Mongolia Languages
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Description
Mongolian is the official language of Mongolia and is spoken by 95% of the population.
A variety of dialects of Oirat and Buryat are also spoken across the country.
There are also some speakers of Mongolic Khamnigan.
In the west of the country, the Turkic languages of Kazakh and Tuvan are also spoken.
Mongolian Sign Language is the dominate language of the deaf community.
Russian is the most frequently spoken foreign language in Mongolia, followed by English, although English has been slowly replacing Russian as the second language.
Korean has gained popularity as tens of thousands of Mongolians work in South Korea.
See Alphabets and Scripts for more information on the historical use in Mongolia.
Word List(s)
Mongolian
Oirat
Buryat
Mongolic Khamnigan
Kazakh
Tuvan
Alphabet and Pronunciation
Mongolian
Oirat
Buryat
Mongolic Khamnigan
Kazakh
Tuvan
Language Aids and Dictionaries
Mongolian
Oirat
Buryat
Mongolic Khamnigan
Kazakh
Tuvan
Additional Resources
History of the alphabet and script used in Mongolia:
As a result of pressure from the Soviet Union, Mongolia adopted the Latin alphabet in 1931 and the Cyrillic alphabet in 1937.
In 1941, the Mongolian government passed a law to abolish the Classical Mongol script, but since 1994 they have been trying to bring it back.
It is now taught to some extent in schools, though is mainly used for decorative purposes by artists, designers, calligraphers and poets.
The average person in Mongolia knows little or nothing about the Classical Mongol script, though there is high literacy in Cyrillic.
In the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region of China, the Classical Mongol script is still used.
The older, traditional alphabet was developed in the 1200s from the Turkic Uighur script.
Unlike most vertical scripts, it begins at the left.
In Mongolia, most older genealogical sources were written either in the classical Mongol script or in Chinese.
Records from the 1900s are written in Russian, in Cyrillic Mongolian, or in the Kazakh language.