Languages of Australia

Australia has no official language, but the national language of Australia is English. There are also many languages spoken by Indigenous Australians and by different ethnic groups.

English

The English language was spoken by the British colonists who came to Australia in the 18th and the 19th centuries. It was used in the colonies they started. Most people who live in Australia today speak English. In 2016, 72.7 percent of people living in Australia only spoke English at home.[1] A dialect of English is spoken in Australia, called Australian English.

Indigenous languages

Indigenous Australians have been living in Australia for at least 50,000 years. There are around 290 to 363[2] Indigenous languages. They are from around 28 language families and language isolates.<[3] Many of these languages are not spoken any more or by many people because of the use of English. The largest language family is the Pama-Nyungan family, which has 248 languages.[4]

Three Indigenous languages are spoken in the Torres Strait Islands. These languages are Kalaw Lagaw Ya, Meriam Mir and Yumplatok, a creole of Pacific English. Yumplatok is spoken on the islands more than the other languages.

Migrant languages

Many different languages are spoken by communities of migrants in Australia. In 2016, 22.2 percent of people living in Australia spoke a language other than English at home.[1] In the same year, these were the 10 most spoken languages other than English at home:[1][5]

Number Language Percent
1 Mandarin 2.5%
2 Arabic 1.4%
3 Cantonese 1.2%
4 Vietnamese 1.2%
5 Italian 1.2%
6 Greek 1.0%
7 Tagalog 0.8%
8 Hindi 0.7%
9 Spanish 0.6%
10 Punjabi 0.6%

In 2011, the most common languages spoken at home other than English were:[5]

Number Language Percent
1 Mandarin 1.6%
2 Italian 1.4%
3 Arabic 1.3%
4 Cantonese 1.2%
5 Greek 1.2%
6 Vietnamese 1.1%
7 Tagalog 0.6%
8 Spanish 0.5%
9 Hindi 0.5%
10 German 0.4%

Most spoken languages by state (2016)

Below is a series of tables showing the top 5 most spoken languages at home, as well as the percent of the population that speaks only English at home.

Australian Capital Territory

Language Percent[6]
English only 72.7%
Mandarin 3.1%
Vietnamese 1.1%
Cantonese 1.0%
Hindi 0.9%
Spanish 0.8%

New South Wales

Language Percent[7]
English only 68.5%
Mandarin 3.2%
Arabic 2.7%
Cantonese 1.9%
Vietnamese 1.4%
Greek 1.1%
Italian 1.0%

Northern Territory

Language Percent[8]
English only 58.0%
Indigenous Australian languages 15.3%
Tagalog 2.2%
Greek 1.4%
Mandarin 0.9%
Malayalam 0.6%

Queensland

Language Percent[9]
English only 81.2%
Mandarin 1.5%
Tagalog 0.6%
Vietnamese 0.6%
Cantonese 0.5%
Spanish 0.4%

South Australia

Language Percent[10]
English only 78.2%
Italian 1.7%
Mandarin 1.7%
Greek 1.4%
Vietnamese 1.1%
Persian 0.7%

Tasmania

Language Percent[11]
English only 88.3%
Mandarin 0.8%
Nepali 0.3%
German 0.3%
Greek 0.2%
Italian 0.2%

Victoria

Language Percent[12]
English only 67.9%
Mandarin 3.2%
Italian 1.9%
Greek 1.9%
Vietnamese 1.7%
Arabic 1.3%

Western Australia

Language Percent[13]
English only 75.2%
Mandarin 1.9%
Italian 1.2%
Tagalog 1.0%
Vietnamese 0.8%
Cantonese 0.8%

References

  1. 1 2 3 Australia. Australian Bureau of Statistics. 2016 Census QuickStats. Australia. https://quickstats.censusdata.abs.gov.au/census_services/getproduct/census/2016/quickstat/036 Archived 2021-11-13 at the Wayback Machine
  2. ↑ Bowern, Claire. 23 December 2011. How many languages were spoken in Australia? Anggarrgoon.
  3. ↑ Bowern, Claire; Atkinson, Quentin (2012). "Computational phylogenetics and the internal structure of Pama-Nyungan". Language. 88 (4): 817–845. doi:10.1353/lan.2012.0081. ISSN 1535-0665. S2CID 4375648.
  4. ↑ "Glottolog 4.8 -". glottolog.org.
  5. 1 2 "Language used at home | Australia | Community profile". Archived from the original on 2021-07-22. Retrieved 2021-08-21.
  6. ↑ "Language used at home | Australia | Community profile". Archived from the original on 2017-05-19. Retrieved 2021-08-22.
  7. ↑ "Language used at home | Australia | Community profile". Archived from the original on 2022-11-17. Retrieved 2021-08-22.
  8. ↑ "Language used at home | Australia | Community profile". Archived from the original on 2017-12-06. Retrieved 2021-08-22.
  9. ↑ "Language used at home | Australia | Community profile". Archived from the original on 2022-03-08. Retrieved 2021-08-22.
  10. ↑ "Language used at home | Australia | Community profile". Archived from the original on 2017-12-08. Retrieved 2021-08-22.
  11. ↑ "Language used at home | Australia | Community profile". Archived from the original on 2020-11-12. Retrieved 2021-08-22.
  12. ↑ "Language used at home | Australia | Community profile". Archived from the original on 2022-01-19. Retrieved 2021-08-22.
  13. ↑ "Language used at home | Australia | Community profile". Archived from the original on 2022-08-15. Retrieved 2021-08-22.
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