Language and Nationality in Europe
Introduction
This activity looks at the geography of language and nationality in Europe. It uses Geographic Information Systems technology to explore the geographic patterns of major languages and the dynamics of changing political boundaries in modern Europe.
Learning Objectives
This activity is designed to help you learn the following:
The geography of language and nationality in a fragmented Europe:
Geographic patterns of major language families
The geography of shifting boundaries in modern Europe:
States emerging from the breakup of the Soviet Union
Setup
In your browser, open the mapping program URL: http://geogserver1.fullerton.edu/webmaps/europejava_2/europe.html
If the map fails to appear, try the alternate site http://geography.fullerton.edu/webmaps/europejava_1/europe.html
When the map appears, resize the browser window to make the scroll
bars disappear. Note: your browser must be Java-enabled for the
program to work properly.
Prominent States of Europe
Before proceeding with the activity, you should familiarize yourself with the locations of some of the more prominent states of Europe. To refresh your knowledge of the basic map of Europe, locate each of the states in the following list. For each state:
Click on what you believe is the appropriate location
UK (United Kingdom)
When you are finished:
Use the same method to find two additional states:
Although neither is considered part of the Europe region, both have part of their territory in Europe and both have significant historic ties to the geography of the rest of Europe.
Major Language Families
We’ll begin our study by looking at the broad patterns of major language families and subfamilies. Language families and subfamilies are groups of languages that are distinct from one another today but that share many features of a common ancestral language. Sharing a common language family is not the same as sharing a common language and nationality, but it does suggest some degree of shared cultural inheritance.
The three major language families of Europe are
Germanic
Each of these is actually a subfamily of the larger Indo-European language family.
To locate the areas associated with each, use the following:
Press the Maps button
States where the Germanic subfamily is dominant are shaded in solid red; other countries where more than one family is prominent are shaded in red diagonal lines.
Now repeat the process, highlighting in turn Romance and Slavic.
1. Which major family of languages is most closely associated with North Central and Northwest Europe?
|
a. Germanic |
b. Romance |
c. Slavic |
2. Which major family of languages is most closely associated with Southern and Southwest Europe?
|
a. Germanic |
b. Romance |
c. Slavic |
3. Which major family of languages is most closely associated with Eastern Europe?
|
a. Germanic |
b. Romance |
c. Slavic |
Before continuing, press the Reset Map button
Languages and Nation-States
The idea of the nation-state dominates the political landscape of Europe. In broad terms, the political map reflects the map of languages. Throughout most of Europe, nation-states are closely identified with their dominant language. Where political boundaries fail to reflect the underlying geography of language, political instability has often been the result.
Press the Maps button
If you click on the highlighted country, you will see that Portugal is the one country where Portuguese is widely spoken.
Examples of Languages Primarily Spoken in Only One State
In Europe, there are countless examples of languages that are primarily spoken in only one particular nation-state. Use the Maps button to identify whether each of the following languages are primarily spoken in only one country (you can click on the map to learn the name of each country you have mapped):
4. Danish
a. Primarily spoken in one country
b. Widely spoken in more than one country
5. Romanian
a. Primarily spoken in one country
b. Widely spoken in more than one country
6. Polish
a. Primarily spoken in one country
b. Widely spoken in more than one country
When identifying language that are dominant in a country and that are primarily spoken in just that one country, don’t assume that the dominant language is only ones spoken in that country. On the contrary, minority languages are found in most European countries. What you do need to understand, however, are the following points:
In Europe, most languages are primarily spoken in only one particular state
Languages Widely Spoken in More Than One State
Now use the same techniques to map three languages that are spoken by substantial numbers of people in more than one country.
English
When viewing the map, note that diagonal red lines indicates a country where a language is widely spoken but where other languages are also spoken by a large proportion of the population. For each language, click on the map and answer the following questions:
7. English is widely spoken in which these countries:
|
a. England and Ireland |
b. England and France |
|
c. England and Germany |
d. England and Spain |
8. French is widely spoken in which of these countries:
|
a. France, Germany and Spain |
b. France, Belgium and Sweden |
|
c. France, Belgium and Switzerland |
d. France, Netherlands and Italy |
9. German is widely spoken in which of these countries:
|
a. Germany, Switzerland and France |
b. Germany, Switzerland and Poland |
|
c. Germany, Switzerland and Austria |
d. Germany, Switzerland and Denmark |
You may have noticed that some states are associated with more than one of these languages. These represent special cases where there is no one dominant language. We'll discuss that situation later in the activity.
Before continuing, press the Reset Map button
Linguistic Diversity Across National Borders
The flow of people and information across national borders is usually easier when a common language is spoken on both sides of the border. In America, we face relatively little linguistic diversity along our borders. We share a common land border with only two other countries: Canada and Mexico. Along most of the Canadian border, English is the dominant language of both sides, though in eastern Canada, English-speaking America meets French-speaking Quebec. Along the U.S.-Mexico border, the dominant language on one side is English, on the other Spanish. But in fact, the dividing line is not nearly so sharp because Spanish is widely spoken by a large population in the U.S. border states.
The states of Europe face a very different situation. As you have seen, it is common for national borders to also be linguistic borders. And because the political map of Europe is highly fragmented, individual states usually have far more neighbors than the two found adjacent to the U.S.
The GIS program has a Neighbors button that helps you explore the cross-border linguistic diversity of individual European states. To use this function, first select one country:
Press the Maps button
10. What is the principal language of Hungary?
|
a. Russian |
b. German |
|
c. French |
d. Hungarian |
Now press the Neighbors button. In the resulting map, Hungary appears in yellow with all its neighboring states shaded in red.
11. Hungary shares a common border with how many other countries?
|
a. 3 |
b. 5 |
|
c. 7 |
d. 9 |
12. How many different languages are spoken in those states?
|
a. 3 |
b. 5 |
|
c. 7 |
d. 9 |
13. How many of Hungary's neighbors have Hungarian as their primary language?
|
a. 7 |
b. 3 |
|
c. 1 |
d. 0 |
Repeat the test for Poland, Finland and the UK.
14. Which of these countries has the greatest diversity of languages along its borders?
|
a. Poland |
b. Finland |
c. UK |
15. Which of these countries has the least diversity of languages along its borders?
|
a. Poland |
b. Finland |
c. UK |
Before continuing, press the Reset Map button
Countries With More Than One Language
Although most European states are dominated by a single language, there are three - Belgium, Luxembourg and Switzerland – where no one language is dominant.
Press the Maps button
16. What are the two principal languages of Belgium?
|
a. French and Dutch |
b. French and German |
|
c. Dutch and German |
d. Dutch and Belgian |
One of these languages dominates southern Belgium, the other northern Belgium. In each case, the language region of Belgium is adjacent to a country where the same language is dominant.
Click on the neighbor to the southwest of Belgium and note its language
17. Which region of Belgium do you think is French speaking?
|
a. North |
b. South |
18. Which region of Belgium do you think is Dutch speaking?
|
a. North |
b. South |
(Note that the Dutch language spoken in Belgium is usually referred to as Flemish.)
Repeat the process for Switzerland
19. What are the three widely spoken languages in Switzerland?
|
a. English, French and German |
b. French, German and Italian |
|
c. French, German and Spanish |
d. English, German and Italian |
20. Which region of Switzerland do you think is French speaking?
|
a. Northeast |
b. Southeast |
c. West |
21. Which region of Switzerland do you think is German speaking, the Northeast, the Southeast or the West?
|
a. Northeast |
b. Southeast |
c. West |
22. Which region of Switzerland do you think is Italian speaking, the Northeast, the Southeast or the West?
|
a. Northeast |
b. Southeast |
c. West |
(Note that there is a fourth "official" language called Romansch spoken in Switzerland, though the number of speakers is very small compared with the other three languages).
Before continuing, press the Reset Map button
Europe's Shifting Boundaries
Despite its linguistic diversity, Switzerland enjoys social stability. This is due in part to its prosperity and its highly decentralized form of government. The same cannot be said for Belgium where the linguistic divide mirrors deep social divisions. Whether Belgium remains in its current form remains to be seen. But there are two other examples – the former Soviet Union and Yugoslavia - where nationalism, fueled at least in part by linguistic differences, has altered the political geography of Europe in recent years.
Let's look first at the former Soviet Union:
Press the Maps button
The area highlighted in red represent the Soviet Union as it existed prior to the early 1990s.
23. Not counting Russia, how many independent countries now occupy the European portion of the former Soviet Union?
|
a. 2 |
b. 3 |
|
c. 6 |
d. 8 |
24. How many of those countries have Russian as their dominant language?
|
a. None |
b. One |
|
c. Two |
d. Three |
Although the Soviet Union was dominated by Russia and the Russian speaking people, it was one of the most linguistically diverse countries in the world. As it began to fall apart, new states emerged along the old linguistic divides.
The situation in the former state of Yugoslavia presents another example where linguistic nationalism has helped break up a state.
Repeat the analysis, this time choosing Yugoslavia as the former state to highlight.
The area highlighted in blue represents Yugoslavia as existed in the early 1990s. Today, the principal remnant of Ex-Yugoslavia is Serbia. Only Montenegro remains politically linked to Serbia, and those ties are tenuous.
25. Not counting Serbia and Montenegro, how many independent states now occupy that area of Ex-Yugoslavia?
|
a. One |
b. Two |
|
c. Three |
d. Four |
26. How many of those states have Serb as their dominant language?
|
a. None |
b. One |
|
c. Two |
d. Three |
27. What is the language of Montenegro, the one region still linked to Serbia?
|
a. Serb |
b. Croat |
|
c. Slovene |
d. Macedonian |
You should note that religious differences also played a major role in the breakup of Yugoslavia. But that doesn’t change the fact that language-based nationalism has been a potent destabilizing force in modern Europe.
Review Questions
Try to answer the following review questions without looking back at your answers or at the computer. If you don't remember, then use the GIS program to help you find the answers.
Are Russia and Turkey considered part of the Europe region or are they states from adjacent regions that have some of their territory and a lot of their history linked to that of Europe?
Are German and English part of the same language family/subfamily? If yes, which one?
Are French and Italian part of the same language family/subfamily? If yes, which one?
Are Russian and Polish part of the same language family/subfamily? If yes, which one?
Which language families/subfamilies dominate:
Central and northern Europe?
If two languages are part of the same family/subfamily, can speakers of one understand speakers of the other? If not, why do we even consider the geography of language families?
Most European Languages are identified closely with only one Nation-State; cite three examples.
English, French and German are obviously identified with England, France and Germany. For each language, can you name a second state where that language is also widely spoken?
Do most European countries have more linguistic diversity along their borders or less when compared with the U.S.?
Is Hungarian the dominant language in any of the seven neighbors of Hungary?
What are the two languages of Belgium? Of Luxembourg?
What are the three major languages of Switzerland?
Switzerland enjoys considerable social stability. Is that usually the case when more than one language is widely spoken in a country?
What is the dominant language in the country that borders on:
the French-speaking part of Belgium?
Is Russian the major language of any of the new states other than Russia that emerged from the disintegration of the European portion of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s?
Is Serb the major language in any of the new states other than Serbia/Montenegro that emerged from the disintegration of Yugoslavia in the early 1990s?
Is language-based nationalism the only reason that Yugoslavia broke apart? What else contributed?
Exit the GIS Program
When you are finished:
Close your browser to exit the GIS program
Be sure to put you name on the completed Scantron form and hand it in to the lab instructor. Keep the activity questions.