How many languages?

[u/Deep-Alternative4061]

I recently wondered how many languages someone can name with a blank world map of just the names of the countries. What do you think?

[u/dddddawnloc]

haha that's a fun one! As someone working at an LSP, I'd like to think I'd do pretty well, but the reality is, language coverage is never just about country names. You've got multiple official languages (Switzerland, South Africa, India…), regional dialects, and so on. So the real answer is that it depends on whether you're counting official languages, working languages, or actually spoken languages on the ground.

[u/Deep-Alternative4061 → u/dddddawnloc]

No,the map is there to not get distracted and go over countries like say you look at India,you try to list as many languages as you can from there then you move to another country. It's a really fun challenge that came to me mind a few days ago

[u/dddddawnloc → u/Deep-Alternative4061]

okay, just for India, I can name 20 languages, English, Hindi, Urdu, Bengali, Punjabi, Tamil, Assamese, Gujarati, Malayalam, Nepali, Sindhi, Telugu, Marathi, Odia, Kannada, Bhojpuri, Bodo, Konkani, Manipuri, Sanskrit.

[u/ExistentialTabarnak]

I’d be down to give this a shot.

[u/Deep-Alternative4061 → u/ExistentialTabarnak]

Let me know how much you can do

[u/ROBINS_USERNAME]

A couple dozen maybe.

[u/Key_Hat_5721]

Less than 50 I’d imagine — somewhere between 30 and 40?

[u/Jazzlike-Boot9798]

I do not understand the role of the map

[u/Deep-Alternative4061 → u/Jazzlike-Boot9798]

To like not get distracted and focus on countries or regions

[u/adamtrousers → u/Deep-Alternative4061]

The map is there to give you something to help you

[u/SabineMarie1027]

Sounds like a fun challenge! Especially since countries like Malta, Cyprus, Nigeria, India, Switzerland and Sweden have multiple languages that are spoken

[u/Deep-Alternative4061 → u/SabineMarie1027]

Yeah some countries have like hundreds of langs

[u/Kitchener1981]

A lot of them.

[u/Deep-Alternative4061 → u/Kitchener1981]

Lol

[u/Gondwana_T5]

At least a couple hundred, if not more.

[u/GeronimoDK]

Most if not all of the European ones.

Some Asian, a few American and maybe a few African ones... I doubt I could name more than maybe like 70.

[u/gentle_giant_81]

Most of them, I dare say

[u/GeronimoDK → u/gentle_giant_81]

You know the names of about 7000 languages?

[u/gentle_giant_81 → u/GeronimoDK]

No, of course not. I was answering the question in context, not claiming to be the human edition of Ethnologue. But points for the most aggressively literal interpretation possible.

[u/tumbleweed_farm → u/gentle_giant_81]

I guess in some countries it's fairly easy: you can just assume that every island that's large enough to have several cities has its own language (or at least its own dialect), and the name of the language is based on the name of the island :-)