The language diversity of the US

Photo by James McDowell

AMERICA’S LANGUAGE SKILLS MAY SUCK, but its linguistic diversity is incredible.

In 2014, Slate put together a series of maps of the languages spoken in American homes by using the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey.

These maps help us go beyond what we know to be the most prevalent languages in the US — English and Spanish — and creates awareness of the amazing multiculturalism at work in this country.

This one is not too much of a suprise, but look at what happens when Spanish is excluded from the data.

Who knew Polish was the third most spoken language in Illinois and that Korean was widely used in Georgia? And what on Earth is “Hmong”? (A dialect spoken in certain regions of China, northern Vietnam, Thailand, and Laos).

According to Slate, Navajo is the most commonly spoken Native American language, with more than 170,000 speakers and “there are more speakers of Navajo in Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona than there are speakers of other Native American languages in all other states combined.”

Nepali spoken in Montana and North Dakota? Really?