is the fourth most commonly spoken
language in the United Kingdom.
According to the
2011 census, 269,000 people (0.5% of UK residents) listed Urdu as their main language.
Ethnologue reports the total number of Urdu speakers in the UK at over 400,000.
Urdu Periodicals of UK
In 1990s, some weekly, fortnightly, and monthly Urdu language periodicals used to get published from the UK.
Challenges
Britain's
Anglophone
Speakers of English are also known as Anglophones, and the countries where English is natively spoken by the majority of the population are termed the ''Anglosphere''. Over two billion people speak English , making English the largest language ...
tradition and inheritance centralises English as the national lingua and vernacular. Radical opportunities exist however for the productive growth of minority
Commonwealth migrant languages such as Urdu and
Punjabi, particularly in curriculum-based education.
Use in politics
When Pakistani-origin Scottish MSP
Bashir Ahmad was elected to the
Scottish parliament in 2007, he took his oath in both English and Urdu.
Queen Victoria
Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 216 days was longer than that of any previo ...
was taught to write Urdu by her
Indian Muslim
Islam is India's second-largest religion, with 14.2% of the country's population, approximately 172.2 million people identifying as adherents of Islam in 2011 Census. India is also the country with the second or third largest number of Muslim ...
servant
Abdul Karim.
See also
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List of English words of Hindi or Urdu origin
This is a list of English-language words of Hindi and Urdu origin, two distinguished registers of the Hindustani language. Many of the Hindi and Urdu equivalents have originated from Sanskrit; see List of English words of Sanskrit origin. Many oth ...
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Glossary of the British Raj
The following is based on a glossary attached to the fifth Report of the Committee of the House of Commons on Indian affairs, appointed in 1810, comprising Hindustani words commonly used in the administration of the British Raj (British India).
E ...
*
Punjabi language writers in the United Kingdom In the second half of the twentieth century, a number of Punjabis migrated to the United Kingdom from India, Pakistan and other countries. Among them a number of writers have emerged, writing variously in English and in Punjabi. Amongst these writer ...
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Languages of the United Kingdom
English, in various dialects, is the most widely spoken language of the United Kingdom, but a number of regional languages are also spoken. These are Scots and Ulster Scots and the Celtic languages, Irish, Scottish Gaelic, Welsh and, as a ...
*
Bo Kata
''Bo Kata'' is a 2007 documentary film produced, directed, edited and shot by Shehzad Afzal.
The original soundtrack for Bo Kata was composed by musician John Walden from Fife Scotland, who runs studio outfit Daft Dog Music.
Douglas Mackinno ...
*
Cinema of the United Kingdom
The United Kingdom has had a significant film industry for over a century. While film production reached an all-time high in 1936, the "golden age" of British cinema is usually thought to have occurred in the 1940s, during which the directors D ...
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BBC Urdu
References
Further reading
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{{Urdu topics
Languages of the Pakistani diaspora
Languages of the Indian diaspora