Austronesian Languages
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Austronesian Languages
The Austronesian languages ( ) are a language family widely spoken throughout Maritime Southeast Asia, parts of Mainland Southeast Asia, Madagascar, the islands of the Pacific Ocean and Taiwan (by Taiwanese indigenous peoples). They are spoken by about 328 million people (4.4% of the world population). This makes it the fifth-largest language family by number of speakers. Major Austronesian languages include Malay (around 250–270 million in Indonesia alone in its own literary standard named " Indonesian"), Javanese, Sundanese, Tagalog (standardized as Filipino), Malagasy and Cebuano. According to some estimates, the family contains 1,257 languages, which is the second most of any language family. In 1706, the Dutch scholar Adriaan Reland first observed similarities between the languages spoken in the Malay Archipelago and by peoples on islands in the Pacific Ocean. In the 19th century, researchers (e.g. Wilhelm von Humboldt, Herman van der Tuuk) started to apply the ...
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Taiwan
Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the China, People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the northeast, and the Philippines to the south. It has an area of , with mountain ranges dominating the eastern two-thirds and plains in the western third, where its Urbanization by country, highly urbanized population is concentrated. The combined Free area of the Republic of China, territories under ROC control consist of list of islands of Taiwan, 168 islands in total covering . The Taipei–Keelung metropolitan area, largest metropolitan area is formed by Taipei (the capital), New Taipei City, and Keelung. With around 23.9 million inhabitants, Taiwan is among the List of countries and dependencies by population density, most densely populated countries. Tai ...
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Tsouic Languages
The Tsouic languages (also known as the Central Formosan languages) are three Formosan languages, Tsou proper and the Southern languages Kanakanavu and Saaroa. The Southern Tsouic languages of Kanakanavu and Saaroa have the smallest phonemic inventories out of all the Formosan languages, with each language having only 13 consonants and 4 vowels (Blust 2009:165).Blust, Robert A. ''The Austronesian Languages''. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics, Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University, 2009. , . These two languages are highly endangered, as many Southern Tsouic speakers are shifting to Bunun and Mandarin Chinese. The Proto-Tsouic language was reconstructed by Japanese linguist Shigeru Tsuchida in 1976, and is supported by Blust (1999), Li (2008), and Sagart (2014). However, Chang (2006)Chang, Henry Yungli. 2006. "Rethinking the Tsouic Subgroup Hypothesis: A Morphosyntactic Perspective." In Chang, H., Huang, L. M., Ho, D. (eds.). ''Streams converg ...
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Cebuano Language
Cebuano ( )Cebuano
on Merriam-Webster.com
is an Austronesian languages, Austronesian language spoken in the southern Philippines by Cebuano people and other Ethnic groups in the Philippines, ethnic groups as a secondary language. It is natively, though informally, called by the generic name Bisayâ (), or Binisayâ () (both terms are translated into English as ''Visayan'', though this should not be confused with other Bisayan languages) and sometimes referred to in English sources as Cebuan ( ). It is spoken by the Visayans, Visayan ethnolinguistic groups native to the islands of Cebu, Bohol, Siquijor, the eastern half of Negros Island, Negros, the western half of Leyte, the northern coastal areas of Northern Mindanao and the eastern part of Zamboanga del Norte due to Captaincy General of the Philippines, Spanish settlements during the 18th ...
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Malagasy Language
Malagasy ( ; ; Sorabe: ) is an Austronesian languages, Austronesian language and dialect continuum spoken in Madagascar. The standard variety, called Official Malagasy, is one of the official languages of Madagascar, alongside French language, French. Malagasy is the westernmost Austronesian language, brought to Madagascar with the settlement of Austronesian peoples, Austronesian speakers from the Sunda Islands (about 7,300 kilometres or 4,500 miles away) around the 5th century AD or perhaps between the 7th and 13th centuries. The Malagasy language is one of the Barito languages and is most closely related to the Maʼanyan language, still spoken on Borneo. Malagasy also includes numerous Malay language, Malay loanwords, from the time of the early Austronesian settlement and trading between Madagascar and the Sunda Islands. After , Malagasy incorporated numerous Bantu languages, Bantu and Arabic language, Arabic loanwords brought over by traders and new settlers. Malagasy is spok ...
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Filipino Language
Filipino ( ; , ) is the national language of the Philippines, the main lingua franca, and one of the two official languages of the country, along with Philippine English, English. It is only a ''de facto'' and not a ''de jure'' standard language, standardized form of the Tagalog language, as spoken and written in Metro Manila, the National Capital Region, and in other urban centers of the archipelago. The Constitution of the Philippines, 1987 Constitution mandates that Filipino be further enriched and developed by the other languages of the Philippines. Filipino, like other Austronesian languages, commonly uses Verb–subject–object, verb-subject-object order, but can also use subject-verb-object order. Filipino follows the Symmetrical voice, trigger system of morphosyntactic alignment that is common among Philippine languages. It has Head-directionality parameter, head-initial directionality. It is an agglutinative language but can also display inflection. It is not a Tone ...
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Tagalog Language
Tagalog ( ,According to the ''OED'' anMerriam-Webster Online Dictionary ; ''Baybayin'': ) is an Austronesian language spoken as a first language by the ethnic Tagalog people, who make up a quarter of the population of the Philippines, and as a second language by the majority, mostly as or through Filipino language, Filipino. Its de facto Standard language, standardized and codified form, officially named ''Filipino'', is the national language of the Philippines, and is one of the nation's two official languages, alongside Philippine English, English. Tagalog, like the other and as one of the regional languages of the Philippines, which majority are Austronesian languages, Austronesian, is one of the auxiliary official languages of the Philippines in the regions and also one of the auxiliary media of instruction therein. Tagalog is closely related to other Philippine languages, such as the Bikol languages, the Bisayan languages, Ilocano language, Ilocano, Kapampangan language, ...
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Sundanese Language
Sundanese ( ; , Sundanese script: , ) is an Austronesian language spoken in Java, primarily by the Sundanese. It has approximately 32 million native speakers in the western third of Java; they represent about 15% of Indonesia's total population. Classification According to American linguist Robert Blust, Sundanese is closely related to the Malayic languages, as well as to language groups spoken in Borneo such as the Land Dayak languages or the Kayan–Murik languages, based on high lexical similarities between these languages. History and distribution Sundanese is mainly spoken on the west side of the island of Java, in an area known as Tatar Sunda ( Pasundan). However, Sundanese is also spoken in the western part of Central Java, especially in Brebes and Cilacap Regency, because these areas were previously under the control of the Galuh Kingdom. Many place names in Cilacap are still Sundanese names such as Dayeuhluhur, Cimanggu, Cipari, even as far as Banyu ...
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Javanese Language
Javanese ( , , ; , Aksara Jawa, Javanese script: , Pegon script, Pegon: , IPA: ) is an Austronesian languages, Austronesian language spoken primarily by the Javanese people from the central and eastern parts of the island of Java, Indonesia. There are also pockets of Javanese speakers on the northern coast of western Java. It is the native language of more than 68 million people. Javanese is the largest of the Austronesian languages in List of languages by number of native speakers, number of native speakers. It has several regional dialects and a number of clearly distinct status styles. Its closest relatives are the neighboring languages such as Sundanese language, Sundanese, Madurese language, Madurese, and Balinese language, Balinese. Most speakers of Javanese also speak Indonesian language, Indonesian for official and commercial purposes as well as a means to communicate with non-Javanese-speaking Indonesians. There are speakers of Javanese in Malaysia (concentrated ...
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Indonesian Language
Indonesian (; ) is the official language, official and national language of Indonesia. It is a standard language, standardized variety (linguistics), variety of Malay language, Malay, an Austronesian languages, Austronesian language that has been used as a lingua franca in the multilingual Indonesian archipelago for centuries. With over 280 million inhabitants, Indonesia ranks as the list of countries by population, fourth-most populous nation globally. According to the 2020 census, over 97% of Indonesians are fluent in Indonesian, making it the largest language by number of speakers in Southeast Asia and one of the List of languages by total number of speakers, most widely spoken languages in the world.James Neil Sneddon. ''The Indonesian Language: Its History and Role in Modern Society''. UNSW Press, 2004. Indonesian vocabulary has been influenced by various native regional languages such as Javanese language, Javanese, Sundanese language, Sundanese, Minangkabau language, Min ...
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Malay Language
Malay ( , ; , Jawi alphabet, Jawi: ) is an Austronesian languages, Austronesian language spoken primarily by Malays (ethnic group), Malays in several islands of Maritime Southeast Asia and the Malay Peninsula on the mainland Asia. The language is an official language of Brunei, Malaysia, and Singapore. Indonesian language, Indonesian, a standardized variety of Malay, is the official language of Indonesia and one of the working languages of East Timor. Malay is also spoken as a regional language of Malays (ethnic group), ethnic Malays in Indonesia and the Thai Malays, southern part of Thailand. Altogether, it is spoken by 60 million people across Maritime Southeast Asia. The language is pluricentric and a ISO 639 macrolanguage, macrolanguage, i.e., a group of Mutual intelligibility, mutually intelligible speech varieties, or dialect continuum, that have no traditional name in common, and which may be considered distinct languages by their speakers. Several varieties of it ar ...
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World Population
In demographics of the world, world demographics, the world population is the total number of humans currently alive. It was estimated by the United Nations to have exceeded eight billion in mid-November 2022. It took around 300,000 years of human prehistory and human history, history for the human population to reach a billion and only 218 more years to reach 8 billion. The human population has experienced Population growth, continuous growth following the Great Famine of 1315–1317 and the end of the Black Death in 1350, when it was nearly 370,000,000. The highest global List of countries by population growth rate, population growth rates, with increases of over 1.8% per year, occurred between 1955 and 1975, peaking at 2.1% between 1965 and 1970. The growth rate declined to 1.1% between 2015 and 2020 and is projected to decline further in the 21st century. The global population is still increasing, but there is significant uncertainty about its long-term trajectory due ...
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Taiwanese Indigenous Peoples
Taiwanese indigenous peoples, formerly called Taiwanese aborigines, are the indigenous peoples of Taiwan, with the nationally recognized subgroups numbering about 600,303 or 3% of the Geography of Taiwan, island's population. This total is increased to more than 800,000 if the Plains indigenous peoples, indigenous peoples of the plains in Taiwan are included, pending future official recognition. When including those of mixed ancestry, such a number is possibly more than a million. Academic research suggests that their ancestors have been living on Taiwan for approximately 15,000 years. A wide body of evidence suggests that the Taiwanese indigenous peoples had maintained regular trade networks with numerous regional cultures of Southeast Asia before the Han Chinese colonists History of Taiwan#Settler expansion (1684–1795), settled on the island from the 17th century, at the behest of the Dutch Formosa#Agriculture, Dutch colonial administration and later by successive governments ...
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