The Modern Language Association has unveiled its new interactive Language Map Data Center which can breakdown and map languages spoken in the United States down to the county or zip code level.
“So often, when we think of languages and cultures that are not Anglophone America, we think of the world out there — foreign,” said Rosemary G. Feal, the MLA’s executive director. “We don’t necessarily realize how, in our own American globalized society, we’ve got all these linguistic resources woven into the fabric.”
Using 2000 U.S. Census data, MLA developers initially conceived the language map idea as “a really big poster” before the idea ran away with them and evolved into an interactive website. They have mapped the top 30 languages in the country and are working on a more detailed second tier that will be made available for crunching.
Potential uses include: academics who track languages honing in on particular areas to find out how immigrants are integrating linguistically; marketers who want to target speakers of Thai, Persian or Navajo can find the postal codes for mass mailings; social service agencies can calibrate their work to the ethnic breakdowns in their own communities.
“For people in this country, to appreciate the range of languages spoken here is so important,” said Donna Christian, president of the Center for Applied Linguistics in Washington. “There’s such a strong feeling that English is the only language around. To get an idea of how many languages are spoken here — that can give us all a better sense of understanding of each other.”