What percent of Americans are fluent in Chinese?
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What percent of Americans are fluent in Chinese?
According to data reported on the 2000 US Census long-form, 259,750 people spoke “Cantonese”, with 58.62\% percent residing in California and the next most with 16.19\% in New York. The actual number of Cantonese speakers was probably higher….Chinese language and varieties in the United States.
| Year | Speakers |
|---|---|
| 2000 | 2,022,143 |
| 2010 | 2,808,692 |
| ^a Foreign-born population only |
How many Chinese language learners are there in the United States?
While China boasts more than 300 million English-language learners, there are only 200,000 K-12 Mandarin language learners here in the U.S. Further, English classes are mandatory for Chinese K-12 students, but less than 0.4 percent of American K-12 students are currently studying Mandarin.
How hard is it for an American to learn Chinese?
Mandarin Chinese Interestingly, the hardest language to learn is also the most widely spoken native language in the world. But writing isn’t the only difficult part of learning Mandarin. The tonal nature of the language makes speaking it very hard as well.
How many people are teaching Chinese around the world?
As of 2008, China had helped 60,000 teachers promote its language internationally, and an estimated 40 million people were studying Chinese as a second language around the world. Other than Standard Mandarin, Cantonese is the only other variant of Chinese that is widely taught as a foreign language.
How many Americans study Chinese in the United States?
The study of Chinese is also rising in the United States. The USC U.S.-China Institute cited a report that 51,582 students were studying the language in US colleges and universities. While far behind the more than 800,000 students who study Spanish, the number is more than three times higher than in 1986.
How many Chinese language schools are there in China?
According to the Chinese Ministry of Education, there are 330 institutions teaching Mandarin Chinese as a foreign language, receiving about 40,000 foreign students. In addition, there are almost 5,000 Chinese language teachers.
How long does it take to learn to speak Chinese?
The average learner should be able to speak conversationally and travel with ease after about six months to a year of studying Chinese. “From my personal experience in a formal learning setting, five contact hours a week for 30 weeks a year can get a person to basic competency, and two years will get a person to practical competency,” Yang says.