Official Language

An official language is a language that is given a special legal status in a particular country, state, or other jurisdiction. Typically a country's official language refers to the language used within its government - its courts, parliament, administration, etc. - to run its operations and conduct its business. Since "the means of expression of a people cannot be changed by any law", the term "official language" does not typically refer to the language used by a people or country, but by its government.

Read more about Official Language:  Status, Politics

Famous quotes containing the words official and/or language:

    ... it is a rather curious thing to have to divide one’s life into personal and official compartments and temporarily put the personal side into its hidden compartment to be taken out again when one’s official duties are at an end.
    Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962)

    UG [universal grammar] may be regarded as a characterization of the genetically determined language faculty. One may think of this faculty as a ‘language acquisition device,’ an innate component of the human mind that yields a particular language through interaction with present experience, a device that converts experience into a system of knowledge attained: knowledge of one or another language.
    Noam Chomsky (b. 1928)