Talk:List of languages by total number of speakers

Figures of Persian speakers

@A455bcd9: Hey, the main article about the Persian language says that there are 72 million L1 Persian speakers and 38 million L2 Persian speakers with a more recent version of Ethnologue as source. 78 million total speakers for this language is an old figure and quite odd as it is widely spoken in 3 countries with a total population of about 140 million (90 million in Iran, 40 million in Afghanistan and 10 millions in Tajikistan).---Wikaviani ^{(talk) (contribs)} 08:50, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

As said in this article: "This section does not include entries that Ethnologue identifies as macrolanguages encompassing several varieties, such as Arabic, Lahnda, Persian, Malay, Pashto, and Chinese." a455bcd9 (Antoine) (talk) 10:18, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

However, those entries are included in the table, thus we should either remove them (will be a bit odd to remove those languages) or update them and remove that meaningless sentence that contradicts the content of the table.---Wikaviani ^{(talk) (contribs)} 12:23, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

No. According to Ethnologue (and the ISO standard), there are:

• Persian, the macrolanguage, code [fas]: Population total all languages (L1 only): 71,977,460. Persian encompasses the following languages:
  • Dari, code [prs]: "Total users in all countries: 31,296,160 (as L1: 10,382,160; as L2: 20,914,000)."
  • Iranian Persian, code [pes]: "Total users in all countries: 78,826,300 (as L1: 61,595,300; as L2: 17,231,000)."

Tajik is classified as a language not part of [fas], with the code [tgk]. "Total users in all countries: 9,995,620 (as L1: 9,960,720; as L2: 34,900)."

Ethnologue notes that Dari [prs], Iranian Persian [pes] and Tajiki [tgk] are mutually intelligible.

Whether the above classification is correct or not is a debate that is irrelevant here. We just follow the source. Feel free to contact Ethnologue to provide feedback and convince them to change their mind (but I assume it will be hard for Tajik as it is using a different writing system, there's a case to merge Dari and Farsi though): https://www.ethnologue.com/contributor-program/ a455bcd9 (Antoine) (talk) 12:37, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

I got your points, but this makes that list a bit irrelevant, since the main article gives much higher figures for Persian language, because it includes Dari and Tajik and the source is still Ethnologue.---Wikaviani ^{(talk) (contribs)} 12:45, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

The distinction between a language and a dialect is somewhat arbitrary. Any list of languages will have that kind of issues. There's no perfect solution. So we stick to RS. The Persian language is about the macro-language so it sums the various sub-varieties. Iranian Persian, Dari, and Tajik language also use the Ethnologue data for their number of speakers. a455bcd9 (Antoine) (talk) 12:52, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

So maybe the best thing to do is to remove Ethnologue and replace it by a better and more consistent source. Leaving out Tajik and Dari from this list while these languages are mutually intelligible and keeping, for example French (as I speak French at mother tongue level, I can testify ...) while the French language as it is spoken in some parts of Africa is almost not intelligible with that spoken in France sounds irrelevant.---Wikaviani ^{(talk) (contribs)} 13:04, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

Ethnologue is THE reference. It's not perfect, but there's nothing "better and more consistent" (read this article: Ethnologue). (I'm a native French speaker as well btw). We don't use our own judgment: we use reliable sources. a455bcd9 (Antoine) (talk) 13:07, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

We don't use our own judgement, absolutely true (I don't claim any inclusion of my own judgement but only to find a better source), but Ethnologue being a top source, I have serious doubts about that.---Wikaviani ^{(talk) (contribs)} 13:20, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

Ethnologue#Reception,_reliability,_and_use: "the standard reference", "truly excellent, highly valuable, and the very best book of its sort available", "the most comprehensive global source list for (mostly oral) languages", "of very high absolute value and by far the best of its kind", etc.

Anyway, last time I checked the only reliable sources with a list of the most spoken languages were Ethnologue and the CIA. I couldn't find anything else. It would be good to have a third source but I'm afraid it doesn't exist. If you find one, please add it! a455bcd9 (Antoine) (talk) 13:24, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

It also says that it is sometimes out of date, and that for some languages, it is not the best source. Another linguist also mentions that Ethnologue does not quote its sources. So while it is a reasonably good source, it is not a top source.---Wikaviani ^{(talk) (contribs)} 13:27, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

Let me know once you find a better one! a455bcd9 (Antoine) (talk) 14:39, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

Ok, if I find one ;)---Wikaviani ^{(talk) (contribs)} 07:52, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

<1 million L2 Japanese speakers is dubious to the point of absurdity

There are obviously definition questions here of what level of language proficiency is sufficient to count as being a speaker of the language, and I'd be surprised if the number were as large as 10 million. On the other hand there are ~3.3 million foreign residents here in Japan. Obviously a decent number of those are L1 speakers, and there are plenty of foreign residents that don't speak Japanese, but the idea that the sum of the total number of L2 speakers of Japanese, inside and outside Japan, is less than a third of just the number of current foreign residents of Japan alone is extraordinary. (and of course the only source for this extraordinary statement is behind a $200 paywall) Captain Segfault (talk) 01:53, 9 October 2024 (UTC)

If you have reliable sources (such as academic papers) about the number of L2 speakers of Japanese, please post them here or send them to Ethnologue. a455bcd9 (Antoine) (talk) 11:30, 9 October 2024 (UTC)

List of languages

Why are the languages linked to the language codes instead of the actual language name? Kartagis (talk) 11:34, 1 November 2024 (UTC)

Because the ranking is based on Ethnologue's language codes. a455bcd9 (Antoine) (talk) 13:29, 1 November 2024 (UTC)

The ethnologue ranking is clearly unreliable

No matter how you cherry pick the numbers, English has more than 380 million native speakers. Obviously, every other number is even more unreliable since it couldn't even get English right and that was the easiest one of all. 5.12.231.251 (talk) 07:11, 9 November 2024 (UTC)