Language
Brooklyn has a high degree of linguistic diversity. In the 2000 United States Census 46.7% of the population reported speaking a language other than English at home (either exclusively or in addition to English). The most prevalent other language identified was Spanish, spoken at home by 18.00% of the population. Additionally, 5.95% of the population reported speaking Russian, 4.19% Haitian Creole, 3.92% Chinese, 3.10% Yiddish, 2.10% Italian, 1.42% Polish, 1.13% Hebrew, and 1.09% Arabic. Other languages spoken at home by at least 5000 people include Cantonese, Urdu, Bengali, Greek, Korean, Tagalog, and Albanian.
Read more about this topic: Demographics Of Brooklyn
Famous quotes containing the word language:
“A president, however, must stand somewhat apart, as all great presidents have known instinctively. Then the language which has the power to survive its own utterance is the most likely to move those to whom it is immediately spoken.”
—J.R. Pole (b. 1922)
“The writer’s language is to some degree the product of his own action; he is both the historian and the agent of his own language.”
—Paul De Man (1919–1983)
“Language makes it possible for a child to incorporate his parents’ verbal prohibitions, to make them part of himself....We don’t speak of a conscience yet in the child who is just acquiring language, but we can see very clearly how language plays an indispensable role in the formation of conscience. In fact, the moral achievement of man, the whole complex of factors that go into the organization of conscience is very largely based upon language.”
—Selma H. Fraiberg (20th century)