, with between 100 million and 150 million speakers
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
The Atlantic-Congo language group is the largest by number of languages - it contains 1,432 languages
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Though it borders the United States, Canada's English resembles that used in England more than the English used in the US
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
The most spoken Native American language is Navajo, which has 170,000 speakers
5 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Pidgin languages have a simpler grammatical structure and more limited vocabulary than other languages, including creoles
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Roughly 100 Creole languages have come into existence since 1500
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
No country outside Europe has German as its official language
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Equatorial Guinea is the only country in Africa where Spanish is an official language
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Within the European Union, German is more widely spoken than English
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Afrikaans is one of the world's youngest official languages, having only been declared a 'real language' by the South African government in 1925
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Japan's three levels of formality all have their own grammatical quirks
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
35% of Swahili vocabulary comes from Arabic
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Canada is home to more than 70 indigenous languages
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
The Russian language has only about 200,000 words, many of which have multiple meanings
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
90-95% of Afrikaans is of Dutch origin
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Many people consider Dutch to be the easiest language for native English speakers to learn, due to their shared Germanic roots
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
While 22.8% of Canadians speak French, they are not evenly spread across the country; 85.4% of them live in Quebec
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
The two languages of space are English and Russian - astronauts have to learn both and the ISS computer system uses both
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
According to Ethnologue, there are 18 pidgin languages currently in use around the world
5 year(s) ago
0
0
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Tomedes
Tagalog and Filipino are not the same: the former is an ethnic language, while the latter is a blend of eight language variants spoken in the Philippines
5 year(s) ago
0
0
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Tomedes
The MÄori language is undergoing a major push to halt its extinction; at present, 3.7% of New Zealand's population can hold a conversation in MÄori
5 year(s) ago
0
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0
Tomedes
Despite its geographic proximity to the US, Canadian English is closer to British English than it is to US English
5 year(s) ago
0
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0
Tomedes
Africa is home to 1,500-3,000 languages, including over 75 languages with more than a million speakers each
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Half the world is bilingual
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Danish has three vowels more than English: Æ, Ø and Å
5 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Although 33% of Moroccans speak French, only Standard Arabic and Tamazight are official languages in Morocco
5 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Croatian used to be written in three different alphabets (Cyrillic, Glagolitic and Latin) but has been written in Gaj’s Latin alphabet since the 19th century
5 year(s) ago
0
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0
Tomedes
Although over 80% of people in Lithuania speak Lithuanian as their first language, it has only been an official language there since 1991
5 year(s) ago
1
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Tomedes
Australian English is usually split into three main kinds: Broad, General and Cultivated Australian English
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Swedish did not legally become the official language of Sweden until 2009 (although it has been the country's de facto primary language for much longer)
5 year(s) ago
0
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0
Tomedes
The Danish language has a phonological feature called stød, which changes the pronunciation of words. It sounds a bit like a small hiccup or creak and is challenging for non-native speakers to master.
5 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Very few English words originate from Russian. Some of those that do include cosmonaut, pogrom, mammoth and vodka
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Portuguese is the second fastest growing European language in the world (English is the first)
5 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
There are two words in Italian with eight consecutive vowels: ghiaiaiuolo (someone who sells/produces gravel) and cuoiaiuolo (someone who sells/produces leather goods)
6 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Danish, Swedish and Norwegian are all derived from Old Norse and are mutually intelligible
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
The longest word in German - Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz - has become obsolete as it was deemed too impractical to use (it means: “the law concerning the delegation of duties for the supervision of cattle marking and the labeling of beefâ€)
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Arabic loanwords and other words derived from Arabic can be found in most European languages, as well as Asian and African languages
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
The longest word in Polish has 54 letters - it is DziewięćsetdziewięćdziesiÄ™ciodziewiÄ™cionarodowoÅ›ciowego, roughly meaning “of nine-hundred and ninety-nine nationalitiesâ€
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Tonal languages exist around the world, but are most common in East/Southeast Asia, sub-Saharan Africa and Mexico
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Around half of the languages in the world have no written form
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Lithuanian is the oldest surviving Indo-European language
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
The Italian alphabet only has 21 letters - it doesn't include j, k, w, x or y
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
"E" is the most commonly used letter in French
6 year(s) ago
1
0
0
Tomedes
Turkish is spoken natively on two continents, but in only one country
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Although 98% of Brazilians speak Portuguese, the country is also home to 274 indigenous languages
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
India is home to 22 'scheduled languages' which are state/regional languages that are recognised by its constitution
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
There are about 60 different varieties and dialects of Romani. They can be grouped into Balkan Romani, Northern Romani, Central Romani and Vlax Romani
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
There are well over 200 known Indo-Aryan languages
6 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
Swahili is the easiest African language for English speakers to learn. Like English, it lacks lexical tone. It also includes several adopted English words!
6 year(s) ago
0
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0
Tomedes
13% of the US population speak Spanish natively - that's around 41 million people
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Africa is home to over 5 million native Portuguese speakers
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
The letters k, y and w only became part of the Portuguese alphabet in 2009, after they were added as a result of the influx of English words
6 year(s) ago
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Tomedes
German is the most widely spoken language in the European Union – ahead of Spanish, French and even English
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
The earliest form of old Hindi was Apabhramsa
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Pidgin languages tend to develop where two communities need to interact but don't have a common tongue
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
The Basque language has seven distinct dialects
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
French has only 76 million native speakers, but 235 million daily, fluent speakers (plus another 77-110 million second language speakers)
6 year(s) ago
0
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0
Tomedes
Spanish words are longer than English words. Expect text expansion of 15-25% when you translate from English to Spanish
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
People who use sign language have regional accents
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Mongolian has at least 8 different writing systems
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
The oldest records of the Egyptian language date from around 3400 BC
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Russian is the second most spoken language on the internet
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Europe only accounts for around 3% of the world's indigenous languages
6 year(s) ago
0
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Tomedes
Japanese verbs aren't conjugated, making them much easier to learn
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Despite not being one of the country's 22 official scheduled languages, English is the second most spoken language in India
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The French language has around 130,000 words; English has just over 170,000
6 year(s) ago
0
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0
Tomedes
The literal translation of China is 'Middle Kingdom'
6 year(s) ago
0
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0
Tomedes
There are seven different honorifics in the Korean language, each of which uses a different verb ending. In North Korea, the Great Leader has a verb ending all of his own
6 year(s) ago
1
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0
Tomedes
The Korean language has two counting systems - one for numbers up to 99 and the other for numbers up to 99 and beyond
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
New Collins Dictionary words in 2019 included: double down, influencer, hopepunk, non-binary and deepfake
6 year(s) ago
0
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0
Tomedes
Collins Dictionary's 'word of the year' for 2019 was "climate strike"
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
World Bank: "Gendered languages are associated with worse labor market participation rates for women and more regressive gender norms"
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Written Spanish has been traced as far back as 9th century medieval documents called the Cartularies of Valpuesta
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Spanish is descended from Latin, but with significant Arabic influences
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The Royal Spanish Academy is the official custodian of the Spanish language
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Research has shown that gendered language may limit women's opportunities, according to the World Bank
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Spanish is considered fairly easy to learn, as it is a phonetic language with a vast global supply of books, films and other resources to aid learning
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
38% of the world's population speaks a gendered language
6 year(s) ago
0
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0
Tomedes
Spanish is an official language in 21 countries
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Canada derives its name from the St Lawrence Iroquoian word kanata, which means village or settlement
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The world's second largest French speaking city is Kinshasa, the capital of the Congo
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The Florentine dialect has become Italy's national language, beating many other regional dialects
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
In 2018, Chinese overtook German as the third most studied language in the UK
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Despite the fact that people all over the world do ballet, the terminology is mainly in French
6 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Books, movies and TV shows have led to the creation of more than 200 artificial languages
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The word 'alphabet' originates from the first two letters of the Greek alphabet - 'alpha' and 'beta'
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Russian was the first language ever spoken in outer space
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Most people agree that the thousands of languages we use today are all descended from one initial language
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The origins of language are lost to time: some believe it was a divine gift, while others believe that humans began to imitate the sounds animals make
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The country name 'Mexico' means 'Navel of the Moon' in Nahuatl: "mexitli" is made up of "metztli" (moon) and "xictli" (navel)
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The Pope's most followed Twitter account is his Spanish language one (he tweets in 9 languages in total)
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Learning another language has benefits for your memory and can help stave off dementia for up to five years
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
21 countries speak Spanish as one of their official languages
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Spanish has incorporated around 4,000 Arabic words into the modern version of its language
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
More than 300 languages are now spoken in London
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Chinese speakers use both sides of the brain when talking, while English speakers use only the left
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Asia and Africa combined account for around 2/3 of all languages
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
There are more than 200 different Hawaiian words for 'rain'
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Over 1.5 million Americans are native French speakers
7 year(s) ago
1
0
0
Tomedes
Different languages and cultures use different degrees of physical contact as part of their communication
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The first ever printed book was written in German
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Spain (España) takes its name from Ispania, which the Carthaginians named it around 300 BC - literally meaning 'land of rabbits'
7 year(s) ago
1
0
0
Tomedes
In Indonesian, “air†means “waterâ€
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Japanese uses three different writing systems: Kanji, Katakana, and Hiragana
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Mexico has more Spanish-speakers than any other country, followed by the US
7 year(s) ago
1
0
0
Tomedes
Speaking Mandarin Chinese enables you to speak to 13% of the world’s population
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Hindi didn’t become the official language of India until 1965
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The word - or rather, sound - 'mmhmm' doesn't appear in the dictionary yet is used daily by English speakers to mean 'yes'
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
To read novels in another language, you need to learn around 8,000 to 9,000 lemmas (root words and all their inflections)
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
A trigraph is the use of 3 letters to make the sound of 1, such as 'igh' making the same sound as 'i' in English, or 'tea' making the same sound as 't'
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
To understand TV/film dialogue sufficiently in another language, you need to learn around 3,000 lemmas
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The letter 'e' is the most commonly used letter in English, whether considered as the most frequently used in text or in the vocabulary as a whole
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Learning 800 of the most frequently used lemmas and their inflections (word families) in English means you will understand 75% of daily conversation
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Learning 800 of the most frequently used lemmas (word families) in English means you will understand 75% of daily conversation
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Studies have shown that native speakers typically know 15,000 to 20,000 lemmas (word families) in their first language
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
A word family - or lemma - is a root word and all its inflections, e.g.: swim, swam, swimming; or red, reddish, reddest, etc.
7 year(s) ago
3
0
0
Tomedes
The English language has some 47,156 obsolete words
7 year(s) ago
1
0
0
Tomedes
There are estimated to be 171,146 words currently in use in the English language
7 year(s) ago
1
0
0
Tomedes
The largest language by number of words is Korean, with more than 1.1 million words. Turkish, in second place, has just over 616,000
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
A digraph is the use of two letters to make a single sound, e.g. ph
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Tautology refers to the saying of the same thing twice over in different words, and is generally considered to be a fault of style (e.g. they arrived one after the other in succession)
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
In the Nigerian village of Ubang, the men and women speak different languages, yet can understand each other perfectly
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The oldest known written language dates back to Yangshao culture pottery from China, dated around 4500 BC
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The smallest alphabet is that of Rotokas, which has just 11-12 letters
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Welsh is still spoken in Patagonia, Argentina, after Welsh settlers travelled there in 1865
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Basque is the only language in Europe not known to be related to any other language
7 year(s) ago
2
0
0
Tomedes
In Japan, a man sued national broadcaster NHK for 'mental distress' due to its use of loan words borrowed from English
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The easiest language for English speakers to learn is Frisian, which is native to part of the Netherlands, as it sounds similar and has a shared history
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Esperanto was created in 1887 by Dr L Zamenhof as a language that would allow people who speak different native languages to communicate while retaining their own languages and cultural identities
7 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Tolkien referred to 12 artificial languages in Lord of the Rings, but only two were well developed - Quenya and Sindarin
7 year(s) ago
3
0
0
Tomedes
Eastern Siberia, Northern Australia and the Northwest Pacific Plateau in the US are hotspots for endangered languages
8 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Languages are dying at a rate of one per fortnight
8 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
25% of the world's population has at least some knowledge of English
8 year(s) ago
1
0
0
Tomedes
There are 2,200 languages in Asia
8 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
12.4% of the world's population speaks Mandarin as a first language
8 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The artificial Esperanto language has up to 2 million speakers, but only 1,000-2,000 people speak it natively from birth
8 year(s) ago
2
0
0
Tomedes
There are only two living Baltic languages: Latvian and Lithuanian
8 year(s) ago
3
0
0
Tomedes
The word pulveratricious means three very different things: 1. (of birds) nesting on the ground; 2. dust-colored; and 3. covered with dust
8 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
90% of communication occurs using just 500 words
8 year(s) ago
2
0
0
Tomedes
Most countries in Europe have several regional or minority languages, some of which have official status
8 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The most widely used non-European languages in Europe are Arabic, Chinese and Hindi
8 year(s) ago
2
0
0
Tomedes
90% of communication occurs using just 500 words
8 year(s) ago
1
0
0
Tomedes
Russia has the highest number of languages spoken on its territory: from 130 to 200 depending on the criteria
8 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The separation of the Korean nations in 1953 has resulted in increasing differences among the several dialects of the Korean language, with North Koreans borrowing Russian terms while South Koreans borrow extensively from English
8 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
"Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo." is a grammatically correct sentence in American English. It is an example of homonyms and homophones creating complicated linguistic constructs through lexical ambiguity.
8 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The verb 'to table' has opposite meanings in the UK and US. In the UK, it means to begin considering a proposal. In the US, it means to suspend a motion.
8 year(s) ago
1
0
0
Tomedes
I.e. - meaning 'in other words' - is an abbreviation of the Latin 'id est'
8 year(s) ago
1
0
0
Tomedes
E.g. - meaning 'for example' - is an abbreviation of the Latin 'exempli gratia'
8 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
The town name “Scheveningen” was used as a code word by Dutch resistance fighters because Germans could not pronounce it correctly
8 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia refers to an irrational fear of the number 666
8 year(s) ago
1
0
0
Tomedes
Hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia refers to an irrational fear of the number 666
8 year(s) ago
0
0
0
Tomedes
Triskaidekaphobia is a fear of the number 13
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Paraskavedekatriaphobia is the word used to describe a fear of Friday the 13th (which some consider to be extremely unlucky)
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The most translated document: Universal Declaration Of Human Rights, written by the United Nations in 1948, has been translated into 321 languages and dialects
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Portuguese is the 5th most spoken native language in the world and the 3rd in Europe
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Portuguese is the 2nd most spoken language in Latin America (after Spanish)
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English is the official language of 27 non-sovereign entities including the UN, the EU, the IOC, NATO, ASEAN, NAFTA, and the Commonwealth of Nations
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French is the official or preferred language of many international organizations, since France is one of the four largest industrial economies in the world and the second largest agricultural producer
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1 in every 10 books published worldwide is in German
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Career-wise, bilingualism is a strong asset and it is said that in certain fields, bilingual candidates can earn up to 20% more than monolinguals
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Career-wise, bilingualism is a strong asset and it is said that in certain fields, bilingual candidates can earn up to 20% more than monolinguals
8 year(s) ago
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Wendy kalman
When Ben Yehuda brought back Hebrew and modernized it, he had to switch up how tenses were used biblically in order to standardize them.
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Learning a foreign language has been shown to have benefits from an academic as well as an information retention point of view. Improvements include critical thinking skills, creativity and flexibility of the mind
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South Africa holds a Guinness World record for having the most official languages in the world, with 11
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Nearly every African country was at one time a colony, therefore many of the population speak English, French or Portuguese as their first or second language
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Danish was the official language of Norway until about 1830 and of Iceland until 1944
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In Albania, shaking your head means ‘yes’ whilst nodding means ‘no’
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There was only one code during World War II that was never broken by the enemy and was used by the US Army. Navajo soldiers, called Codetalkers, developed a radio code based on their native language. It was the only way US soldiers on the battlefiel
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Besides Wales, Argentina is the only other country where Welsh is spoken by a significant minority thanks to settlers that inhabited Patagonia nearly 200 years ago
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840 (almost 1/7) of all the languages on Earth are spoken in 1 country…Papua New Guinea
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The Silbo language of La Gomera off the coast of Spain consists entirely of whistles
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There are 2,400 languages classified as being ‘endangered’
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Q is the only letter that does not occur in any of the US state names
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At 45 letters, "pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis," a lung disease, is the longest word in English
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"Euouae," a medieval music term, is the longest word in English that contains only vowels. It’s also the word with the most consecutive vowels
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"Euouae," a medieval music term, is the longest word in English that contains only vowels. It’s also the word with the most consecutive vowels
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Irish has no words for "yes" and "no" - the answer to a question contains a repetition of the verb, either with or without a negative particle
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1 out of every 8 letters written in English is an E
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Somalia is the only African country in which the entire population speaks the same language - Somali
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The shortest -ology is oology, the scientific study of eggs
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In written English, only one letter in every 510 is a Q
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Schoolmaster is an anagram of “the classroom"
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If you were to write out every number in full (one, two, three, four...), you wouldn’t use a single letter B until you reached one billion
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Only two modern English words end in “-gry”: “angry” and “hungry" - unless you count the addition of "hangry"
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The dot above the letters “i” and “j” is called a superscript dot
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"Typewriter” is one of the longest common words you can type on the top row of a typewriter
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The oldest English word that is still in use is ‘town’
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The first English dictionary was written in 1755
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The word ‘lol’ was added to the Oxford English Dictionary in 2011
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The most commonly used noun in English is ‘time’
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The most common adjective used in English is ‘good’
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A text that deliberately excludes a particular letter of the alphabet is called a lipogram
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About 100 languages rely on the Roman alphabet. Used by roughly two billion people, it's the world's most popular script
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Goddessship is the only word in the English language with a triple letter
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The history of the alphabet started in ancient Egypt. By the 27th century BC Egyptian writing had a set of some 24 hieroglyphs which are called uniliterals, to represent syllables that begin with a single consonant of their language, plus a vowel (o
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Famous pangrams include: "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" and "Pack my box with five dozen liquor jugs."
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A sentence which contains all 26 letters of the English alphabet is called a pangram
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The longest word in English which doesn't use the letter E is floccinaucinihilipilification
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1 out of every 8 letters written is an E
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The word "rhythm" is the longest English word without a vowel
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If you try to say the alphabet without moving your lips or tongue every letter will sound the same
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The 26 letters of the English alphabet make up more than 40 distinct sounds
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Despite no discernible relationship between English and Mbabaram, the word for 'dog' is the same in both languages
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Irish has no words for "yes" and "no" - the answer to a question contains a repetition of the verb, either with or without a negative particle
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Semantic satiation (semantic saturation) refers to the repetition of a word or phrase until it temporarily loses meaning for the listener/reader
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Elephants have voices that are different for each individual, in just the same way that humans do
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Koko the gorilla, born in 1971 at San Francisco Zoo, learned to sign over 1,000 words and was able to competently communicate with her trainers
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Cats only ‘meow’ when communicating with humans - they purr and hiss to communicate with other cats
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Baby chickens can cheep before they hatch: about 24 hours before hatching they cheep in response to the mother hen's clucks
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Whales and dolphins have regional accents, just as humans do
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Whales and dolphins have regional accents, just as humans do
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Bilinguals recover faster from strokes than monolinguals
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“Go!” is the shortest grammatically correct sentence in English
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Approximately one new word is added to the English language every two hours and around 4,000 new words are added to the English dictionary every year
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A polyglot is a person who can write and speak several different languages
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German and French were voted the best languages for graduates to learn to help enhance their job prospects
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Agatha Christie is the world’s most translated author
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80% of African languages have no written form
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Hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia is the fear of long words
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You speak about 4,800 words a day
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The language which has won the most Oscars for Best Foreign Film is Italian (there have been 12 winning films in Italian)
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Languages have existed since about 100,000BC
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There is a language in Mexico called Ayapaneco that is in danger of dying out because its last two remaining speakers refused to talk to one another (though they are now on speaking terms and have even opened a school to try and teach the language t
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The United Nations has 6 official languages – Arabic, Manadarin, Russian, English, French and Spanish
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The European Union has 24 official languages
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More than 70% of all the home pages on the Internet are in English
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Silbo is a variation of Spanish used to communicate over long distances in the mountains, it consists entirely of whistles
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Tolstoy’s original text for War And Peace in Russian and French contains about 460,000 words. The English translation has about 560,000.
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After The Bible, the most translated books are ‘The Little Prince’ and ‘Pinocchio’
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The Khumer language from Cambodia has the longest alphabet, with 74 letters
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Cryptophasias is the private language developed between twins
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There is a language in Botswana that consists mainly of five types of clicks
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You can us an ATM in Latin in Vatican City
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The pope tweets in nine languages
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The bible is available in 2,454 languages
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George R.R. Martin, in his A Song of Ice and Fire book series, established the nomadic horse-rearing Dothraki people. In the books Martin included very few words of the Dothraki language, but for the HBO television series David Peterson of the Langu
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There is an adaptation of Shakespeare’s Hamlet published in Klingon
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Star Trek fans have used Klingon to conduct marriage ceremonies and write songs
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The Klingon Language Institute has a quarterly journal dedicated to the fictional Klingon languge
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The fictional language Klingon was created by linguist Marc Okrand as the language of the warrior Klingon race on the TV show Star Trek
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Due to the influx of migrants and refugees, Europe has become largely multilingual. In London alone some 300 languages are spoken (Arabic, Turkish, Kurdish, Berber, Hindi, Punjabi, etc.).
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There are only 12 letters in the Hawaiian alphabet
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The word "girl" appears only once in the Bible
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"Polish" is the only word in the English language that when capitalized is changed from a noun or a verb to a nationality
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Honorificabilitudinitatibus, at 27 letters long, is the longest word consisting strictly of alternating consonants and vowels. It is the dative and ablative plural of the medieval Latin word honorificabilitudinitas, which can be translated as "the state of being able to achieve honours"
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The little dot above lower case ‘i’s and ‘j’s is called a tittle
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In Germany, Rice Krispies don’t go ‘snap, crackle and pop’ - they go ‘Knisper! Knasper! Knusper!'
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The language in which a government conducts business is the official language of that country
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The most difficult language to learn is Basque, which is spoken in northwestern Spain and southwestern France. It is not related to any other language in the world. It has an extremely complicated word structure and vocabulary
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No words in English rhyme with: "month," "orange," "silver," or "purple"
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William Shakespeare created many of the words in the English language including birthplace, blushing, torture, circumstantial, excitement, dwindle, and jaded
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"Bookkeeper" is the only word in English language with three consecutive double letters
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The English word 'infant' comes from the Latin word 'infans', meaning "unable to speak" or "speechless"
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By the age of 18 months a child usually has a vocabulary of 50 to 150 words
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The most common first words are ?mama? or ?dada?. No matter the language, the first words are usually mum or dad
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Children usually say their first words between nine and 18 months old
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There are hundreds of sign language dialects in use around the world. Each culture has developed its own form of sign language to be compatible with the language spoken in that country.
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American Sign Language (ASL) is the third most widely used language in the U.S., after English and Spanish.
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The United States has more Spanish speakers than Spain
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Almost is the longest word in the English language with all the letters in alphabetical order
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The word "queue" is the only word in the English language that is still pronounced the same way when the last four letters are removed.
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Include more from no. 16 onwards from here: http://edl.ecml.at/LanguageFun/LanguageFacts/tabid/1859/Default.aspx
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Countries can sing in any language in the Eurovision Song Contest, even made up languages
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Most European languages are either Germanic, Romance or Slavic
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Languages can have upwards of 50,000 words, but everyday conversation uses just a few hundred
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At least 50% of the world's population is bilingual
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Europe is home to around 225 indigenous languages, which account for just 3% of the world's total
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25% of the world's population has at least some knowledge of the English language
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Although English is most commonly spoken there, the US does not have an official national language
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Babies exposed to different languages in early life find it easier to learn languages when they grow up
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South Africa is the country with the largest number of official languages (it has 11)
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The Lord of the Rings includes an impressive 12 imaginary languages
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50% of educational time in Luxembourg is devoted to learning languages (English, German and French)
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There are around 50,000 characters in the Chinese language but you only need to know about 2,000 to read a newspaper
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Chinese grammar is free of tenses, genders, cases and plurals, making it surprisingly easy to grasp
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Written Chinese does not have an alphabet, with characters representing sounds. Instead, it has a system of characters that represent meaning
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In Japanese, there are at least 20 different ways to say "sorry"
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"Mamihlapinatapai" is considered the most succinct word in Yaghan and the hardest to translate. It roughly translates to "a look shared by two people, each wishing that the other will offer something that they both desire but are unwilling to suggest or offer themselves."
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The English dictionary from 1932 to 1940 included a misprinted word which had no definition, 'Dord'. ?Dord? became known as a ?ghost word?.
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There is a town called Okay, Oklahoma. On maps it is written as Okay, OK
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The first recorded use of the letter x being used to represent a kiss was in 1763
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Bookkeeper and bookkeeping are the only unhyphenated English words with three consecutive double letters
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Angry and hungry are the only two current English words that end in 'gry'
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SWIMS is an ambigram and reads the same even when turned upside down
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Ghost words are words that appear in dictionaries due to printing errors and do not actucally have a meaning
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In certain roles, multilingual employees can enjoy up to 20% higher wages than their monolingual colleagues
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Children of bilingual couples tend to have better memories and heightened intelligence than children of monolingual couples
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Language-learning improves memory, aptitude, attention span and multi-tasking abilities
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Bilingual speakers are less likely to suffer dementia as early as mononlinguists
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Chinese and Arabic are considered to be the hardest languages to learn
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Language learning is easiest up to about the age of 12, with age 7 being the peak time to learn
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2,500 of the world's languages are in danger of extinction, according to UNESCO
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Learning a second language can physically increase the size of your brain
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The United Nations has six official languages: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish
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More than 50% of all languages have no written form
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Only one English word has five consecutive vowels: queueing
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All international pilots communicate in English when they are in the sky, wherever they are from
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The longest word in English is pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis (it's a type of lung disease)
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The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog? is a pangram - it uses every letter in the English alphabet
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E' is the most used letter in English, but more words start with 's' than with any other letter
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