The English language in Europe, as a native language, is mainly spoken in the United Kingdom and Ireland. Outside of these states, it has a special status in Jersey and Guernsey (two of the three Crown Dependencies), Gibraltar (one of the British Overseas Territories), Malta and Cyprus (two former British colonies). In other parts of Europe, English is spoken mainly by those who have learned it as a second language, but also, to a lesser extent, natively by expatriates from the English-speaking world.
The English language is the official language of Gibraltar and one of the official languages of Ireland, Scotland, Wales, the Isle of Man, Malta, Jersey, Guernsey and the European Union.
According to a survey published in 2006 13% of EU citizens speak English as their native language. Another 38% of EU citizens state that they have sufficient skills in English to have a conversation, so the total reach of English in the EU is 51%.
Read more about English Language In Europe: History of English in England, English As Lingua Franca
Famous quotes containing the words english, language and/or europe:
“The English countryside, its growth and its destruction, is a genuine and tragic theme.”
—E.M. (Edward Morgan)
“There’s a cool web of language winds us in,
Retreat from too much joy or too much fear:
We grow sea-green at last and coldly die
In brininess and volubility.”
—Robert Graves (1895–1985)
“That land is like an Eagle, whose young gaze
Feeds on the noontide beam, whose golden plume
Floats moveless on the storm, and in the blaze
Of sunrise gleams when Earth is wrapped in gloom;
An epitaph of glory for the tomb
Of murdered Europe may thy fame be made,
Great People! as the sands shalt thou become;
Thy growth is swift as morn, when night must fade;
The multitudinous Earth shall sleep beneath thy shade.”
—Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822)