Languages of the European Union

What should be the official language(s) of the European Union?

  • English

    Votes: 32 26.2%
  • English + French

    Votes: 3 2.5%
  • English + German

    Votes: 2 1.6%
  • German + French

    Votes: 1 0.8%
  • German + English + French

    Votes: 33 27.0%
  • Some other combination of major languages

    Votes: 6 4.9%
  • Latin

    Votes: 7 5.7%
  • Esperanto

    Votes: 4 3.3%
  • Modern Indo-European

    Votes: 2 1.6%
  • Other Auxlang

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Status Quo

    Votes: 11 9.0%
  • Status Quo + minority languages (eg. Catalan, Romani, Basque, Welsh, etc.)

    Votes: 8 6.6%
  • Some else entirely

    Votes: 5 4.1%
  • Godwynn is right: Deutsche Sprache #1

    Votes: 8 6.6%

  • Total voters
    122
Nylan, you got ninja'd by the poll in a way...it would only have been funny if you managed to present convincing reasons why Lojban is better than Esperanto which has a longer history and more speakers :mischief:

Also: This is why you make multiple choice polls, so everyone can vote "Godwin is right." Sorry we couldn't though; I think the English/French/German major languages solution sounds good.
 
Nylan, you got ninja'd by the poll in a way...it would only have been funny if you managed to present convincing reasons why Lojban is better than Esperanto which has a longer history and more speakers :mischief:

No, not really. Esperanto is of an entirely different (read: less efficient) construction and following. It's also lame.
 
OK what's Status Quo??? Didn't understand it over this question.
For me it's ok as now, the 27 languages and incresing to more. Europe is know to be multi-cultural and language is one of them (charactics)...
 
English. Let everyone keep their cute little local tongues, but make English the official language that everyone should speak at least in public.

Related oldie but goodie...
The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the EU rather than German which was the other possibility. As part of the negotiations, Her Majesty's Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a 5 year phase-in plan that would be known as "Euro-English".

In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy. The hard "c" will be dropped in favour of the"k". This should klear up konfusion and keyboards kan have 1 less letter.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f". This will make words like "fotograf" 20% shorter.

In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be ekspekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkorage the removal of double letters, which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of the silent "e"s in the language is disgraseful, and they should go away.

By the fourth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with "z" and "w" with "v". During ze fifz year, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and similar changes vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters.

After zis fifz yer, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi to understand ech ozer. Ze drem vil finali kum tru! And zen ve vil tak over ze world!
 
In addition to German English and French, perhaps also Polish. There are beginning to be many Slavic speakers in the EU, and they should also be represented with a language which they can easily learn.
 
Keep it how it is. Diversity is a good thing, any change reducing the languages makes it harder for some people to access services or employment.
 
English. Let everyone keep their cute little local tongues, but make English the official language that everyone should speak at least in public.

Um what you say
 
All languages that people speak in Europe are and should be official languages. Some are major, others are minor but they're all recognized. None should have precedence. At present, Scots Gaelic, Irish Gaelic, Welsh, Cornish, Breton, Galician, Basque and Catalan are all recognized as minority languages. As they should be.

EDIT If you're asking what the official working language of the EU should be, that's entirely a different question to the OP. Probably English and one other. Whatever works, IMO.
 
And we forgot Russian, Europe's biggest language, the main language of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, major language in the Baltic and Moldova, more widely known than English in many others like some of the former Yugoslavia and Bulgaria (an EU country). The EU after all in principle seeks to confederate all Europe!

Russian is not the main language of Ukraine.

Additionally, it is not official at state level in any EU nation. AND it is spoken natively by less than 1% of the population of the EU.
 
Russian is neither the main language of Ukraine nor of Belarus.

Additionally, it is not official at state level in any EU nation. AND it is spoken natively by less than 1% of the population of the EU.

I'm almost certain its the most spoken language in Belarus.
 
English. Let everyone keep their cute little local tongues, but make English the official language that everyone should speak at least in public.

Everyone should speak English in public? This has to be a joke. Let's try to legislate everyone in Italy speak English in public.

The day that happens will be the day I demand everyone speak Hungarian in public in Missouri. It will probably have the same effect.

There should be a Latin one, a Germanic one, and a Slavic one.

You are rasist against the Hungarians, Estonians, Basques, and Fins!

I have an unrelated question, though. Do you speak Irish (or Gaelic, or whatever its proper name is)?

This is why you make multiple choice polls, so everyone can vote "Godwin is right." Sorry we couldn't though; I think the English/French/German major languages solution sounds good.

IS THERE EVER A TIME WHEN I'M WRONG?
 
Knowing English is a good thing. It being the main UE language would be a bad one.

Yay for linguistic diversity!
 
Latin would be awesome, Modern Indo European would also be cool.
But English, French and German would be practical.
 
There is a difference between official languages and working languages
Official languages - long list - all treaties and some other documents need to be translated
Working languages - English, French and German - these are the languages meetings take place in and most working papers are drafted in.

IIRC, the EU spends ~50% on translation, so cutting down on the languages would save money and give the euroskeptics on less bludgeon to bash the Union.
Any backup for this? This: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budget_of_the_European_Union
suggests only 6% is spent on administration.
 
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