World Language Map

Where is Washo spoken?

Washo (wáꞏšiw ʔítlu) is a language isolate, spoken in the United States. It is marked on the map by a ringed point.

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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 Washo is spoken

Washo is spoken in one country: the United States.

Country
United States

Washo 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 Washo?

Wikidata gives about 20 speakers (Wikidata, with no source given, 2011). 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 Washo sits in the language family tree

Washo is a language isolate: Glottolog knows of no language that it is demonstrably related to.

More about Washo

Codes: ISO 639-3 was, Glottolog wash1253. Glottolog macroarea: North America.

Questions about Washo

Where is Washo spoken?

Washo 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 Washo?

Wikidata gives about 20 speakers (Wikidata, with no source given, 2011). Speaker numbers are approximate and differ between sources: counting who is a speaker, and whether to include second-language speakers, is not settled.

Is Washo related to any other language?

Glottolog lists Washo as a language isolate: a language with no demonstrated relatives. It sits on its own in the classification.

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