Romania

Romanian language

romanian flag

Romania is a country located in Eastern Europe, whose capital is Bucharest. It has a population of 20 million inhabitants (59th) and an area of ​​238,397 km 2 (81st). Its human development index is very high (52nd) and its official currency is the Romanian leu. But what language is spoken in Romania?

What language do they speak in Romania?

Romania has one official language, Romanian.

In addition, according to the constitution, local administrations must guarantee the linguistic rights of minorities, in those municipalities with ethnic minorities greater than 20%. Your language may be used in public administration, in the judicial system and in education. These minority languages ​​include Hungarian (1,260,000 native speakers), Romani (246,000), Ukrainian (48,900), German (26,600), Turkish (25,300), Tatar (22,000), Russian (18,900), Serbian (16,800), Slovak (12,800), Bulgarian (6,520), and Croatian (5,170).

romania ethnicity map

The Roma are what is traditionally known as the Roma ethnic group. In Romania there is a large population that speaks Romani (1.1% of the country), which corresponds to almost half of its world speakers. Its dialects are divided into Balkan, Vlax (or Wallachian), and Carpathian. German was one of the country’s great minority languages, but today it is disappearing: in 1938 there were 780,000 speakers, in 1992 there were 111,301, in 2002 only 45,129 and finally the current 26,600 native speakers.

The most learned foreign languages ​​are English (31%), French (17%), Italian (7%), German (5%), Spanish (5%) and Russian (3%).

The Romanian language

Romanian (limba română) is spoken by 93% of the population. It is used in all official areas. Being a Romance language, it is quite similar lexically to other languages: 77% with Italian, 75% with French, 73% with Catalan, 72% with Portuguese and 71% with Spanish. Its alphabet consists of the 26 standard letters of the Latin alphabet + the following 5: ă â î ț ș (in upper case Ă Â Î Ț Ș).

Hungarian language

Hungarian or Magyar (magyar nyelv) is spoken by 6.2% of the population, thus becoming the most widely spoken minority language in Romania. Most of this linguistic minority lives in the Transylvania region (since it was part of the Kingdom of Hungary until 1918). In the northwest of the country there is also a good part of the Hungarian ethnic group.

Share which languages ​​are spoken in Romania.

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