Some objectives of the European Day of Languages

( EDL )To draw public attention to the importance of learning languages, in order to increase plurilingualism and intercultural understanding;

To promote awareness and respect for all languages alike;

To encourage lifelong language learning in and out of school;life;

To promote the rich linguistic and cultural diversity of Europe. the rich linguistic and culturality of Europe, which must be preserved and fostered;

Most of the many languages of Europe

belong to the Indo-European language

family. Another major family is the Finno-

Ugric. The Turkic family also has several

European members. The North and South

Caucasian families are important in the

southeastern extremity of geographical

Europe. Basque is an isolated language and

Maltese is the only national language in

Europe that is Semitic.

Languages of Europe

Romance languages

The Romance languages (sometimes

referred to as Romanic languages, Latin

languages or Neo-Latin languages) are a

branch of the Indo-European language family

comprising all the languages that descend from

Latin, the language of ancient Rome. The six

most widely spoken Romance languages are

Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian, Romanian

and Catalan.

Language FactsThere are between 6000 and 7000 languages in the world - spoken by six billion people divided into 189 independent states. Most European languages belong to

three broad groups: Germanic, Romance and Slavic.

The Romance languages include Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese and Romanian, among others.

The mother tongues spoken by most people in Europe are Russian, German, English, French and Italian, in that order.

Most countries in Europe have a number of regional or minority languages – some of these have obtained official status..

Due to the influx of migrants and refugees, Europe has become largely multilingual.

• Elsa Ferreira Catarina Teixeira Isabel Cristina Marques Miguel Sampaio 11 I