Languages of Venezuela
Encyclopedia
There are at least 40 languages around Venezuela
, but Spanish
is the language spoken by the majority of Venezuelans. The Constitution of Venezuela
of the year 1999 declared Spanish and languages spoken by Indigenous people from Venezuela
as official languages. Deaf
people use a variety of sign language
lengua de señas venezolana (LSV).
, Italian
, Catalan
, Basque
, Galician
, Portuguese
, Arabic
, English
and French
.
Some people who live next to the border of Brazil
speak Portuguese. In the areas located near to Guyana
English language is used by some inhabitants, especially in the Ankoko Island
. Alemán Coloniero
, a dialect of German language
, is spoken in the Colonia Tovar
.
English is taught as a compulsory subject in the secondary education and in the bachillerato for five years. Bachillerato is a segment of secondary education similar to the baccalaureat
, secondary school
or American high school
and is divided into two branches: sciences and humanities. According to the syllabus approved by the Venezuelan Ministry of Education in 1986 English language is considered as a tool to communicate with people from other countries and to obtain information in the areas of humanities, technology and science. For that reason it is taught using a Notional Functional Approach
. In the bachillerato a Structuralistic Approach
is used. However, and despite of the lines provided by the syllabus, few people learn to speak the language with only the knowledge acquired at school.
In some universities degree programs to train teachers or translators of English language are offered. In the rest of universities English is studied as a compulsory subject to understand texts written in this language.
. There are even expressions in the local young people that mix Italian and Spanish words: "Muérete que chao" is an example.
According to the Italian Embassy in Caracas the "....Italian language teaching is guaranteed by the presence of a consistent number of private Venezuelan schools and institutions, where Italian language courses and Italian literature are active. Other similar courses are organized and sponsored by the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Regional Associations.
The Didactic Office of the General Consulate of Caracas, together with the Embassy, is negotiating an Agreement with the Venezuelan Authorities for the recognition of the Study Diplomas emitted by the Italian School (in Venezuela there is a Civil Association called “Agostino Codazzi” which offers the complete didactic cycle from elementary to high school) so that there can be access to the University system in Venezuela with an Italian high school Diploma.
Since 2002, the Italian Government has become the promoter for a provision which makes it mandatory to teach Italian as a second language in a consistent number of public and private schools within Venezuela..."
is taught as a compulsory subject in the branch of humanities of the bachillerato for two years. Students learn French grammar in their first year of study, then construct and translate French texts in the second year.
In some universities degree programs to train teachers or translators of French language are offered.
Latin is taught as a compulsory subject in the branch of humanities of the high school for two years. Students learn Latin grammar in their first year of study, then construct and translate Latin texts in the second year.
At university level, the University of the Andes offers a degree program for Letras Mención Lengua y Literaturas Clásicas (Classical Languages and Literatures). In this program (the only one of its type in Venezuela), the students learn Latin, Ancient Greek
and the literature of both languages for five years. In other Venezuelan universities, Latin is a compulsory subject of the program for Letras (Hispanic Literature) and Educación, mención: Castellano y Literatura (Education of Spanish language and Hispanic Literature).
Latin and Koine Greek
are also taught in Roman Catholic seminaries
.
Venezuela
Venezuela , officially called the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela , is a tropical country on the northern coast of South America. It borders Colombia to the west, Guyana to the east, and Brazil to the south...
, but Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
is the language spoken by the majority of Venezuelans. The Constitution of Venezuela
Constitution of Venezuela
||The Constitution of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela is the current and twenty-sixth constitution of Venezuela. It was drafted in mid-1999 by a constitutional assembly that had been created by popular referendum. Adopted in December 1999, it replaced the 1961 Constitution - the longest...
of the year 1999 declared Spanish and languages spoken by Indigenous people from Venezuela
Indigenous peoples of the Americas
The indigenous peoples of the Americas are the pre-Columbian inhabitants of North and South America, their descendants and other ethnic groups who are identified with those peoples. Indigenous peoples are known in Canada as Aboriginal peoples, and in the United States as Native Americans...
as official languages. Deaf
Hearing impairment
-Definition:Deafness is the inability for the ear to interpret certain or all frequencies of sound.-Environmental Situations:Deafness can be caused by environmental situations such as noise, trauma, or other ear defections...
people use a variety of sign language
Sign language
A sign language is a language which, instead of acoustically conveyed sound patterns, uses visually transmitted sign patterns to convey meaning—simultaneously combining hand shapes, orientation and movement of the hands, arms or body, and facial expressions to fluidly express a speaker's...
lengua de señas venezolana (LSV).
Indigenous languages
Below is a non-exhaustive list of these languages.- WayuuWayuu languageThe Wayuu language, or Goajiro , is spoken by 305,000 indigenous Wayuu people in northeastern Colombia and northwestern Venezuela on the Guajira Peninsula....
- WaraoWarao languageWarao is a language isolate of the indigenous Warao people. It is the native language spoken by approximately 18,000 people inhabiting the Orinoco River delta in northeastern Venezuela as well as small populations of speakers in western Guyana and Suriname.A connection to the extinct Timucua...
- PemonPemon languageThe Pemon are an indigenous people of South America, living in areas of Venezuela, Brazil and Guyana. They are also known as Arecuna/AricunaJaricuna, , Kamarakoto/Camaracoto, Taurepan/Taulipang....
- MapoyoMapoyo languageMapoyo is a Carib language spoken along the Suapure and Parguaza Rivers, Venezuela. The ethnic population is about 365....
- PanarePanarePanare is a Cariban language, spoken by approximately 3,000–4,000 people in Bolivar State in southern Venezuela. Their main area is South of the town of Caicara del Orinoco, south of the Orinoco River. There are several subdialects of the language...
- PuinavePuinave languagePuinave, Waipunavi or Wanse , is a poorly attested and generally unclassified language of South America.-Consonants:-Vowels:...
- PémonoPémono languagePémono is a Cariban language that was spoken by only an eighty-year-old woman when discovered in 1998 in Venezuela. The ethnic population now speaks Spanish. Pémono may already be extinct....
- SapéSapé languageSapé Kaliana is a nearly extinct language spoken along the Paragua and Karuna rivers. In 2008 a few elderly speakers were found. Sape is one of the most poorly attested extant languages in South America, and may be a language isolate.-External links:...
- SikianaSikiana languageSikiana is a Carib language that was spoken by 33 people in Brazil and 15 people in Suriname. It was spoken in Venezuela at one time and is now probably extinct there. Sikiana as a whole is near extinction....
- YabaranaYabarana languageYabarana is a Carib language that was spoken by 20 to 50 people in 1977 in Venezuela. It is nearly extinct....
- YaruroYaruroThe Yaruro are Native Americans who live primarily in Venezuela near the Orinoco River and its tributaries. Current population estimates are generally between 3,000 and 4,000. They live by hunting, fishing, agriculture, paid labor of various types, and the selling of handicrafts...
Other languages
Other languages spoken :P :) :3 :O by foreigners and their descendants are found in Venezuela. The most important are ChineseChinese language
The Chinese language is a language or language family consisting of varieties which are mutually intelligible to varying degrees. Originally the indigenous languages spoken by the Han Chinese in China, it forms one of the branches of Sino-Tibetan family of languages...
, Italian
Italian language
Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...
, Catalan
Catalan language
Catalan is a Romance language, the national and only official language of Andorra and a co-official language in the Spanish autonomous communities of Catalonia, the Balearic Islands and Valencian Community, where it is known as Valencian , as well as in the city of Alghero, on the Italian island...
, Basque
Basque language
Basque is the ancestral language of the Basque people, who inhabit the Basque Country, a region spanning an area in northeastern Spain and southwestern France. It is spoken by 25.7% of Basques in all territories...
, Galician
Galician language
Galician is a language of the Western Ibero-Romance branch, spoken in Galicia, an autonomous community located in northwestern Spain, where it is co-official with Castilian Spanish, as well as in border zones of the neighbouring territories of Asturias and Castile and León.Modern Galician and...
, Portuguese
Portuguese language
Portuguese is a Romance language that arose in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia, nowadays Galicia and Northern Portugal. The southern part of the Kingdom of Galicia became independent as the County of Portugal in 1095...
, Arabic
Arabic language
Arabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...
, English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
and French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
.
Some people who live next to the border of Brazil
Brazil
Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...
speak Portuguese. In the areas located near to Guyana
Guyana
Guyana , officially the Co-operative Republic of Guyana, previously the colony of British Guiana, is a sovereign state on the northern coast of South America that is culturally part of the Anglophone Caribbean. Guyana was a former colony of the Dutch and of the British...
English language is used by some inhabitants, especially in the Ankoko Island
Ankoko Island
Ankoko Island is located at the confluence of the Cuyuni River and Wenamu River, at , on the border between Venezuela and the disputed area of Guayana Esequiba, Guyana....
. Alemán Coloniero
Alemán Coloniero
Alemán Coloniero, spoken in Colonia Tovar, Venezuela, is a dialect that belongs to the Low Alemannic branch of German.-Characteristics:The language, like other Alemannic dialects, is not mutually intelligible with Standard German. It is spoken by descendants of Germans from the Black Forest region...
, a dialect of German language
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
, is spoken in the Colonia Tovar
Colonia Tovar
Colonia Tovar is a city located in the Tovar Municipality of the state of Aragua in Venezuela, 60 km west of Caracas. The town was named after Martín Tovar y Ponte who donated the land over 150 years ago, and was founded by Agostino Codazzi...
.
English
English is a foreign language with a great demand in Venezuela. It is spoken by many academics and professionals and by some members of the middle and high social classes. There is an English language newspaper in Caracas: The Daily Journal, founded in 1946. The use of English arose in part due to the presence of oil companies from English speaking countries (especially from the United States) since the beginning of the 20th century.English is taught as a compulsory subject in the secondary education and in the bachillerato for five years. Bachillerato is a segment of secondary education similar to the baccalaureat
Baccalauréat
The baccalauréat , often known in France colloquially as le bac, is an academic qualification which French and international students take at the end of the lycée . It was introduced by Napoleon I in 1808. It is the main diploma required to pursue university studies...
, secondary school
Secondary school
Secondary school is a term used to describe an educational institution where the final stage of schooling, known as secondary education and usually compulsory up to a specified age, takes place...
or American high school
High school
High school is a term used in parts of the English speaking world to describe institutions which provide all or part of secondary education. The term is often incorporated into the name of such institutions....
and is divided into two branches: sciences and humanities. According to the syllabus approved by the Venezuelan Ministry of Education in 1986 English language is considered as a tool to communicate with people from other countries and to obtain information in the areas of humanities, technology and science. For that reason it is taught using a Notional Functional Approach
Communicative language teaching
Communicative language teaching is an approach to the teaching of second and foreign languages that emphasizes interaction as both the means and the ultimate goal of learning a language...
. In the bachillerato a Structuralistic Approach
Structuralism
Structuralism originated in the structural linguistics of Ferdinand de Saussure and the subsequent Prague and Moscow schools of linguistics. Just as structural linguistics was facing serious challenges from the likes of Noam Chomsky and thus fading in importance in linguistics, structuralism...
is used. However, and despite of the lines provided by the syllabus, few people learn to speak the language with only the knowledge acquired at school.
In some universities degree programs to train teachers or translators of English language are offered. In the rest of universities English is studied as a compulsory subject to understand texts written in this language.
Italian
In the second half of the twentieth century, more than 300,000 Italians moved to this oil rich country and left -linguistically - many words in the local language. For example "Ciao" (English: Hi) is now a usual friendly salute in Caracas, not only between Italo-venezuelansItalo-Venezuelans
Italian-Venezuelans are the Venezuelan citizens of Italian descent. The word may refer to someone born in Venezuela of Italian descent or to someone who has emigrated to Venezuela from Italy...
. There are even expressions in the local young people that mix Italian and Spanish words: "Muérete que chao" is an example.
According to the Italian Embassy in Caracas the "....Italian language teaching is guaranteed by the presence of a consistent number of private Venezuelan schools and institutions, where Italian language courses and Italian literature are active. Other similar courses are organized and sponsored by the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Regional Associations.
The Didactic Office of the General Consulate of Caracas, together with the Embassy, is negotiating an Agreement with the Venezuelan Authorities for the recognition of the Study Diplomas emitted by the Italian School (in Venezuela there is a Civil Association called “Agostino Codazzi” which offers the complete didactic cycle from elementary to high school) so that there can be access to the University system in Venezuela with an Italian high school Diploma.
Since 2002, the Italian Government has become the promoter for a provision which makes it mandatory to teach Italian as a second language in a consistent number of public and private schools within Venezuela..."
French
French languageFrench language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
is taught as a compulsory subject in the branch of humanities of the bachillerato for two years. Students learn French grammar in their first year of study, then construct and translate French texts in the second year.
In some universities degree programs to train teachers or translators of French language are offered.
Latin and Greek
In VenezuelaVenezuela
Venezuela , officially called the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela , is a tropical country on the northern coast of South America. It borders Colombia to the west, Guyana to the east, and Brazil to the south...
Latin is taught as a compulsory subject in the branch of humanities of the high school for two years. Students learn Latin grammar in their first year of study, then construct and translate Latin texts in the second year.
At university level, the University of the Andes offers a degree program for Letras Mención Lengua y Literaturas Clásicas (Classical Languages and Literatures). In this program (the only one of its type in Venezuela), the students learn Latin, Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek is the stage of the Greek language in the periods spanning the times c. 9th–6th centuries BC, , c. 5th–4th centuries BC , and the c. 3rd century BC – 6th century AD of ancient Greece and the ancient world; being predated in the 2nd millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek...
and the literature of both languages for five years. In other Venezuelan universities, Latin is a compulsory subject of the program for Letras (Hispanic Literature) and Educación, mención: Castellano y Literatura (Education of Spanish language and Hispanic Literature).
Latin and Koine Greek
Koine Greek
Koine Greek is the universal dialect of the Greek language spoken throughout post-Classical antiquity , developing from the Attic dialect, with admixture of elements especially from Ionic....
are also taught in Roman Catholic seminaries
Seminary
A seminary, theological college, or divinity school is an institution of secondary or post-secondary education for educating students in theology, generally to prepare them for ordination as clergy or for other ministry...
.
See also
- Italian language in VenezuelaItalian language in VenezuelaThe Italian language in Venezuela has been present since colonial times in the area around Caracas and Maracaibo. The language is found in many modisms and words of the Venezuelan Spanish language.-History:...
- Venezuelan SpanishVenezuelan SpanishVenezuelan Spanish is a dialect of the Spanish language spoken in Venezuela.Spanish was introduced in Venezuela by the conquistadors. Most of them were from Andalusia, Galicia, Basque Country, and the Canary Islands...