# Places with the most multilingual people. **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 11, 2012, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926 "2012-07-11T20:54:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2012, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/61 "2012-07-14T17:49:52Z")
> [@hibernicus](#): > > . . . Gibraltar is not part of the UK. I think part of the difficulty with this is that there is no easy name for the entity that includes the UK and British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies and whatnot, since “British Empire” is apparently no longer okay. Certainly something that is identified as a territory and has only 30 K people is part of another country, and that country should by rights have a name, but what is it? You can hardly say “Spain borders the British Crown,” and Gibraltar is clearly not part of the island of Great Britain or the British Isles. I think “Britain” is the best you can do for “that country ultimately governed from London, England”, but inaccurate confusion with Great Britain and the UK is bound to happen. ---
**Author:** ![hibernicus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hibernicus/32/2802_2.png) [@hibernicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hibernicus)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2012, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/62 "2012-07-15T15:34:01Z")
> [@Dr.Drake](#): > > Certainly something that is identified as a territory and has only 30 K people is part of another country This is the point where we disagree. To pick an example closer to home (for me), are you aware that the Isle of Man, for example, is not part of the UK? The reason there is no name for the entity you describe (UK and its overseas possessions) is that there is no such legal entity. It all becomes much easier if you accept that the world is divided into places that are sovereign independent countries _and places that are not_, Gibraltar being an example of the latter. Then you can just say “Spain borders France, Portugal, Andorra, Morocco and Gibraltar”. Otherwise you are led to the absurdity of claiming that Spain borders Britain. And when your logic leads you to absurdity, you have to question your premises! ---
**Author:** ![mattomic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/3ec8ea/32.png) [@mattomic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mattomic)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2012, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/63 "2012-07-15T16:54:56Z")
Over two-thirds of Montreal residents are bilingual in both English and French to some degree, with a growing number of immigrants also fluent in a third language (Italian, Arabic, Chinese, etc.) It’s not uncommon to hear conversations between people in Montreal (and the rest of Quebec, to a lesser extent) slip in and out between English and French ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2012, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/64 "2012-07-15T17:14:54Z")
> [@hibernicus](#): > > This is the point where we disagree. To pick an example closer to home (for me), are you aware that the Isle of Man, for example, is not part of the UK? Yes. The Isle of Man also has a distinct languge, culture, and history, and for a number of reasons I don’t think it’s strictly comparable to Gilbraltar. For one thing, it isn’t a British Overseas Territory, but a Crown Dependency, which is a different animal altogether. > [@hibernicus](#): > > The reason there is no name for the entity you describe (UK and its overseas possessions) is that there is no such legal entity. > > It all becomes much easier if you accept that the world is divided into places that are sovereign independent countries _and places that are not_, Gibraltar being an example of the latter. So you are arguing that the people of Gibraltar are not British. Huh. According to Wikipedia, the people of Gibraltar use British passports (which identify them as Gibraltarians). They are defended by the British military. I know they are not part of the UK, but I don’t see how you can make the argument that there is no entity legal encompassing both the UK and the territories it governs; I’d say parliament is a legal entity. ---
**Author:** ![Rhaegar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/51bf81/32.png) [@Rhaegar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rhaegar)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/65 "2012-07-16T04:26:04Z")
> [@bengangmo](#): > > “Almost everyone” is a bit of an exaggeration,(based on my anecdotal experience) but certainly a very good proportion. > > Looking specifically towards Malaysia, a Malaysian chinese will normally speak his dialect (Mandarin, Cantonese and Hokkein being most common) + English and Malay being taught at school. > > In Singapore, since 198? all school leavers are **expected** (under pain of failing their primary school leaving exam meaning they cannot proceed to secondary school) to be bi-lingual in English and Mother Tongue (Mandarin, Malay or Tamil) + many will also speak their cradle dialect. (my wife, as an example, is fluent in Mandarin and Cantonese) Yeah, Singapore for sure. When I visited there, the road signs were all in English, Chinese and Malaysian? or something. I was told that there were 3 official languages in Singapore. ---
**Author:** ![bengangmo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@bengangmo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bengangmo)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/66 "2012-07-16T05:33:01Z")
> [@Rhaegar](#): > > Yeah, Singapore for sure. When I visited there, the road signs were all in English, Chinese and Malaysian? or something. I was told that there were 3 official languages in Singapore. There’s 4 English (Lingua Franca) Malay (national language) Tamil Mandarin ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/67 "2012-07-16T06:17:36Z")
> [@Maastricht](#): > > ETA: it is nice to see that English has replaced Latin as the international language of science. (Is that the case all over the world, by the way)? The Dutch school system used to have gifted classes in highschool where kids were also taught Greek and Latin (“the Gymnasium”) . I still had those on my curriculum. Never had much use for them. That has been replaced by classes, not about English, but about other subjects (physics, for instance) where the class is given IN English. Not just science, but business also. My daughter just got a Masters in International Business in Germany - all the classes for that program were taught in English. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 6:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/68 "2012-07-16T06:19:34Z")
> [@JKellyMap](#): > > Africa, in general, is famous for this. Most people (no cite, but this was mentioned by linguist John McWhorter in _The Power of Babel_) speak at least three languages: 1. The “tribal” language, spoken just in their part of their country, 2. The “national” African language of their country (or one of the several such), and 3. The language of the European country which formerly colonized the place. Many speak several examples of “1”, because they married into, or work with, people from another “tribe”. Not a cite, but when we lived in the Congo the guy who worked for my mother (who was smart but not well educated) spoke both French and Bakongo, the local dialect. I’m not sure many west African countries have national languages, since they were stitched together by the European colonizers. Maybe the East is different. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 6:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/69 "2012-07-16T06:22:40Z")
> [@Iggy](#): > > Lots of people I dealt with in Malta spoke Maltese, English and Italian. English thanks to British colonial rule. Italian thanks to proximity and getting a lot of television from Italy. That’s a good example. In my experience those in countries too small to have a self-supporting entertainment industry learn their native language and at least one other, usually English these days. In Estonia older people learned Russian and Estonian, but I think they’ve stopped teaching Russian for obvious reasons - German seems next most popular. ---
**Author:** ![hibernicus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hibernicus/32/2802_2.png) [@hibernicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hibernicus)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/70 "2012-07-16T13:18:49Z")
> [@Dr.Drake](#): > > So you are arguing that the people of Gibraltar are not British. No, I made no claim of any kind about their nationality. > [@](#): > > They are defended by the British military. […]I don’t see how you can make the argument that there is no entity legal encompassing both the UK and the territories it governs; I’d say parliament is a legal entity. Parliament is precisely what distinguishes the UK from its overseas territories, not a unifying factor. If Gibraltar elected members to Parliament and was governed by its laws, it would effectively be part of the UK. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/71 "2012-07-16T13:30:30Z")
I’m seriously confused, then. British nationality was conferred on the Gibraltarians by parliament; how is that not parliament passing a law that effects Gibraltar? I don’t get the distinction you are making. We agree that Gibraltar is not in the UK. We agree that Gibraltarians are British: they are British Overseas Territory citizens. Where we seem to disagree is that you think British Overseas Territories are not British, despite the name, the passport, and the fact that Parliament in Westminister passes laws that effect them. Gibraltar does not elect members to parliament as far as I know, but it is indeed subject to its laws, like the British Nationality Act of 1981. ---
**Author:** ![hibernicus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hibernicus/32/2802_2.png) [@hibernicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hibernicus)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/72 "2012-07-16T13:58:00Z")
> [@Dr.Drake](#): > > I’m seriously confused, then. British nationality was conferred on the Gibraltarians by parliament; how is that not parliament passing a law that effects Gibraltar? > > I don’t get the distinction you are making. We agree that Gibraltar is not in the UK. We agree that Gibraltarians are British: they are British Overseas Territory citizens. Where we seem to disagree is that you think British Overseas Territories are not British, despite the name, the passport, and the fact that Parliament in Westminister passes laws that effect them. Gibraltar does not elect members to parliament as far as I know, but it is indeed subject to its laws, like the British Nationality Act of 1981. Gibraltar certainly is British territory, although it is not Britain (as I suspect any Gibraltarian would confirm). However I think a new point of disagreement has arisen - Gibraltar is not subject to laws enacted by the UK Parliament. The example you chose of a law that “affects” Gibraltar is a slightly slippery one; Parliament can enact a law that confers citizenship on anyone, wherever they live. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/73 "2012-07-16T14:38:42Z")
Okay. I’ll leave parliament aside. “British but not Britain” is the sticking point. It’s not _Great_ Britain, because that is the name of a specific island, but “Britain” on its own is a pretty good name for the entity encompassing both Gilbraltar and the UK. If you insist there is no such thing, fine. Let’s agree to disagree. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/74 "2012-07-16T14:47:05Z")
Is there even an official way to reference “the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, plus any and all overseas territories, crown domains and others”? I said “the UK” originally as the polite shorthand in English - but it’s not enough for **hibernicus**. OK, so what is the correct expression? Is there one that wouldn’t be a mouthful? ---
**Author:** ![Full\_Tilt\_Boogie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/2acd7d/32.png) [@Full\_Tilt\_Boogie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Full_Tilt_Boogie)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/75 "2012-07-16T15:27:44Z")
In my experience, The Netherlands is the place where it is commonplace for most people to have more than a schoolboy command of at least five languages: typically Dutch (obviously), English (as they learn it from being under ten years old), German (they’re neighbours with a contiguous border), French and either Spanish, Italian or a Scandinavian language. ---
**Author:** ![suranyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@suranyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suranyi)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/76 "2012-07-16T17:13:46Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > Not just science, but business also. My daughter just got a Masters in International Business in Germany - all the classes for that program were taught in English. Indeed. I have spent much of my career working for multi-national companies based in Belgium and The Netherlands. They had offices all over the world. All corporate communications were always in English, and everyone was expected to be able to work in that language. ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/77 "2012-07-16T19:37:17Z")
West Africa, for sure. West Africa began with some of the greatest diversity on earth (Cameroon alone has 250 ethnic groups, each with their own language) and it’s spent the last millennia caught in the rise and fall of empire after empire, meaning that they’ve had many chances for foreign languages and trade languages to become important. In the village I lived in Cameroon, your average Joe would speak at least five languages. The language on the street was Fulfulde, which has become the widespread West African trade language during the period of the Fulbe conquests in the mid-1800s. Fulfulde was the lingua franca of the area, and basically everyone has to know it to conduct daily life. People in my village would also speak Hausa, because the traditional leadership was derived from the Borno Empire (1300’s-1893) and Hausa culture was still a hegemonic force. People would speak Guidar, the language of my particular town (which is completely unrelated to the other two, being an older, indigenous language) which, for example, would be what kids playing in the street, friends drinking at the bar, or church services would be in. Everyone also had their “maternal language” that comes directly from their ethnic group and may only be spoken in a tiny remote village somewhere. This would be used for talking with your close family members. In some cases this might be Hausa or Guidar or Fulfulde, but more likely it was one of the many, many, many tiny ethnic groups dotting the region. FInally, anyone with any education could get by with a smattering of French, and anyone with a high school education would know at least some English. Additionally, many people pick up side languages from nearby villages and trading areas, especially if they are involved in cross-regional trade or had spent time in another village. Thanks to the history and geography of the region, many of these languages are from completely different language groups that have nothing in common with each other. In parts of Africa that speak primarily Bantu languages, all of these languages are going to have similarities and may be somewhat mutually intelligible. But in West Africa, a village may speak languages originating in places are far flung as Senegal and Sudan. ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2012, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/78 "2012-07-16T19:49:41Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > Not a cite, but when we lived in the Congo the guy who worked for my mother (who was smart but not well educated) spoke both French and Bakongo, the local dialect. I’m not sure many west African countries have national languages, since they were stitched together by the European colonizers. Maybe the East is different. In most of Africa, the “national language” refers to a European language (usually, but not always, of a colonizer.) This language is often used by government, media, and the education system because it is considered “neutral” (as in not favoring a specific ethnicity) and allows mass communication with people who would not otherwise share a common language. Most people will have some proficiency with this language, but you generally wouldn’t expect to ever hear it in private homes, especially outside of the larger cities. Pretty much nobody speaks this as their first language. Additionally, most areas are going to have a widespread language that is used in trade, informal business, and non-official public life. These languages probably don’t map exactly on to national boundaries, but rather follow long-established trade routes and cultural corridors. None the less, the function essentially like a national language, and that is the language you will use for most of daily life. In some places, such as South Africa, they have been enshrined as national languages. In other cases, it remains a de facto thing. A country can and usually does have a few of these running through it. Then you have local languages, which may be local to a region as large as a state or as small as a village. ---
**Author:** ![bdcochran](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a183cd/32.png) [@bdcochran](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bdcochran)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2012, 1:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/79 "2012-07-17T13:00:00Z")
I went to an Argentine Milonga last night. I spoke in English and French. I understood what was being said in Spanish. If necessary, I could have conversed with the German consulate employee. Almost 1/2 of the people in my city do not speak English as the primary language at home. Multilingualism is more widespread than people might think. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2012, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/places-with-the-most-multilingual-people/627926/80 "2012-07-17T13:22:08Z")
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