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5. Toponymic importance of linguistic status
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The following language variants exists:
- An official (#248) language is ‘a language expressly adopted by
the government of a country … and employed as a language
of administration’
Example: Dutch is an official language in the Netherlands, Flanders
(the northern part of Belgium), Suriname, Aruba, Curacao and the
BES islands in the Caribean.
- A non-official (#152)language is ‘a language that lacks official status
in a particular legally constituted entity’
Example: Although about 500 000 people in the Netherlands have
Arab as their mother tongue, Arab is no official language in the
Netherlands
- A dialect (#066) is ‘a variety of language which
is distinguished by phonological and/or morphological characteristics
that give it a distinctive identity’.
Example: In the eastern part of the Netherlands, the local vernacular
is a dialect that is in-between standard Dutch and lower German.
- A literary (#149) language is a ‘written form of language regarded
as the desirable standard for works of literature’
Example: the vernacular spoken in Tuscany, and used by Dante in
his Divina Commedia, became the standard form for the Italian
language.
- A national (#151) language is a ‘language in widespread current
use throughout a given country or in part of its territory …’,
and it ‘… may have or may not have the status of an
official language’.
Example: The national languages in Cameroon are French and English,
as these languages are used in administration, education and as
a means of communication in-between the various different language
communities in the country.
- A minority (#150) language is ‘any language not used
by a significantly large part of the country’s population’
Example: In the Netherlands (16 million inhabitants), with its
official language Dutch, in the province of Frisia the 500 000
inhabitants speak a minority language, Frisian. Within this province,
the Frisian language has official status in education, administration
and the courts of law as well.
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A principal (# 154) language is ‘in a linguistic community where
more than one language is in use, that language which has greatest
currency’.
Example: Two languages are spoken in the Netherlands, Dutch and
Frisian. The whole population speaks Dutch, although 500 000 inhabitants
of Frisia province have Frisian as their main language. So Dutch
would be the principal language of the country.
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A living resp. dead language is ‘any language spoken today, resp.
not longer spoken as someone's main language’.
Example: Coptic, Old Church Slavonic and Latin are still used
for religious purposes but no longer are used as people's main
language.
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A lingua
franca(# 172) is a medium of communication
for people who speak different first languages.
Examples: English is the lingua franca of international business;
in the 17th and 18th century French used to be the lingua franca
of diplomacy.
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A pidgin (# 262) is a language with a reduced range of structure
and use, with no native speakers.
Example: Beach-la-Mar or Bislama is an English-based pidgin used
in the Central Pacific Islands.
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A creole (# 047) is a pidgin that has become the mother tongue of
a speech community.
Example: Papiamento is a language based on Spanish, Portuguese
and Dutch, spoken on the Leeward isles; Sranan Tongo is a language
based on English and Dutch spoken in Suriname.
For more information click 
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