Statistics about monolingualism in the US?

Hi,

are there any good sources for statistics about the language skills of US Americans or other English speaking countries?
it should answer questions like:
How many are monlingual, how man speak 1 foreign language, more than 1, what languages, how many non-native English speakers live in the US, how many don't speak English and so on.

thanks in advance

In USA many people are proud to be monolingual and look down on those who are not, as can clearly be seen watching the backlash of Obama's "your children should speak foreign languages" comments.

In the US, you'd proabbly want to exclude foreign-born from your statistics, to get a better picture of monolingualism. In fact, perhaps you should lmiit the sample to:

- people born in the US, all of whose grandparents were born in the US.
- people not living in Spanish speaking areas (like LA, Miami, Laredo, etc.)
- people who have spent their entire life in the US (perhaps allowing only for short trips outside the US as a tourist.)
- people without learning difficulties, etc.
- "ordinary" people, i.e. not language/linguistics/international commerce/etc. majors.

I suspect that almost nobody in this sample is multilingual (i.e. near native-level fluency in two or more languages). A good portion will have taken foreign languages in school, but will have forgotten them almost completely.

<<In USA many people are proud to be monolingual and look down on those who are not, as can clearly be seen watching the backlash of Obama's "your children should speak foreign languages" comments.>>

This is stupid. It is not looked down upon to be a polyglot in the U.S. Instead, let’s look for the simplest explanation: The U.S. is in an election cycle. What does this typically mean? Well, the two factions will often attempt to find fault with the other. This can often mean that the candidates will twist the words of the other in order to gain an upper hand. This is the case with what happened with Obama's statement on multilingualism. Conservatives attempted to twist his comments into insult to America. Most Americans wish that they spoke another language. I know I wish I were more fluent in the languages I have studied. A portion of the controversy stems from the notion that the U.S. should be a multilingual nation, (e.g. Canada with its mixture of French and English). This reflects conservative’s anty-imigration beliefs not anty-language. But primarily the conservatives were attacking Obama for stating that he was embarrassed about anything to do with the U.S. In other words, they were trying to use unquestioning patriotism to divide voters—this usually only works on complete idiots. And though they do not make up the majority of American citizens, one can find them here as well as they can find them in any other country.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KReZyAZLI0

Some people view "foreign" things with disdain, Wintereis. I have a friend who looks down on me because I speak foreign languages. It's subtle, but I know that she considers it "dirty" in some way.

<<In the US, you'd proabbly want to exclude foreign-born from your statistics, to get a better picture of monolingualism. In fact, perhaps you should lmiit the sample to:

- people born in the US, all of whose grandparents were born in the US.
- people not living in Spanish speaking areas (like LA, Miami, Laredo, etc.)
- people who have spent their entire life in the US (perhaps allowing only for short trips outside the US as a tourist.)
- people without learning difficulties, etc.
- "ordinary" people, i.e. not language/linguistics/international commerce/etc. majors.

I suspect that almost nobody in this sample is multilingual (i.e. near native-level fluency in two or more languages). A good portion will have taken foreign languages in school, but will have forgotten them almost completely.>>

I agree with you that this would be the way to do this and that most of the people in that group would be monolingual. But I suspect, as you probably did when you were writing that post, that getting such statistics would be impossible. Excluding foreign born would be momumental from a reporting/analysis perspective and that would be one of the easiest of all the tasks. So we'd be back at square one, wondering how many people fall into the bucket that's left over.

I also agree with Wintereis:
<<This is stupid. It is not looked down upon to be a polyglot in the U.S. Instead, let’s look for the simplest explanation: The U.S. is in an election cycle.>>

The hoopla surrounding the Obama statement was indeed ridiculous. In fact, political conversation in general in an election year is always more ridiculous than in the off years, but all in all politicians and pundits are not the most honest or logical people.

I am a polyglot and I can attest that being a polyglot in the US puts me in the minority, but instead of being looked down on, I find people usually respect me more than I probably deserve and they think I'm smarter than I am! I speak 4 languages fluently, but it's not because I'm very smart. I've had my intelligence tested and I'm average. I just happen to like languages and have a knack for it, like someone who can draw or sing. At work I think it's translated to a somewhat unfair advantage because people assume I'm somehow more intellectually capable because of the languages. I live in LA, but even in my hometown in the midwest, where my parents and family are decidely pro-Bush conservatives, very monolingual and generally disdainful of anything European, people are impressed by my being a polyglot. They bag on me for being a vegetarian but they like the fact that I can speak different languages.


KT wrote:
<<I have a friend who looks down on me because I speak foreign languages. It's subtle, but I know that she considers it "dirty" in some way.>>

Don't worry KT, the rest of us like you *because* you're "dirty".

<<- people born in the US, all of whose grandparents were born in the US.
- people not living in Spanish speaking areas (like LA, Miami, Laredo, etc.)
- people who have spent their entire life in the US (perhaps allowing only for short trips outside the US as a tourist.)
- people without learning difficulties, etc.
- "ordinary" people, i.e. not language/linguistics/international commerce/etc. majors. >>

Why include the last point? I think these people make up the majority of polyglots in any country.

<<Some people view "foreign" things with disdain, Wintereis. I have a friend who looks down on me because I speak foreign languages. It's subtle, but I know that she considers it "dirty" in some way.>>

How very horrifying. I've never come across anyone who looked down at another person for knowing something. Granted, all of my best friends are nerds. Question: can gay people be nerds? Aren't nerds just boring intellectuals? How can a person be boring when the rest of society has labeled them a pervert? I think that would instantly move nerdy gays into the sophisticated bracket. (It is my story and I am sticking to it) So, all of my best friends are sophisticated, and they respect and admire knowledge, no matter what knowledge it is. Perhaps that is your problem, you need more sophisticated friends. Though, I would venture to say that her disgust with you is more a projection of what she feels about her self. Perhaps she is jealous of the fact that you can speak more languages than she can.

P.S. I have a hell of a time impressing my cousin by declining Latin verbs (she tells me that I'm insane when I just suddenly drift into bo, bis, bit, bimis, bitis, bunt), but boy when her "cowboy" boyfriend and x-marine friend couldn't start a campfire in the rain and her gay cousin could, she was extremely proud.

<<I've never come across anyone who looked down at another person for knowing something. >>

There are a lot of them out there. It's "anti-intellectualism". People like this see knowledge as elitism.

<But primarily the conservatives were attacking Obama for stating that he <was embarrassed about anything to do with the U.S. In other words, they <were trying to use unquestioning patriotism to divide voters—this usually <only works on complete idiots.

In fact it was Obama who was using arrogance and elitism to divide voters--which *always* works on the complete idiots on the left.

Yes, you can find raw data about language use in the census statistics, which are compiled every ten years and easily found by Googling, say, "US Census 2000". Search through those pages and you will find things like "percentage of people who speak more than one language at home".

For example, from http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/00000.html:

"Language other than English spoken at home, pct age 5+, 2000 17.9%"

However, I called this raw data because it doesn't tell you how well they speak the language or count people who are fluent in another language but don't actually use it at home, such as people who majored in French at college or lived in Lithuania for five years. So it's not a complete picture, as this caveat from the same site points out:

"Persons were asked to report whether they sometimes or always spoke a language other than English at home. People who knew languages other than English but did not use them at home, who only used them elsewhere, or whose usage was limited to a few expressions or slang were excluded.

Most people who reported speaking a language other than English at home also speak English. Separate questions identified the level of ability to speak English, and the specific language spoken at home.

Tabulations of language spoken at home include only the responses of persons 5 years old and over. The percentage shown is obtained by dividing the number of persons speaking a language other than English at home by the total number of persons 5 years and over.

Scope and Methodology:

These data are collected on the census long form. Roughly one in every six households received this sample questionnaire. The data are estimates and are subject to sampling variability."

But those would all be immigrants, not Anglos who've learnt another language... who I doubt would speak it at home...

No, they might not be immigrants at all, actually. Many people still speak their family's original language two or three generations (or more) later, even though they are Americans born and bred, especially if they live in an area with a large ethnic population. Many of my neighbors here in New Mexico are proficient in Spanish despite not having ever left the US for more than a little barhopping in Juarez, and Portuguese was spoken in my family by my American-born grandparents, father, and uncle. (And sorry -- the Guest right after my previous post was also me.)

That's the same thing though pretty much. They have a personal connection with the culture so it's not surprising they learnt it. I'm referring to people who have learnt a language unrelated to their ethnicity - ie, the analogous situation to, say, a Russian who speaks English - no cultural connection whatsoever to the English language yet he still knows it.