World Language Map

Where is Hawaiian spoken?

Hawaiian (‘Ōlelo Hawai‘i) is an Austronesian language, spoken in the United States. It is marked on the map by a ringed point.

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The filter only changes what is drawn. Tap the map to list every language at a spot, whichever family is shown. You can also pick any family from its own page.

Key

Language families (largest ten)

  • Atlantic-Congo
  • Austronesian
  • Sino-Tibetan
  • Indo-European
  • Afro-Asiatic
  • Nuclear Trans New Guinea
  • Otomanguean
  • Austroasiatic
  • Tai-Kadai
  • Pama-Nyungan

Everything else

  • All other families Smaller families, isolates and unclassified languages.
  • Point A language with no area map. The dot sits at its Glottolog position, in its family colour.

How to read the map. Each colour is a language family: a group of languages that share a common ancestor. The ten largest families have their own colour and every other family is grey. Areas are see-through, so where two languages share a place the colours mix. Tap anywhere to list every language whose area covers that spot. Areas are generalisations drawn from published atlases, many of them decades old, and cities are multilingual, so an area never says that everyone there speaks the language. A dot marks a language that has no area map. The family name is always given in words, because colour alone is hard to tell apart for some people.

Where Hawaiian is spoken

Hawaiian is spoken in one country: the United States.

Country
United States

Hawaiian has no area on the map because no open area map covers it. The ringed point is the position Glottolog gives for the language.

How many people speak Hawaiian?

Wikidata gives about 26,000 speakers (2010 United States Census, 2010). These figures are approximate: they come from different sources, years and definitions of a speaker.

Status: Moribund. Glottolog lists it as moribund: the youngest speakers are middle-aged or older, and children are no longer learning it.

Where Hawaiian sits in the language family tree

Glottolog classifies Hawaiian as follows, from the largest family down to the language itself.

  1. Austronesian
  2. Malayo-Polynesian
  3. Eastern Malayo-Polynesian
  4. Oceanic
  5. Central Pacific linkage
  6. Tokalau Fijian
  7. Polynesian
  8. Nuclear Polynesian
  9. Northern Outlier Polynesian-East Polynesian
  10. Solomons Northern Outlier Polynesian-East Polynesian
  11. Central Northern Outlier Polynesian-East Polynesian
  12. East Polynesian
  13. East Polynesian Proximal
  14. Hawaiian

More about Hawaiian

Codes: ISO 639-3 haw, Glottolog hawa1245. Glottolog macroarea: Papunesia.

Questions about Hawaiian

Where is Hawaiian spoken?

Hawaiian is spoken in the United States. On the map it is shown as a single point, because no open area map covers it.

How many people speak Hawaiian?

Wikidata gives about 26,000 speakers (2010 United States Census, 2010). Speaker numbers are approximate and differ between sources: counting who is a speaker, and whether to include second-language speakers, is not settled.

Which language family is Hawaiian in?

Glottolog places Hawaiian in the Austronesian family, in the branch Malayo-Polynesian, Eastern Malayo-Polynesian, Oceanic, Central Pacific linkage, Tokalau Fijian, Polynesian, Nuclear Polynesian, Northern Outlier Polynesian-East Polynesian, Solomons Northern Outlier Polynesian-East Polynesian, Central Northern Outlier Polynesian-East Polynesian, East Polynesian and East Polynesian Proximal.

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