The use of flag icons, particularly national flags, for languages is a common practice. Such icons have long been used on tourist attraction signage, and elsewhere in the tourism space, but have found wider use in website localization where UX limitations have become apparent. [1] [2]
National flags are the most commonly used flag icons for representing languages. They are generally chosen because they either represent the language's origin (e.g. the flag of Spain used over the flag of Mexico) or the highest number of native speakers (e.g. the flag of the United States over the Flag of England). [3]
A diagonally divided flag between two or more nation states may be used when more than one country is a major user of a language. Examples of this are the flags of the United Kingdom, the United States and Canada to indicate the English language, the flags of China and Taiwan to represent Mandarin, the flags of France, Belgium, and Canada to represent the French language, the flags of Spain and Mexico to represent the Spanish language, and the flags of Portugal and Brazil to represent the Portuguese language. [4] [5]
Some international linguistic communities have flags which encompass all the speakers of a language while avoiding the symbolism of national flags, though they are not as widely recognized. [6] Some, like the flag of Esperanto, the Yiddish flag or the Arabic flag have been designed specifically as symbols for languages themselves rather than for organizations which link nations that share the same language. [7]
Some international organizations do not link nations speficially through language, but nonetheless encompass all the regions where one language is spoken. The flags for such organizations, like the flag of the Arab League, are therefore sometimes used to represent those languages. [8]
National flags can also be used to distinguish between different written standards for a single language. For example, the Flag of Taiwan is often used for Traditional Chinese and the Flag of the People's Republic of China for Simplified Chinese. [9]
Some Euronet ATMs (automated teller machines) display the Irish flag as a symbol for the English language (usually UK flag or English flag). In the media, this was speculated to be a response to Brexit, with the Republic of Ireland as one of the only two Anglophone nations left in the European Union (another being Malta). Dr. Oetker have been observed doing the same. [10] The Irish flag is more usually used to signify the Irish language. [11]
The use of flag icons for languages has been criticized as poor design, with some going as far as to call them harmful. [12] [13] [ better source needed ] The symbolism of a flag introduces politicization, and often ambiguity. The use of a national flag disregards the fact that many languages are natively spoken in several nation states, and many nations have several major languages. [14] Alternatives include using the native names of languages or their language codes, possibly under a generic symbol of translation such as the Language Icon.[ citation needed ]
The meaning of the word American in the English language varies according to the historical, geographical, and political context in which it is used. American is derived from America, a term originally denoting all of the Americas, ultimately derived from the name of the Florentine explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci (1451–1512). In some expressions, it retains this Pan-American sense, but its usage has evolved over time and, for various historical reasons, the word came to denote people or things specifically from the United States of America.
Esperanto is the world's most widely spoken constructed international auxiliary language. Created by L. L. Zamenhof in 1887, it is intended to be a universal second language for international communication, or "the international language". Zamenhof first described the language in Dr. Esperanto's International Language, which he published under the pseudonym Doktoro Esperanto. Early adopters of the language liked the name Esperanto and soon used it to describe his language. The word esperanto translates into English as "one who hopes".
L. L. Zamenhof developed Esperanto in the 1870s and '80s. Unua Libro, the first print discussion of the language, appeared in 1887. The number of Esperanto speakers have increased gradually since then, without much support from governments and international organizations. Its use has, in some instances, been outlawed or otherwise suppressed.
Esperanto symbols, primarily the Esperanto flag, have seen much consistency over the time of Esperanto's existence, though a few variations in exact flag patterning and symbology exist.
The United States does not have an official language at the federal level, but the most commonly used language is English, which is the de facto national language. In addition, 32 U.S. states out of 50 and all five U.S. territories have declared English as an official language. The majority of the U.S. population (77.5%) speaks only English at home as of 2023. The remainder of the population speaks many other languages at home, most notably Spanish, according to the American Community Survey (ACS) of the U.S. Census Bureau; others include indigenous languages originally spoken by Native Americans, Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians, and native populations in the U.S. unincorporated territories. Other languages were brought in by people from Europe, Africa, Asia, other parts of the Americas, and Oceania, including multiple dialects, creole languages, pidgin languages, and sign languages originating in what is now the United States. Interlingua, an international auxiliary language, was also created in the U.S.
A lingua franca, also known as a bridge language, common language, trade language, auxiliary language, link language or language of wider communication (LWC), is a language systematically used to make communication possible between groups of people who do not share a native language or dialect, particularly when it is a third language that is distinct from both of the speakers' native languages.
This is a list of notable persons by nationality.
Political colours are colours used to represent a political ideology, movement or party, either officially or unofficially. They represent the intersection of colour symbolism and political symbolism. Politicians making public appearances will often identify themselves by wearing rosettes, flowers, ties or ribbons in the colour of their political party. Parties in different countries with similar ideologies sometimes use similar colours. As an example the colour red symbolises left-wing ideologies in many countries, while the colour blue is often used for conservatism, the colour yellow is most commonly associated with liberalism and right-libertarianism, and Green politics is named after the ideology's political colour. The political associations of a given colour vary from country to country, and there are exceptions to the general trends, for example red has historically been associated with Christianity, but over time gained association with leftist politics, while the United States differs from other countries in that conservatism is associated with red and liberalism with blue. Mass media has driven a standardisation of colour by political party, to simplify messaging, while historically the colour a candidate chose to identify with could have been chosen based on other factors such as family or regional variations.
This is a list of articles about poetry in a single language or produced by a single nation.
A regional language is a language spoken in a region of a sovereign state, whether it be a small area, a federated state or province or some wider area.
Sinophone, which means "Chinese-speaking", typically refers to an individual who speaks at least one variety of Chinese. Academic writers often use the term Sinophone in two definitions: either specifically "Chinese-speaking populations where it is a minority language, excluding Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan" or generally "Chinese-speaking areas, including where it is an official language". Many authors use the collocation Sinophone world or Chinese-speaking world to mean the Chinese-speaking world itself or the distribution of the Chinese diaspora outside of Greater China.
A pluricentric language or polycentric language is a language with several codified standard forms, often corresponding to different countries. Many examples of such languages can be found worldwide among the most-spoken languages, including but not limited to Chinese in the People's Republic of China, Taiwan and Singapore; English in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, South Africa, India, and elsewhere; and French in France, Canada, and elsewhere. The converse case is a monocentric language, which has only one formally standardized version. Examples include Japanese and Russian. In some cases, the different standards of a pluricentric language may be elaborated to appear as separate languages, e.g. Malaysian and Indonesian, Hindi and Urdu, while Serbo-Croatian is in an earlier stage of that process.
A national language is a language that has some connection—de facto or de jure—with a nation. The term is applied quite differently in various contexts. One or more languages spoken as first languages in the territory of a country may be referred to informally or designated in legislation as national languages of the country. National languages are mentioned in over 150 world constitutions.
In linguistics, a sprachraum is a geographical region where a common first language, with dialect varieties, or group of languages is spoken.
The official languages of the United Nations are the six languages used in United Nations (UN) meetings and in which the UN writes all its official documents.
The languages of the Caribbean reflect the region's diverse history and culture. There are six official languages spoken in the Caribbean:
The Constitution of the Republic of Mauritius does not mention any official language. The Constitution contains one statement in Article 49 that states that "the official language of the Assembly shall be English but any member may address the chair in French" which indicate that French and English are official languages of the National Assembly (parliament) only.
Teaching English as a second (TESL) orforeign language (TEFL) and teaching English to speakers of other languages (TESOL) are terms that refer to teaching English to students whose first language is not English. The terms TEFL, TESL, and TESOL distinguish between a class's location and student population, and have become problematic due to their lack of clarity. TEFL refers to English-language programs conducted in countries where English is not the primary language, and may be taught at a language school or by a tutor. For some jobs, the minimum TEFL requirement is a 100-hour course; the 120-hour course is recommended, however, since it may lead to higher-paid teaching positions. TEFL teachers may be native or non-native speakers of English.
