Languages of the European Union
The languages of the European Union are languages used by people within the member states of the European Union. They include the twenty-three official languages of the European Union along with a range of others. The EU asserts that it is in favour of linguistic diversity and currently has a European Commissioner for Multilingualism, Leonard Orban.
I
n
the European Union, language policy is the responsibility of member states
and EU does not have a common language policy; European Union institutions
play a supporting role in this field, based on the "principle of
subsidiarity". Their role is to promote cooperation between the member
states and to promote the European dimension in the member states language
policies. The EU encourages all its citizens to be multilingual;
specifically, it encourages them to be able to speak two languages in
addition to their mother tongue. Though the EU has very limited influence in
this area as the content of educational systems is the responsibility of
individual member states, a number of EU funding programmes actively promote
language learning and linguistic diversity. [1]
It should be noted that according to statistics the plurality of EU citizens speaks German, while the absolute majority can understand English and speak German, English, French or Italian as mother languages.
French is an official language common to the three cities that are political centres of the Union: Brussels (Belgium), Strasbourg (France) and Luxembourg city (Luxembourg), while Catalan, Galician and (in the Baltic states) Russian are the most widely used non-recognized languages in the EU.
The languages of the European Union are languages used by people within the member states of the European Union. They include the twenty-three official languages of the European Union along with a range of others. The EU asserts that it is in favour of linguistic diversity and currently has a European Commissioner for Multilingualism, Leonard Orban.
I
n
the European Union, language policy is the responsibility of member states
and EU does not have a common language policy; European Union institutions
play a supporting role in this field, based on the "principle of
subsidiarity". Their role is to promote cooperation between the member
states and to promote the European dimension in the member states language
policies. The EU encourages all its citizens to be multilingual;
specifically, it encourages them to be able to speak two languages in
addition to their mother tongue. Though the EU has very limited influence in
this area as the content of educational systems is the responsibility of
individual member states, a number of EU funding programmes actively promote
language learning and linguistic diversity. [1]It should be noted that according to statistics the plurality of EU citizens speaks German, while the absolute majority can understand English and speak German, English, French or Italian as mother languages.
French is an official language common to the three cities that are political centres of the Union: Brussels (Belgium), Strasbourg (France) and Luxembourg city (Luxembourg), while Catalan, Galician and (in the Baltic states) Russian are the most widely used non-recognized languages in the EU.
The official languages of the European Union, as
stipulated in the amended EEC Council: Regulation No 1 determining the
languages to be used by the European Economic Community of 1958-04-15 are:
stipulated in the amended EEC Council: Regulation No 1 determining the
languages to be used by the European Economic Community of 1958-04-15 are:| Language | Used in | Since |
| Bulgarian | Bulgaria | 2007 |
| Czech | Czech Republic | 2004 |
| Danish | Denmark | 1973 |
| Dutch | Netherlands & Belgium | 1958 |
| English | Ireland, Malta & United Kingdom | 1958 |
| Estonian | Estonia | 2004 |
| Finnish | Finland | 1995 |
| French | Belgium, France & Luxembourg | 1958 |
| German | Austria, Germany & Luxembourg | 1958 |
| Greek | Cyprus & Greek | 1981 |
| Hungarian | Hungary | 2004 |
| Irish | Ireland | 2007 |
| Italian | Italy | 1958 |
| Latvian | Latvia | 2004 |
| Lithuanian | Lithuania | 2004 |
| Maltese | Malta | 2004 |
| Polish | Poland | 2004 |
| Portuguese | Portugal | 1986 |
| Romanian | Romania | 2007 |
| Slovak | Slovakia | 2004 |
| Slovene | Slovenia | 2004 |
| Swedish | Finland & Sewden | 1995 |