Language
Polish (język polski, polszczyzna) is a language of the Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages, used throughout Poland (being that country's official language) and by Polish minorities in other countries. Its written standard is the Polish alphabet, which corresponds to the Latin alphabet with several additions. Despite the pressure of non-Polish administrations in Poland, who have often attempted to suppress the Polish language, a rich literature has developed over the centuries, and the language is currently the largest, in terms of speakers, of the West Slavic group. It is also the second most widely spoken Slavic language, after Russian and ahead of Ukrainian. Polish is mainly spoken in Poland. Poland is one of the most linguistically homogeneous European countries; nearly 97% of Poland's citizens declare Polish as their mother tongue.
Read more about this topic: Culture Of Poland
Famous quotes containing the word language:
“The language I have learnt these forty years,
My native English, now I must forgo,
And now my tongue’s use is to me no more
Than an unstringèd viol or a harp.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“One can say of language that it is potentially the only human home, the only dwelling place that cannot be hostile to man.”
—John Berger (b. 1926)
“If fancy then
Unequal fails beneath the pleasing task,
Ah, what shall language do?”
—James Thomson (1700–1748)