| Table 5. | Language Spoken at Home for the Foreign-Born Population 5 Years and Over: 1980 and 1990 |
|---|---|
| Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census Internet Release date: March 9, 1999 (See text for sources, definitions, and explanations) |
| Language | 1990* | 1980* |
| Total | 19,506,238 | 13,859,059 |
| English only | 4,075,804 | 4,129,722 |
| Non-English languages | 15,430,434 | 9,729,337 |
| Language data available | 15,428,619 | 9,639,071 |
| Indo-European languages | 11,196,120 | 7,502,923 |
| English-based pidgin creoles | 13,111 | 4,398 |
| Jamaican Creole | 12,124 | 3,237 |
| Germanic languages | 690,339 | 878,236 |
| German | 529,678 | 627,998 |
| Yiddish | 72,779 | 157,252 |
| Dutch | 82,558 | 90,353 |
| Scandinavian languages | 80,700 | 103,615 |
| Swedish | 33,224 | 42,580 |
| Danish | 20,334 | 23,113 |
| Norwegian | 23,726 | 34,903 |
| Romance languages | 8,713,899 | 5,235,425 |
| Italian | 493,439 | 705,407 |
| French (including creoles) | 534,192 | 376,060 |
| French (excluding creoles) | 387,915 | 359,870 |
| French Creole (Haitian) | 140,433 | 14,519 |
| Spanish (including creoles) | 7,350,512 | 3,896,505 |
| Spanish (excluding creoles) | 7,346,270 | 3,896,060 |
| Portuguese (including creoles) | 281,635 | 232,794 |
| Portuguese (excluding creoles) | 281,034 | 232,467 |
| Romanian | 53,493 | 24,058 |
| Celtic languages | 17,747 | 14,260 |
| Irish Gaelic | 15,233 | 11,661 |
| Greek | 181,965 | 215,700 |
| Albanian | 13,608 | 9,671 |
| Slavic languages | 663,450 | 626,668 |
| Russian | 186,514 | 127,605 |
| Ukranian | 50,725 | 70,117 |
| Czech | 27,739 | 35,147 |
| Polish | 286,896 | 260,341 |
| Slovak | 16,459 | 24,159 |
| Serbo-Croatian | 80,222 | 91,811 |
| Baltic languages | 39,903 | 57,689 |
| Lithuanian | 20,758 | 32,535 |
| Lettish | 19,145 | 25,154 |
| Armenian | 115,017 | 69,995 |
| Iranian languages | 186,913 | 97,590 |
| Persian | 178,354 | 94,395 |
| Indic languages | 479,468 | 189,676 |
| Hindi | 287,067 | 115,774 |
| Bengali | 33,814 | 11,516 |
| Panjabi | 43,184 | 16,820 |
| Marathi | 12,580 | 5,426 |
| Gujarati | 87,539 | 32,065 |
| Asian and Pacific Island languages | 3,637,263 | 1,718,934 |
| Turkic languages | 32,564 | 22,651 |
| Turkish | 32,024 | 21,827 |
| Dravidian languages | 82,990 | 34,458 |
| Telugu | 19,052 | 8,572 |
| Malayalam | 31,143 | 10,345 |
| Tamil | 24,575 | 9,691 |
| Chinese | 1,088,296 | 494,855 |
| Thai (Laotian) | 173,226 | 73,542 |
| Miao (Hmong) | 62,699 | 14,638 |
| Japanese | 245,294 | 171,715 |
| Korean | 530,860 | 237,516 |
| Mon-Khmer (Cambodian) | 113,910 | 15,089 |
| Vietnamese | 434,731 | 182,890 |
| Indonesian languages | 33,009 | 12,498 |
| Indonesian | 22,102 | 9,457 |
| Malay | 10,245 | 2,662 |
| Philippine languages | 793,365 | 428,470 |
| Tagalog | 746,443 | 402,968 |
| Ilocano | 35,098 | 21,233 |
| Micronesian languages | 3,057 | 2,384 |
| Polynesian languages | 21,430 | 18,876 |
| Samoan | 11,309 | 12,234 |
| Melanesian languages | 2,002 | 1,222 |
| Asian and Pacific Island languages n.e.c. | 19,830 | 8,130 |
| Other languages | 595,236 | 417,214 |
| Uralic languages | 108,289 | 135,318 |
| Finnish | 14,324 | 19,437 |
| Hungarian | 87,024 | 105,298 |
| Caucasian (Georgian) | 710 | 521 |
| Basque | 1,327 | 1,783 |
| Semitic languages | 382,997 | 230,184 |
| Arabic | 251,409 | 164,953 |
| Hebrew | 74,985 | 49,044 |
| Syriac | 27,494 | 5,844 |
| Amharic | 29,109 | 10,343 |
| Afro-Asiatic languages | 4,373 | 2,257 |
| Nilo-Saharan languages | 630 | 478 |
| Niger-Congo languages | 80,676 | 33,886 |
| Kru (Kwa) | 58,172 | 22,454 |
| African languages n.e.c. | 5,608 | 3,323 |
| Native American languages | 10,626 | 9,464 |
| Language data not available 1/ | 1,815 | 90,266 |
* Indicates sample data.
n.e.c. Not elsewhere classified.
| 1/ | For 1980, includes 11,136 cases of "Indian" with no other information provided to classify the language as Indic or Native American. |
