Chinese language in the United States
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| 1960a |
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| 1970a |
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| 1980[1] |
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| 1990[2] |
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| 2000[3] |
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| 2010[4] |
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| ^a Foreign-born population only[5] | |
Chinese, mostly Yue dialects including Taishanese and Cantonese, is the third most-spoken language in the United States, almost completely spoken within Chinese American populations and by immigrants or the descendants of immigrants, especially in California.[6] Over 2 million Americans speak some variety of Chinese, with Standard Chinese becoming increasingly common due to immigration from mainland China and Taiwan.[6]
In New York City, although Mandarin is spoken as a native language among only ten percent of Chinese speakers, it is used as a secondary dialect and is replacing Cantonese as their lingua franca.[7] In addition, immigration from Fujian is bringing an increasingly large number of Min speakers. Wu dialects, previously unheard of in the United States, are now spoken by a minority of recent Chinese immigrants hailing from Jiangsu, Zhejiang, and Shanghai.
Although Chinese Americans grow up learning English, some teach their children Chinese for a variety of reasons including preservation of an ancient civilization, preservation of a unique identity, pride in their cultural ancestry, desire for easy communication with them and other relatives, and the perception that Chinese will be a very useful language as China's economic strength increases. Cantonese, historically the language of most Chinese immigrants, is the third most widely spoken non-English language in the United States.[8]
| State | Chinese speakers |
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| California |
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| New York |
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| Texas |
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| New Jersey |
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| Massachusetts |
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| Illinois |
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About 40% of all Chinese-speakers in the United States live in California.
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- ^ "Appendix Table 2. Languages Spoken at Home: 1980, 1990, 2000, and 2007.". United States Census Bureau. Retrieved August 6, 2012.
- ^ "Detailed Language Spoken at Home and Ability to Speak English for Persons 5 Years and Over --50 Languages with Greatest Number of Speakers: United States 1990". United States Census Bureau. 1990. Retrieved July 22, 2012.
- ^ "Language Spoken at Home: 2000". United States Bureau of the Census. Retrieved August 8, 2012.
- ^ "2010 American Community Survey 1-Year Estimates: Language spoken at home by ability to speak English for the population 5 years and over". United States Census Bureau. Retrieved 14 December 2012.
- ^ "Mother Tongue of the Foreign-Born Population: 1910 to 1940, 1960, and 1970". United States Census Bureau. March 9, 1999. Retrieved August 6, 2012.
- ^ a b Lai, H. Mark (2004). Becoming Chinese American: A History of Communities and Institutions. AltaMira Press. ISBN 0-7591-0458-1.
- ^ García, Ofelia; Fishman, Joshua A. (2002). The Multilingual Apple: Languages in New York City. Walter de Gruyter. ISBN 3-11-017281-X.
- ^ Lai, H. Mark (2004). Becoming Chinese American: A History of Communities and Institutions. AltaMira Press. ISBN 0759104581. need page number(s)
- ^ "Table 5.Detailed List of Languages Spoken at Home for the Population 5 Years and Over by State: 2000" (PDF). United States Census Bureau. February 25, 2003. Retrieved October 3, 2012.
