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124-539: Galápagos National Park ( Spanish : Parque Nacional Galápagos ) was established in 1959. It began operation in 1968, and it is Ecuador's first national park and a UNESCO World Heritage Site . The government of Ecuador has designated 97% of the land area of the Galápagos Islands as the country's first national park. The remaining 3% is distributed between the inhabited areas of Santa Cruz , San Cristóbal , Baltra , Floreana and Isabela . In 1971,
248-553: A mixed language or a creole —a theory called the Middle English creole hypothesis . Although the great influence of these languages on the vocabulary and grammar of Modern English is widely acknowledged, most specialists in language contact do not consider English to be a true mixed language. English is classified as a Germanic language because it shares innovations with other Germanic languages including Dutch , German , and Swedish . These shared innovations show that
372-644: A 2012 official Eurobarometer poll (conducted when the UK was still a member of the EU), 38 percent of the EU respondents outside the countries where English is an official language said they could speak English well enough to have a conversation in that language. The next most commonly mentioned foreign language, French (which is the most widely known foreign language in the UK and Ireland), could be used in conversation by 12 percent of respondents. A working knowledge of English has become
496-591: A Spanish-based creole language called Chavacano developed in the southern Philippines. However, it is not mutually intelligible with Spanish. The number of Chavacano-speakers was estimated at 1.2 million in 1996. The local languages of the Philippines also retain significant Spanish influence, with many words derived from Mexican Spanish , owing to the administration of the islands by Spain through New Spain until 1821, until direct governance from Madrid afterwards to 1898. English language English
620-603: A considerable number of words from Arabic , as well as a minor influence from the Germanic Gothic language through the period of Visigoth rule in Iberia. In addition, many more words were borrowed from Latin through the influence of written language and the liturgical language of the Church. The loanwords were taken from both Classical Latin and Renaissance Latin , the form of Latin in use at that time. According to
744-658: A distinct language from Modern English and is virtually impossible for 21st-century unstudied English-speakers to understand. Its grammar was similar to that of modern German: nouns, adjectives, pronouns, and verbs had many more inflectional endings and forms , and word order was much freer than in Modern English. Modern English has case forms in pronouns ( he , him , his ) and has a few verb inflections ( speak , speaks , speaking , spoke , spoken ), but Old English had case endings in nouns as well, and verbs had more person and number endings. Its closest relative
868-522: A dramatic change in the pronunciation of its sibilant consonants , known in Spanish as the reajuste de las sibilantes , which resulted in the distinctive velar [x] pronunciation of the letter ⟨j⟩ and—in a large part of Spain—the characteristic interdental [θ] ("th-sound") for the letter ⟨z⟩ (and for ⟨c⟩ before ⟨e⟩ or ⟨i⟩ ). See History of Spanish (Modern development of
992-482: A first language by Spaniards and educated Filipinos ( Ilustrados ). Despite a public education system set up by the colonial government, by the end of Spanish rule in 1898, only about 10% of the population had knowledge of Spanish, mostly those of Spanish descent or elite standing. Spanish continued to be official and used in Philippine literature and press during the early years of American administration after
1116-490: A foreign language, make up the "expanding circle". The distinctions between English as a first language, as a second language, and as a foreign language are often debatable and may change in particular countries over time. For example, in the Netherlands and some other countries of Europe, knowledge of English as a second language is nearly universal, with over 80 percent of the population able to use it, and thus English
1240-478: A long history in the territory of the current-day United States dating back to the 16th century. In the wake of the 1848 Guadalupe Hidalgo Treaty , hundreds of thousands of Spanish speakers became a minoritized community in the United States. The 20th century saw further massive growth of Spanish speakers in areas where they had been hitherto scarce. According to the 2020 census, over 60 million people of
1364-520: A more standard version of English. They have many more speakers of English who acquire English as they grow up through day-to-day use and listening to broadcasting, especially if they attend schools where English is the medium of instruction. Varieties of English learned by non-native speakers born to English-speaking parents may be influenced, especially in their grammar, by the other languages spoken by those learners. Most of those varieties of English include words little used by native speakers of English in
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#17327766014281488-695: A number of other Anglic languages, including Scots and the extinct Fingallian dialect and Yola language of Ireland. Like Icelandic and Faroese , the development of English in the British Isles isolated it from the continental Germanic languages and influences, and it has since diverged considerably. English is not mutually intelligible with any continental Germanic language, as it differs in vocabulary , syntax , and phonology . However, some of these, such as Dutch or Frisian, do show strong affinities with English, especially with its earlier stages. Unlike Icelandic and Faroese, which were isolated,
1612-508: A primarily Hassaniya Arabic -speaking territory, Spanish was officially spoken as the language of the colonial administration during the late 19th and 20th centuries. Today, Spanish is present in the partially-recognized Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic as its secondary official language, and in the Sahrawi refugee camps in Tindouf ( Algeria ), where the Spanish language is still taught as
1736-684: A requirement in a number of occupations and professions such as medicine and computing. English has become so important in scientific publishing that more than 80 percent of all scientific journal articles indexed by Chemical Abstracts in 1998 were written in English, as were 90 percent of all articles in natural science publications by 1996 and 82 percent of articles in humanities publications by 1995. International communities such as international business people may use English as an auxiliary language , with an emphasis on vocabulary suitable for their domain of interest. This has led some scholars to develop
1860-407: A rich inflectional morphology and relatively free word order to a mostly analytic pattern with little inflection and a fairly fixed subject–verb–object word order . Modern English relies more on auxiliary verbs and word order for the expression of complex tenses , aspects and moods , as well as passive constructions , interrogatives , and some negation . The earliest form of English
1984-617: A second language features characteristics involving the variability of the vowel system. While far from its heyday during the Spanish protectorate in Morocco , the Spanish language has some presence in northern Morocco , stemming for example from the availability of certain Spanish-language media. According to a 2012 survey by Morocco's Royal Institute for Strategic Studies (IRES), penetration of Spanish in Morocco reaches 4.6% of
2108-531: A second language, largely by Cuban educators. The number of Spanish speakers is unknown. Spanish is also an official language of the African Union . Spanish was an official language of the Philippines from the beginning of Spanish administration in 1565 to a constitutional change in 1973. During Spanish colonization , it was the language of government, trade, and education, and was spoken as
2232-758: A significant minority speaks English. The countries with the most native English speakers are, in descending order, the United States (at least 231 million), the United Kingdom (60 million), Canada (19 million), Australia (at least 17 million), South Africa (4.8 million), Ireland (4.2 million), and New Zealand (3.7 million). In these countries, children of native speakers learn English from their parents, and local people who speak other languages and new immigrants learn English to communicate in their neighbourhoods and workplaces. The inner-circle countries provide
2356-447: A verb ending ( present plural): From the 8th to the 11th centuries, Old English gradually transformed through language contact with Old Norse in some regions. The waves of Norse (Viking) colonisation of northern parts of the British Isles in the 8th and 9th centuries put Old English into intense contact with Old Norse , a North Germanic language. Norse influence was strongest in the north-eastern varieties of Old English spoken in
2480-563: Is Old Frisian , but even some centuries after the Anglo-Saxon migration, Old English retained considerable mutual intelligibility with other Germanic varieties. Even in the 9th and 10th centuries, amidst the Danelaw and other Viking invasions, there is historical evidence that Old Norse and Old English retained considerable mutual intelligibility, although probably the northern dialects of Old English were more similar to Old Norse than
2604-416: Is cognate to the root word of satisfacer ("to satisfy"), and hecho ("made") is similarly cognate to the root word of satisfecho ("satisfied"). Compare the examples in the following table: Some consonant clusters of Latin also produced characteristically different results in these languages, as shown in the examples in the following table: In the 15th and 16th centuries, Spanish underwent
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#17327766014282728-540: Is a West Germanic language in the Indo-European language family , whose speakers, called Anglophones , originated in early medieval England on the island of Great Britain . The namesake of the language is the Angles , one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to Britain . It is the most spoken language in the world, primarily due to the global influences of the former British Empire (succeeded by
2852-403: Is also undergoing change under the influence of American English, fuelled by the strong presence of American English in the media and the prestige associated with the United States as a world power. As of 2016 , 400 million people spoke English as their first language , and 1.1 billion spoke it as a secondary language. English is the largest language by number of speakers . English
2976-610: Is also widely used in media and literature, and the number of English language books published annually in India is the third largest in the world after the US and UK. However, English is rarely spoken as a first language, numbering only around a couple hundred-thousand people, and less than 5% of the population speak fluent English in India. David Crystal claimed in 2004 that, combining native and non-native speakers, India now has more people who speak or understand English than any other country in
3100-407: Is an official language of countries populated by few descendants of native speakers of English. It has also become by far the most important language of international communication when people who share no native language meet anywhere in the world. The Indian linguist Braj Kachru distinguished countries where English is spoken with a three circles model . In his model, Kachru based his model on
3224-486: Is called Old English or Anglo-Saxon ( c. 450–1150 ). Old English developed from a set of West Germanic dialects, often grouped as Anglo-Frisian or North Sea Germanic , and originally spoken along the coasts of Frisia , Lower Saxony and southern Jutland by Germanic peoples known to the historical record as the Angles , Saxons , and Jutes . From the 5th century, the Anglo-Saxons settled Britain as
3348-454: Is estimated that about 486 million people speak Spanish as a native language , making it the second most spoken language by number of native speakers . An additional 75 million speak Spanish as a second or foreign language , making it the fourth most spoken language in the world overall after English, Mandarin Chinese, and Hindi with a total number of 538 million speakers. Spanish is also
3472-761: Is heavily influenced by Venezuelan Spanish. In addition to sharing most of its borders with Spanish-speaking countries, the creation of Mercosur in the early 1990s induced a favorable situation for the promotion of Spanish language teaching in Brazil . In 2005, the National Congress of Brazil approved a bill, signed into law by the President , making it mandatory for schools to offer Spanish as an alternative foreign language course in both public and private secondary schools in Brazil. In September 2016 this law
3596-536: Is often arbitrarily defined as beginning with the conquest of England by William the Conqueror in 1066, but it developed further in the period from 1150 to 1500. With the Norman conquest of England in 1066, the now-Norsified Old English language was subject to another wave of intense contact, this time with Old French , in particular Old Norman French , influencing it as a superstrate. The Norman French spoken by
3720-732: Is related to Castile ( Castilla or archaically Castiella ), the kingdom where the language was originally spoken. The name Castile , in turn, is usually assumed to be derived from castillo ('castle'). In the Middle Ages , the language spoken in Castile was generically referred to as Romance and later also as Lengua vulgar . Later in the period, it gained geographical specification as Romance castellano ( romanz castellano , romanz de Castiella ), lenguaje de Castiella , and ultimately simply as castellano (noun). Different etymologies have been suggested for
3844-424: Is routinely used to communicate with foreigners and often in higher education. In these countries, although English is not used for government business, its widespread use puts them at the boundary between the "outer circle" and "expanding circle". English is unusual among world languages in how many of its users are not native speakers but speakers of English as a second or foreign language. Many users of English in
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3968-517: Is spoken by communities on every continent and on islands in all the major oceans. The countries where English is spoken can be grouped into different categories according to how English is used in each country. The "inner circle" countries with many native speakers of English share an international standard of written English and jointly influence speech norms for English around the world. English does not belong to just one country, and it does not belong solely to descendants of English settlers. English
4092-844: Is spoken by very small communities in Angola due to Cuban influence from the Cold War and in South Sudan among South Sudanese natives that relocated to Cuba during the Sudanese wars and returned for their country's independence. Spanish is also spoken in the integral territories of Spain in Africa, namely the cities of Ceuta and Melilla and the Canary Islands , located in the Atlantic Ocean some 100 km (62 mi) off
4216-813: Is the de facto national language of the country, Spanish is often used in public services and notices at the federal and state levels. Spanish is also used in administration in the state of New Mexico . The language has a strong influence in major metropolitan areas such as those of Los Angeles , Miami , San Antonio , New York , San Francisco , Dallas , Tucson and Phoenix of the Arizona Sun Corridor , as well as more recently, Chicago , Las Vegas , Boston , Denver , Houston , Indianapolis , Philadelphia , Cleveland , Salt Lake City , Atlanta , Nashville , Orlando , Tampa , Raleigh and Baltimore-Washington, D.C. due to 20th- and 21st-century immigration. Although Spanish has no official recognition in
4340-564: Is the sole or dominant language for historical reasons without being explicitly defined by law (such as in the United States and United Kingdom ). It is a co-official language of the United Nations , the European Union , and many other international and regional organisations. It has also become the de facto lingua franca of diplomacy, science , technology, international trade, logistics, tourism, aviation, entertainment, and
4464-777: Is the third person pronoun group beginning with th- ( they, them, their ) which replaced the Anglo-Saxon pronouns with h- ( hie, him, hera ). Other core Norse loanwords include "give", "get", "sky", "skirt", "egg", and "cake", typically displacing a native Anglo-Saxon equivalent. Old Norse in this era retained considerable mutual intelligibility with some dialects of Old English, particularly northern ones. Englischmen þeyz hy hadde fram þe bygynnyng þre manner speche, Souþeron, Northeron, and Myddel speche in þe myddel of þe lond, ... Noþeles by comyxstion and mellyng, furst wiþ Danes, and afterward wiþ Normans, in menye þe contray longage ys asperyed, and som vseþ strange wlaffyng, chyteryng, harryng, and garryng grisbytting. Although, from
4588-485: The Augustinian canon Orrm , which highlights the blending of both Old English and Anglo-Norman elements in English for the first time. In Wycliff'e Bible of the 1380s, the verse Matthew 8:20 was written: Foxis han dennes, and briddis of heuene han nestis . Here the plural suffix -n on the verb have is still retained, but none of the case endings on the nouns are present. By the 12th century Middle English
4712-505: The Commonwealth of Nations ) and the United States . English is the third-most spoken native language , after Standard Chinese and Spanish ; it is also the most widely learned second language in the world, with more second-language speakers than native speakers. English is either the official language or one of the official languages in 59 sovereign states (such as India , Ireland , and Canada ). In some other countries, it
4836-546: The Danelaw area around York, which was the centre of Norse colonisation; today these features are still particularly present in Scots and Northern English . The centre of Norsified English was in the Midlands around Lindsey . After 920 CE, when Lindsey was incorporated into the Anglo-Saxon polity, English spread extensively throughout the region. An element of Norse influence that continues in all English varieties today
4960-552: The European Free Trade Association , Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) set English as their organisation's sole working language even though most members are not countries with a majority of native English speakers. While the European Union (EU) allows member states to designate any of the national languages as an official language of
5084-607: The Iberian Peninsula of Europe . Today, it is a global language with about 500 million native speakers, mainly in the Americas and Spain , and about 600 million when including second language speakers. Spanish is the official language of 20 countries , as well as one of the six official languages of the United Nations . Spanish is the world's second-most spoken native language after Mandarin Chinese ;
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5208-663: The Internet . English accounts for at least 70% of total speakers of the Germanic language branch, and as of 2021 , Ethnologue estimated that there were over 1.5 billion speakers worldwide. Old English emerged from a group of West Germanic dialects spoken by the Anglo-Saxons . Late Old English borrowed some grammar and core vocabulary from Old Norse , a North Germanic language . Then, Middle English borrowed vocabulary extensively from French dialects , which are
5332-767: The Low Saxon and Frisian languages . English is an Indo-European language and belongs to the West Germanic group of the Germanic languages . Old English originated from a Germanic tribal and linguistic continuum along the Frisian North Sea coast, whose languages gradually evolved into the Anglic languages in the British Isles , and into the Frisian languages and Low German /Low Saxon on
5456-568: The Spanish as a First Foreign Language (SAFFL) initiative in March 2005. Spanish has historically had a significant presence on the Dutch Caribbean islands of Aruba , Bonaire and Curaçao ( ABC Islands ) throughout the centuries and in present times. The majority of the populations of each island (especially Aruba) speaking Spanish at varying although often high degrees of fluency. The local language Papiamentu (Papiamento on Aruba)
5580-508: The Spanish–American War but was eventually replaced by English as the primary language of administration and education by the 1920s. Nevertheless, despite a significant decrease in influence and speakers, Spanish remained an official language of the Philippines upon independence in 1946, alongside English and Filipino , a standardized version of Tagalog . Spanish was briefly removed from official status in 1973 but reimplemented under
5704-541: The United Nations at the end of World War II , English had become pre-eminent and is now the main worldwide language of diplomacy and international relations. It is one of six official languages of the United Nations. Many other worldwide international organisations, including the International Olympic Committee , specify English as a working language or official language of the organisation. Many regional international organisations such as
5828-608: The collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century. The oldest Latin texts with traces of Spanish come from mid-northern Iberia in the 9th century, and the first systematic written use of the language happened in Toledo , a prominent city of the Kingdom of Castile , in the 13th century. Spanish colonialism in the early modern period spurred the introduction of the language to overseas locations, most notably to
5952-536: The lava rocks in Tortuga Bay. There is a separate cove where you can swim where it is common to view white tip reef sharks swimming in groups, small fish, birds, and sometimes the gigantic galápagos tortoise . Spanish language Spanish ( español ) or Castilian ( castellano ) is a Romance language of the Indo-European language family that evolved from the Vulgar Latin spoken on
6076-518: The palatalisation of consonants that were velar consonants in Proto-Germanic (see Phonological history of Old English § Palatalization ). The earliest varieties of an English language, collectively known as Old English or "Anglo-Saxon", evolved from a group of North Sea Germanic dialects brought to Britain in the 5th century. Old English dialects were later influenced by Old Norse -speaking Viking invaders and settlers , starting in
6200-505: The "outer circle" countries are countries such as the Philippines , Jamaica , India , Pakistan , Singapore , Malaysia and Nigeria with a much smaller proportion of native speakers of English but much use of English as a second language for education, government, or domestic business, and its routine use for school instruction and official interactions with the government. Those countries have millions of native speakers of dialect continua ranging from an English-based creole to
6324-404: The 2021–2022 school year alone. The local business process outsourcing industry has also helped boost the language's economic prospects. Today, while the actual number of proficient Spanish speakers is around 400,000, or under 0.5% of the population, a new generation of Spanish speakers in the Philippines has likewise emerged, though speaker estimates vary widely. Aside from standard Spanish,
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#17327766014286448-595: The 20th century, Spanish was introduced to Equatorial Guinea and the Western Sahara , and to areas of the United States that had not been part of the Spanish Empire, such as Spanish Harlem in New York City . For details on borrowed words and other external influences upon Spanish, see Influences on the Spanish language . Spanish is the primary language in 20 countries worldwide. As of 2023, it
6572-617: The 8th and 9th centuries. Middle English began in the late 11th century after the Norman Conquest of England, when a considerable amount of Old French vocabulary was incorporated into English over some three centuries. Early Modern English began in the late 15th century with the start of the Great Vowel Shift and the Renaissance trend of borrowing further Latin and Greek words and roots, concurrent with
6696-465: The Americas. As a Romance language, Spanish is a descendant of Latin. Around 75% of modern Spanish vocabulary is Latin in origin, including Latin borrowings from Ancient Greek. Alongside English and French , it is also one of the most taught foreign languages throughout the world. Spanish is well represented in the humanities and social sciences . Spanish is also the third most used language on
6820-608: The Angles. English may have a small amount of substrate influence from Common Brittonic, and a number of possible Brittonicisms in English have been proposed, but whether most of these supposed Brittonicisms are actually a direct result of Brittonic substrate influence is disputed. Old English was divided into four dialects: the Anglian dialects ( Mercian and Northumbrian ) and the Saxon dialects ( Kentish and West Saxon ). Through
6944-524: The British Empire in the 1950s and 1960s, former colonies often did not reject English but rather continued to use it as independent countries setting their own language policies. For example, the view of the English language among many Indians has gone from associating it with colonialism to associating it with economic progress, and English continues to be an official language of India. English
7068-547: The Early Modern period includes the works of William Shakespeare and the translation of the Bible commissioned by King James I . Even after the vowel shift the language still sounded different from Modern English: for example, the consonant clusters /kn ɡn sw/ in knight , gnat , and sword were still pronounced. Many of the grammatical features that a modern reader of Shakespeare might find quaint or archaic represent
7192-655: The English Language , which introduced standard spellings of words and usage norms. In 1828, Noah Webster published the American Dictionary of the English language to try to establish a norm for speaking and writing American English that was independent of the British standard. Within Britain, non-standard or lower class dialect features were increasingly stigmatised, leading to the quick spread of
7316-557: The English-speaking inner circle countries outside Britain helped level dialect distinctions and produce koineised forms of English in South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand. The majority of immigrants to the United States without British ancestry rapidly adopted English after arrival. Now the majority of the United States population are monolingual English speakers. English has ceased to be an "English language" in
7440-654: The Equatoguinean education system and is the primary language used in government and business. Whereas it is not the mother tongue of virtually any of its speakers, the vast majority of the population is proficient in Spanish. The Instituto Cervantes estimates that 87.7% of the population is fluent in Spanish. The proportion of proficient Spanish speakers in Equatorial Guinea exceeds the proportion of proficient speakers in other West and Central African nations of their respective colonial languages. Spanish
7564-402: The Galápagos Islands Natural Heritage for Humanity , making the Park Service through the Superintendent of the Park responsible for performing permanent park conservation and guarding the islands. The photo on the left is the Itabaca Channel and is located between two islands in the Galápagos , Ecuador . Looking at the aerial photo, Baltra Island , also known as South Seymour Island, is on
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#17327766014287688-463: The Galápagos National Park Service had its first Superintendent, 2 officers and 6 park rangers on Santa Cruz Island . In 1974, the Galápagos National Park Service had its first management plan and a team of officials in accordance with the organic structure issued in 1973, with a Superintendent, 2 conservation officers, 40 park rangers to comply with management objectives. On Santa Cruz is the Charles Darwin Research Station . In 1979, UNESCO declared
7812-577: The Iberian Peninsula. These languages included Proto-Basque , Iberian , Lusitanian , Celtiberian and Gallaecian . The first documents to show traces of what is today regarded as the precursor of modern Spanish are from the 9th century. Throughout the Middle Ages and into the modern era , the most important influences on the Spanish lexicon came from neighboring Romance languages — Mozarabic ( Andalusi Romance ), Navarro-Aragonese , Leonese , Catalan/Valencian , Portuguese , Galician , Occitan , and later, French and Italian . Spanish also borrowed
7936-424: The Old Spanish sibilants) for details. The Gramática de la lengua castellana , written in Salamanca in 1492 by Elio Antonio de Nebrija , was the first grammar written for a modern European language. According to a popular anecdote, when Nebrija presented it to Queen Isabella I , she asked him what was the use of such a work, and he answered that language is the instrument of empire. In his introduction to
8060-502: The Roman economy and administration collapsed . By the 7th century, this Germanic language of the Anglo-Saxons became dominant in Britain , replacing the languages of Roman Britain (43–409): Common Brittonic , a Celtic language , and British Latin , brought to Britain by the Roman occupation. At this time, these dialects generally resisted influence from the then-local Brittonic and Latin languages. England and English (originally Ænglaland and Ænglisc ) are both named after
8184-424: The Spanish-speaking world, Spanish is called not only español but also castellano (Castilian), the language from the Kingdom of Castile , contrasting it with other languages spoken in Spain such as Galician , Basque , Asturian , Catalan/Valencian , Aragonese , Occitan and other minor languages. The Spanish Constitution of 1978 uses the term castellano to define the official language of
8308-502: The U.S. population were of Hispanic or Hispanic American by origin. In turn, 41.8 million people in the United States aged five or older speak Spanish at home, or about 13% of the population. Spanish predominates in the unincorporated territory of Puerto Rico , where it is also an official language along with English. Spanish is by far the most common second language in the country, with over 50 million total speakers if non-native or second-language speakers are included. While English
8432-442: The Union, in practice English is the main working language of EU organisations. Although in most countries English is not an official language, it is currently the language most often taught as a foreign language . In the countries of the EU, English is the most widely spoken foreign language in nineteen of the twenty-five member states where it is not an official language (that is, the countries other than Ireland and Malta ). In
8556-399: The administration of Ferdinand Marcos two months later. It remained an official language until the ratification of the present constitution in 1987, in which it was re-designated as a voluntary and optional auxiliary language. Additionally, the constitution, in its Article XIV, stipulates that the Government shall provide the people of the Philippines with a Spanish-language translation of
8680-407: The base from which English spreads to other countries in the world. Estimates of the numbers of second language and foreign-language English speakers vary greatly from 470 million to more than 1 billion, depending on how proficiency is defined. Linguist David Crystal estimates that non-native speakers now outnumber native speakers by a ratio of 3 to 1. In Kachru's three-circles model,
8804-401: The basis for the required controlled natural languages Seaspeak and Airspeak, used as international languages of seafaring and aviation. English used to have parity with French and German in scientific research, but now it dominates that field. It achieved parity with French as a language of diplomacy at the Treaty of Versailles negotiations in 1919. By the time of the foundation of
8928-400: The beginning, Englishmen had three manners of speaking, southern, northern and midlands speech in the middle of the country, ... Nevertheless, through intermingling and mixing, first with Danes and then with Normans, amongst many the country language has arisen, and some use strange stammering, chattering, snarling, and grating gnashing. John Trevisa , c. 1385 Middle English
9052-684: The classic hispanus or hispanicus took the suffix -one from Vulgar Latin , as happened with other words such as bretón (Breton) or sajón (Saxon). Like the other Romance languages , the Spanish language evolved from Vulgar Latin , which was brought to the Iberian Peninsula by the Romans during the Second Punic War , beginning in 210 BC. Several pre-Roman languages (also called Paleohispanic languages )—some distantly related to Latin as Indo-European languages , and some that are not related at all—were previously spoken in
9176-638: The consensus of educated English speakers around the world, without any oversight by any government or international organisation. American listeners readily understand most British broadcasting, and British listeners readily understand most American broadcasting. Most English speakers around the world can understand radio programmes, television programmes, and films from many parts of the English-speaking world. Both standard and non-standard varieties of English can include both formal or informal styles, distinguished by word choice and syntax and use both technical and non-technical registers. The settlement history of
9300-500: The consonant written b (a bilabial with plosive and fricative allophones). In modern Spanish, there is no difference between the pronunciation of orthographic b and v . Typical of Spanish (as also of neighboring Gascon extending as far north as the Gironde estuary , and found in a small area of Calabria ), attributed by some scholars to a Basque substratum was the mutation of Latin initial f into h- whenever it
9424-701: The continent. The Frisian languages, which together with the Anglic languages form the Anglo-Frisian languages , are the closest living relatives of English. Low German/Low Saxon is also closely related, and sometimes English, the Frisian languages, and Low German are grouped together as the North Sea Germanic languages, though this grouping remains debated. Old English evolved into Middle English , which in turn evolved into Modern English. Particular dialects of Old and Middle English also developed into
9548-404: The country's constitution. In recent years changing attitudes among non-Spanish speaking Filipinos have helped spur a revival of the language, and starting in 2009 Spanish was reintroduced as part of the basic education curriculum in a number of public high schools, becoming the largest foreign language program offered by the public school system, with over 7,000 students studying the language in
9672-476: The development of English was influenced by a long series of invasions of the British Isles by other peoples and languages, particularly Old Norse and French dialects . These left a profound mark of their own on the language, so that English shows some similarities in vocabulary and grammar with many languages outside its linguistic clades —but it is not mutually intelligible with any of those languages either. Some scholars have argued that English can be considered
9796-476: The distinct characteristics of Early Modern English. In the 1611 King James Version of the Bible, written in Early Modern English, Matthew 8:20 says, "The Foxes haue holes and the birds of the ayre haue nests." This exemplifies the loss of case and its effects on sentence structure (replacement with subject–verb–object word order, and the use of of instead of the non-possessive genitive), and
9920-401: The early period of Old English were written using a runic script . By the 6th century, a Latin alphabet was adopted, written with half-uncial letterforms . It included the runic letters wynn ⟨ ƿ ⟩ and thorn ⟨ þ ⟩ , and the modified Latin letters eth ⟨ ð ⟩ , and ash ⟨ æ ⟩ . Old English is essentially
10044-551: The educational reforms of King Alfred in the 9th century and the influence of the kingdom of Wessex , the West Saxon dialect became the standard written variety . The epic poem Beowulf is written in West Saxon, and the earliest English poem, Cædmon's Hymn , is written in Northumbrian. Modern English developed mainly from Mercian, but the Scots language developed from Northumbrian. A few short inscriptions from
10168-695: The elite in England eventually developed into the Anglo-Norman language . Because Norman was spoken primarily by the elites and nobles, while the lower classes continued speaking English, the main influence of Norman was the introduction of a wide range of loanwords related to politics, legislation and prestigious social domains. Middle English also greatly simplified the inflectional system, probably in order to reconcile Old Norse and Old English, which were inflectionally different but morphologically similar. The distinction between nominative and accusative cases
10292-408: The expanding circle use it to communicate with other people from the expanding circle, so that interaction with native speakers of English plays no part in their decision to use the language. Non-native varieties of English are widely used for international communication, and speakers of one such variety often encounter features of other varieties. Very often today a conversation in English anywhere in
10416-683: The following table: Spanish is marked by palatalization of the Latin double consonants ( geminates ) nn and ll (thus Latin annum > Spanish año , and Latin anellum > Spanish anillo ). The consonant written u or v in Latin and pronounced [w] in Classical Latin had probably " fortified " to a bilabial fricative /β/ in Vulgar Latin. In early Spanish (but not in Catalan or Portuguese) it merged with
10540-466: The former British colony of Belize (known until 1973 as British Honduras ) where English is the sole official language, according to the 2022 census, 54% of the total population are able to speak the language. Due to its proximity to Spanish-speaking countries and small existing native Spanish speaking minority, Trinidad and Tobago has implemented Spanish language teaching into its education system. The Trinidadian and Tobagonian government launched
10664-604: The grammar, dated 18 August 1492, Nebrija wrote that "... language was always the companion of empire." From the 16th century onwards, the language was taken to the Spanish-discovered America and the Spanish East Indies via Spanish colonization of America . Miguel de Cervantes , author of Don Quixote , is such a well-known reference in the world that Spanish is often called la lengua de Cervantes ("the language of Cervantes"). In
10788-721: The growing economic and cultural influence of the United States and its status as a superpower following the Second World War has, along with worldwide broadcasting in English by the BBC and other broadcasters, caused the language to spread across the planet much faster. In the 21st century, English is more widely spoken and written than any language has ever been. As Modern English developed, explicit norms for standard usage were published, and spread through official media such as public education and state-sponsored publications. In 1755, Samuel Johnson published his A Dictionary of
10912-479: The history of English was Early Modern English (1500–1700). Early Modern English was characterised by the Great Vowel Shift (1350–1700), inflectional simplification, and linguistic standardisation. The Great Vowel Shift affected the stressed long vowels of Middle English. It was a chain shift , meaning that each shift triggered a subsequent shift in the vowel system. Mid and open vowels were raised , and close vowels were broken into diphthongs . For example,
11036-407: The history of how English spread in different countries, how users acquire English, and the range of uses English has in each country. The three circles change membership over time. Countries with large communities of native speakers of English (the inner circle) include Britain, the United States, Australia, Canada, Ireland, and New Zealand, where the majority speaks English, and South Africa, where
11160-403: The inner-circle countries, and they may show grammatical and phonological differences from inner-circle varieties as well. The standard English of the inner-circle countries is often taken as a norm for use of English in the outer-circle countries. In the three-circles model, countries such as Poland, China, Brazil, Germany, Japan, Indonesia, Egypt, and other countries where English is taught as
11284-506: The internet by number of users after English and Chinese and the second most used language by number of websites after English. Spanish is used as an official language by many international organizations , including the United Nations , European Union , Organization of American States , Union of South American Nations , Community of Latin American and Caribbean States , African Union , among others. In Spain and some other parts of
11408-531: The introduction of loanwords from French ( ayre ) and word replacements ( bird originally meaning "nestling" had replaced OE fugol ). By the late 18th century, the British Empire had spread English through its colonies and geopolitical dominance. Commerce, science and technology, diplomacy, art, and formal education all contributed to English becoming the first truly global language. English also facilitated worldwide international communication. English
11532-475: The introduction of the printing press to London. This era notably culminated in the King James Bible and the works of William Shakespeare . The printing press greatly standardised English spelling, which has remained largely unchanged since then, despite a wide variety of later sound shifts in English dialects. Modern English has spread around the world since the 17th century as a consequence of
11656-423: The language's hegemony in an intensely centralising Spanish state were established from the 18th century onward. Other European territories in which it is also widely spoken include Gibraltar and Andorra . Spanish is also spoken by immigrant communities in other European countries, such as the United Kingdom , France , Italy , and Germany . Spanish is an official language of the European Union . Today,
11780-431: The languages have descended from a single common ancestor called Proto-Germanic . Some shared features of Germanic languages include the division of verbs into strong and weak classes, the use of modal verbs , and the sound changes affecting Proto-Indo-European consonants, known as Grimm's and Verner's laws . English is classified as an Anglo-Frisian language because Frisian and English share other features, such as
11904-694: The majority of the Spanish speakers live in Hispanic America . Nationally, Spanish is the official language—either de facto or de jure —of Argentina , Bolivia (co-official with 36 indigenous languages), Chile , Colombia , Costa Rica , Cuba , Dominican Republic , Ecuador , El Salvador , Guatemala , Honduras , Mexico (co-official with 63 indigenous languages), Nicaragua , Panama , Paraguay (co-official with Guaraní ), Peru (co-official with Quechua , Aymara , and "the other indigenous languages"), Puerto Rico (co-official with English), Uruguay , and Venezuela . Spanish language has
12028-734: The northwest of the African mainland. The Spanish spoken in the Canary Islands traces its origins back to the Castilian conquest in the 15th century , and, in addition to a resemblance to Western Andalusian speech patterns, it also features strong influence from the Spanish varieties spoken in the Americas, which in turn have also been influenced historically by Canarian Spanish. The Spanish spoken in North Africa by native bilingual speakers of Arabic or Berber who also speak Spanish as
12152-654: The other hand, currently uses the term español in its publications. However, from 1713 to 1923, it called the language castellano . The Diccionario panhispánico de dudas (a language guide published by the Royal Spanish Academy) states that, although the Royal Spanish Academy prefers to use the term español in its publications when referring to the Spanish language, both terms— español and castellano —are regarded as synonymous and equally valid. The term castellano
12276-533: The population. Many northern Moroccans have rudimentary knowledge of Spanish, with Spanish being particularly significant in areas adjacent to Ceuta and Melilla. Spanish also has a presence in the education system of the country (through either selected education centers implementing Spain's education system, primarily located in the North, or the availability of Spanish as foreign language subject in secondary education). In Western Sahara , formerly Spanish Sahara ,
12400-426: The prestige varieties among the middle classes. In modern English, the loss of grammatical case is almost complete (it is now only found in pronouns, such as he and him , she and her , who and whom ), and SVO word order is mostly fixed. Some changes, such as the use of do-support , have become universalised. (Earlier English did not use the word "do" as a general auxiliary as Modern English does; at first it
12524-731: The progress made since 2007. A favorite of visitors to the Galapagos is Tortuga Bay , located on the Santa Cruz Island , about a 20-minute walk from the main water taxi dock in Puerto Ayora . The walking path is 1.55 miles (2,490 m) and is open from six in the morning to six in the evening. Visitors must sign in and out at the start of the path with the Galapagos Park Service office. Marine iguanas , galapagos crabs and birds are seen dotted along
12648-678: The reign of Henry V . Around 1430, the Court of Chancery in Westminster began using English in its official documents , and a new standard form of Middle English, known as Chancery Standard , developed from the dialects of London and the East Midlands . In 1476, William Caxton introduced the printing press to England and began publishing the first printed books in London, expanding the influence of this form of English. Literature from
12772-525: The right and Santa Cruz Island is on the left. The Itabaca Channel is used by water taxis who take people from Baltra to Santa Cruz. The Galápagos Marine Reserve was created in 1986. Additionally, the same year, the Galápagos National Park was included in the list of Biosphere Reserve because of its unique scientific and educational worth that should be preserved for perpetuity. A UNESCO mission arrived in Galapagos on 29 April to study
12896-415: The sense of belonging only to people who are ethnically English . Use of English is growing country-by-country internally and for international communication. Most people learn English for practical rather than ideological reasons. Many speakers of English in Africa have become part of an "Afro-Saxon" language community that unites Africans from different countries. As decolonisation proceeded throughout
13020-483: The source of approximately 28% of Modern English words , and from Latin , which is the source of an additional 28% . As such, though most of its total vocabulary comes from Romance languages , Modern English's grammar, phonology, and most commonly used words in everyday use keep it genealogically classified under the Germanic branch. It exists on a dialect continuum with Scots and is then most closely related to
13144-474: The southern dialects. Theoretically, as late as the 900s AD, a commoner from certain (northern) parts of England could hold a conversation with a commoner from certain parts of Scandinavia. Research continues into the details of the myriad tribes in peoples in England and Scandinavia and the mutual contacts between them. The translation of Matthew 8:20 from 1000 shows examples of case endings ( nominative plural, accusative plural, genitive singular) and
13268-455: The study of English as an auxiliary language. The trademarked Globish uses a relatively small subset of English vocabulary (about 1500 words, designed to represent the highest use in international business English) in combination with the standard English grammar. Other examples include Simple English . The increased use of the English language globally has had an effect on other languages, leading to some English words being assimilated into
13392-537: The term español (Spanish). According to the Royal Spanish Academy, español derives from the Occitan word espaignol and that, in turn, derives from the Vulgar Latin * hispaniolus ('of Hispania'). Hispania was the Roman name for the entire Iberian Peninsula . There are other hypotheses apart from the one suggested by the Royal Spanish Academy. Spanish philologist Ramón Menéndez Pidal suggested that
13516-444: The theories of Ramón Menéndez Pidal , local sociolects of Vulgar Latin evolved into Spanish, in the north of Iberia, in an area centered in the city of Burgos , and this dialect was later brought to the city of Toledo , where the written standard of Spanish was first developed, in the 13th century. In this formative stage, Spanish developed a strongly differing variant from its close cousin, Leonese , and, according to some authors,
13640-768: The third most used language on the Internet , after English and Chinese. Spanish is the official language of Spain . Upon the emergence of the Castilian Crown as the dominant power in the Iberian Peninsula by the end of the Middle Ages, the Romance vernacular associated with this polity became increasingly used in instances of prestige and influence, and the distinction between "Castilian" and "Spanish" started to become blurred. Hard policies imposing
13764-585: The whole of Spain, in contrast to las demás lenguas españolas (lit. "the other Spanish languages "). Article III reads as follows: El castellano es la lengua española oficial del Estado. ... Las demás lenguas españolas serán también oficiales en las respectivas Comunidades Autónomas... Castilian is the official Spanish language of the State. ... The other Spanish languages shall also be official in their respective Autonomous Communities... The Royal Spanish Academy ( Real Academia Española ), on
13888-473: The word bite was originally pronounced as the word beet is today, and the second vowel in the word about was pronounced as the word boot is today. The Great Vowel Shift explains many irregularities in spelling since English retains many spellings from Middle English, and it also explains why English vowel letters have very different pronunciations from the same letters in other languages. English began to rise in prestige, relative to Norman French, during
14012-785: The world may include no native speakers of English at all, even while including speakers from several different countries. This is particularly true of the shared vocabulary of mathematics and the sciences. English is a pluricentric language , which means that no one national authority sets the standard for use of the language. Spoken English, including English used in broadcasting, generally follows national pronunciation standards that are established by custom rather than by regulation. International broadcasters are usually identifiable as coming from one country rather than another through their accents , but newsreader scripts are also composed largely in international standard written English . The norms of standard written English are maintained purely by
14136-506: The world's fourth-most spoken language overall after English , Mandarin Chinese, and Hindustani ( Hindi - Urdu ); and the world's most widely spoken Romance language. The country with the largest population of native speakers is Mexico . Spanish is part of the Ibero-Romance language group , in which the language is also known as Castilian ( castellano ). The group evolved from several dialects of Vulgar Latin in Iberia after
14260-539: The world, but the number of English speakers in India is uncertain, with most scholars concluding that the United States still has more speakers of English than India. Modern English, sometimes described as the first global lingua franca , is also regarded as the first world language . English is the world's most widely used language in newspaper publishing, book publishing, international telecommunications, scientific publishing, international trade, mass entertainment, and diplomacy. English is, by international treaty,
14384-438: The worldwide influence of the British Empire and the United States. Through all types of printed and electronic media in these countries, English has become the leading language of international discourse and the lingua franca in many regions and professional contexts such as science, navigation , and law. Its modern grammar is the result of a gradual change from a dependent-marking pattern typical of Indo-European with
14508-405: Was adopted in parts of North America, parts of Africa, Oceania, and many other regions. When they obtained political independence, some of the newly independent states that had multiple indigenous languages opted to continue using English as the official language to avoid the political and other difficulties inherent in promoting any one indigenous language above the others. In the 20th century
14632-634: Was developed in the cities of Toledo , in the 13th to 16th centuries, and Madrid , from the 1570s. The development of the Spanish sound system from that of Vulgar Latin exhibits most of the changes that are typical of Western Romance languages , including lenition of intervocalic consonants (thus Latin vīta > Spanish vida ). The diphthongization of Latin stressed short e and o —which occurred in open syllables in French and Italian, but not at all in Catalan or Portuguese—is found in both open and closed syllables in Spanish, as shown in
14756-622: Was distinguished by a heavy Basque influence (see Iberian Romance languages ). This distinctive dialect spread to southern Spain with the advance of the Reconquista , and meanwhile gathered a sizable lexical influence from the Arabic of Al-Andalus , much of it indirectly, through the Romance Mozarabic dialects (some 4,000 Arabic -derived words, make up around 8% of the language today). The written standard for this new language
14880-713: Was followed by a vowel that did not diphthongize. The h- , still preserved in spelling, is now silent in most varieties of the language, although in some Andalusian and Caribbean dialects, it is still aspirated in some words. Because of borrowings from Latin and neighboring Romance languages, there are many f -/ h - doublets in modern Spanish: Fernando and Hernando (both Spanish for "Ferdinand"), ferrero and herrero (both Spanish for "smith"), fierro and hierro (both Spanish for "iron"), and fondo and hondo (both words pertaining to depth in Spanish, though fondo means "bottom", while hondo means "deep"); additionally, hacer ("to make")
15004-518: Was fully developed, integrating both Norse and French features; it continued to be spoken until the transition to early Modern English around 1500. Middle English literature includes Geoffrey Chaucer 's The Canterbury Tales , and Thomas Malory 's Le Morte d'Arthur . In the Middle English period, the use of regional dialects in writing proliferated, and dialect traits were even used for effect by authors such as Chaucer. The next period in
15128-505: Was lost except in personal pronouns, the instrumental case was dropped, and the use of the genitive case was limited to indicating possession . The inflectional system regularised many irregular inflectional forms, and gradually simplified the system of agreement, making word order less flexible. The transition from Old to Middle English can be placed during the writing of the Ormulum . The oldest Middle English texts that were written by
15252-533: Was only used in question constructions, and even then was not obligatory. Now, do-support with the verb have is becoming increasingly standardised.) The use of progressive forms in -ing , appears to be spreading to new constructions, and forms such as had been being built are becoming more common. Regularisation of irregular forms also slowly continues (e.g. dreamed instead of dreamt ), and analytical alternatives to inflectional forms are becoming more common (e.g. more polite instead of politer ). British English
15376-462: Was revoked by Michel Temer after the impeachment of Dilma Rousseff . In many border towns and villages along Paraguay and Uruguay, a mixed language known as Portuñol is spoken. Equatorial Guinea is the only Spanish-speaking country located entirely in Africa, with the language introduced during the Spanish colonial period . Enshrined in the constitution as an official language (alongside French and Portuguese), Spanish features prominently in
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