Ethnologue

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Ethnologue: Languages of the World is a web and print publication of SIL International (formerly known as the Summer Institute of Linguistics), a Christian linguistic service organization, which studies lesser-known languages, primarily to provide the speakers with Bibles in their native language.

The Ethnologue contains statistics for 7,358 languages in the 16th edition, released in 2009 (up from 6,912 in the 15th edition, released 2005 and 6,809 in the 14th edition, released 2000) and gives the number of speakers, location, dialects, linguistic affiliations, availability of the Bible and so forth. It is currently the most comprehensive existing language inventory, along with the Linguasphere Observatory Register. However, some information is dated.

What counts as a language depends on socio-linguistic evaluation: see Dialect. Some accuse^{[citation needed]} the Ethnologue of dividing languages, preferring to call the different varieties "dialects". In other cases, the Ethnologue has been accused of lumping together different languages as "dialects" of single languages.^{[citation needed]} As the preface says, "Not all scholars share the same set of criteria for what constitutes a 'language' and what features define a 'dialect.'"

In 1984, the Ethnologue released a three-letter coding system, called a SIL code, to identify each language that it describes. This set of codes significantly exceeded the scope of previous standards, e.g., ISO 639-1. The 14th edition, published in 2000, included 7148 language codes which generally did not match the ISO 639-2 codes. In 2002 the Ethnologue was asked to work with the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) to integrate its codes into a draft international standard. The Ethnologue now uses this standard, called ISO 639-3. The 15th edition which was published in 2005 includes 7299 codes. A 16th edition was released in the Summer of 2009.

In addition to choosing a primary name for the language, it also gives some of the names by which a language is called by its speakers, by the government, by foreigners and by neighbors, as well as how it has been named and referenced historically, regardless of which designation is considered official, politically correct or offensive or by whom.

Errors are fixed in every new edition; for instance, en route to the 14th edition, some languages such as Chenoua were added, and some rumoured "languages" such as Nemadi or Wutana were removed. Some possible remaining errors are discussed at Imraguen language, Senhaja de Srair language, Ghomara language, Kwavi language, Molengue language, Yauma language, Fer language, Yeni language, Phla-Pherá languages and Ofayé.

Bill Bright, editor of Language: Journal of the Linguistic Society of America, wrote that it "is indispensable for any reference shelf on the languages of the world" (1986:698).

Old information

Although Ethnologue is updated periodically, much of the information is old: The editors do not re-examine each entry for each new edition and generally rely on users to submit change requests. One example is the figures for Ireland, which rely on the census of 1983 even though three censuses have been held since then. Another is the classification of the Khoisan languages, which dates from the 1960s and includes several spurious language entries, though some of these were deleted for the 15th edition.

Language families

Following are the language families listed in the Ethnologue language family index of the 15th edition. The first column gives the Ethnologue name for the group, followed by the location by continent and Ethnologue's count of the number of languages in the family. In addition to language families, Ethnologue lists three artificial languages, one 'cant' (Pitkern), 86 creoles, 18 pidgins, 121 Deaf sign languages, three other sign languages, 21 mixed languages, forty language isolates, and 78 unclassified languages.

See also

• Ethnologue list of most-spoken languages
• Language
• Lists of languages
• List of language families

Notes

References

• Bright, William. 1986. Book Notice on Ethnologue. Language62:698.

External links

• Web version of The Ethnologue
  • Ethnologue - History
• Review of the 15th edition, by Ole Stig Andersen (Danmarks Radio)
• How Linguists and Missionaries Share a Bible of 6,912 Languages (The New York Times)