Kalpana Kalpana (Editor)

List of largest languages without official status

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Below is list of languages without any official status (or a minority language) with more than a million speakers, ordered by the number of native speakers

Contents

List

  1. Southwest Mandarin (incl. Sichuanese): 200 million
  2. Central Plains Mandarin (inc. Shaanxi dialect): 170 million
  3. Javanese language: 100 million speakers, no official status in Indonesia
  4. Wu (incl. Shanghainese) : 77 million
  5. Southern Min/Hokkien: 48 million
  6. Hakka: 34 million
  7. Xiang: 30–36 million
  8. Sundanese language: 42 million speakers, no official status in Indonesia
  9. Gan: 22 million
  10. Madurese language: 13 million speakers, no official status in Indonesia
  11. Eastern Min (incl. Fuzhou dialect): 9.5 million
  12. Batak languages (7 languages): 7 million speakers, no official status in Indonesia
  13. Minangkabau language: 7 million speakers, no official status in Indonesia
  14. Banjar language: 3.5 million speakers, no official status in Indonesia
  15. Krio: 6 millions speakers, de facto national language of Sierra Leone but without official status
  16. Bhili language: 6 million speakers, largest linguistic community of India without regional status
  17. Balinese language: 4 million speakers, no official status in Indonesia
  18. Bugis language: 4 million speakers, no official status
  19. Hmong language: 4 million speakers, no official status
  20. Acehnese language: 3.5 million speakers, no official status in Indonesia
  21. Silesian language: 2 million speakers, no official status
  22. Aramaic language: 2 million speakers, no official status
  23. Yi language: 2 million speakers, no official status
  24. Northern Min: 2 million speakers,

Languages with official status in their region but not country

  1. Telugu language: 81 million speakers, state official status in India
  2. Cantonese: 70 million, de facto official (as "Chinese") in Hong Kong and Macau, the Special Administrative Regions of the People's Republic of China
  3. Marathi language: 60 million speakers, state official status in India
  4. Rajasthani language:It is spoken by 50 million people in Rajasthan and neighbouring states of India and Pakistan, state official status in India
  5. Malayalam language: 38 million speakers, state official status in India
  6. Kannada language: 40 million speakers, state official status in India
  7. Gujarati language: 40 million speakers, state official status in India
  8. Oriya language: 36 million speakers, state official status in India
  9. Punjabi language: 100 million speakers, regional status in Pakistan where its speakers form the majority of the country's population, but state official status in India
  10. Maithili language: 20 million speakers, state official status in India
  11. Assamese language: 13 million speakers, state official status in India
  12. Catalan language 9.4 million speakers, official language in Catalonia, Valencia and Balearic Islands, but not in the rest of Spain, and in Andorra
  13. Uyghur language: 8–11 million speakers, regional official status in China
  14. Konkani language: 7.4 million speakers, state official status in India
  15. Santali language: 6.2 million speakers, state official status in India
  16. Tatar language: 5.4 million speakers, regional official status in Russia (Tatarstan)
  17. Low German: at least 4.5 million speakers with good skills, regional official language in Brazil, the Netherlands and Germany, state official status in Schleswig-Holstein (Germany) and federal official status in Germany disputed
  18. Galician language: 3 million speakers, regional official language in Spain (Galicia)
  19. Mundari language: 2,080,000 speakers, state official status in India
  20. Meitei language: 1.4 million speakers, state official status in India

Language with low regional status

  1. Bhojpuri language: 35 million speakers, formerly considered a dialect of Hindi, in the process of being granted regional status on its own right in India
  2. Kurdish language: 16–26 million speakers, regional status in Iraq
  3. Oromo language: 25 million speakers, regional status in Ethiopia and Kenya
  4. Cebuano language: 20 million speakers, regional status in Central Visayas, eastern Negros Island Region and Davao Region, Philippines
  5. Hausa, Yoruba and Igbo with close to 20 million speakers each are the major languages of Nigeria, all three with regional status, and none with majority status.
  6. Zhuang languages: 14 million speakers, regional status in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region
  7. Sylheti language: 11 million speakers, regional status in Sylhet Division
  8. Balochi language: 8 million speakers, regional status in Balochistan
  9. Ilokano language: 8 million speakers, regional status in Ilocos Region and Cagayan Valley, Philippines
  10. Hiligaynon language: 7 million speakers, regional status in Western Visayas, western Negros Island Region and SOCCSKSARGEN, Philippines

References

List of largest languages without official status Wikipedia