I want to caution people that the chart should *not* be taken as an exact guide. The percentage of language speakers within a country, and the percent of GDP ascribable to those language speakers are all pretty fuzzy. In addition, I had excluded countries that were at or below 0.05% of world GDP, just to make my mappings easier. Moreover, the Excel chart cuts off some languages that did have data.
Mark __________________________________ http://www.macchiato.com ► शिष्यादिच्छेत्पराजयम् ◄ ----- Original Message ----- From: "Peter Kirk" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Thu, 2003 Oct 23 03:03 Subject: Re: [OT] RE: GDP by language > On 23/10/2003 01:24, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > >>no countries as far as I know using Arabic script but not Arabic, Persian > >>or Urdu as official languages (except perhaps Pashto in Afghanistan). > >> > >> > > > >Equating countries and languages is wrought with danger... > > > >Currently: Hausa, Kashmiri, Kurdish (written in Latin, Cyrillic, and Arabic), Sindhi. > > > >In recent history: Kazak, Kyrghyz, Turkish, Uighur. > > > >Until early Middle Ages: Aragonese, Maltese. > > > >(Source: www.omniglot.com, and Aragonese and Maltese from my faulty memory...) > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > I'll give you Uighur, which *currently* surely has official status in > Arabic script in China, and perhaps Kashmiri if Arabic script is used in > the Indian-controlled parts of Kashmir. Kurdish is written in Arabic > script only in countries where Arabic script is used for the official > national language, similarly Sindhi and many other languages of Pakistan > - but I was assuming that Mark's chart counted all of these people under > Arabic, Persian and Urdu. I'm prettty sure that Latin script is official > for Hausa. I can list lots more languages which used to be written in > Arabic script, but that's not my point. > > -- > Peter Kirk > [EMAIL PROTECTED] (personal) > [EMAIL PROTECTED] (work) > http://www.qaya.org/ > > > >
