Papua New Guinea

Population

• Geography

• Size

  9,119,000

  total✵

  839

  languages✵

  64% (2015 World Factbook)

  literate✵

• Vitality

  1. Institutional
     26
  2. Stable
     502
  3. Endangered
     312
  4. Extinct
     12

  Details

  This graph shows the profile of languages in Papua New Guinea with respect to their level of language vitality.

  • Institutional — The language has been developed to the point that it is used and sustained by institutions beyond the home and community.
  • Stable — The language is not being sustained by formal institutions, but it is still the norm in the home and community that all children learn and use the language.
  • Endangered — It is no longer the norm that children learn and use this language.
  • Extinct - The language is no longer used and no one retains a sense of ethnic identity associated with the language.

  These four summary levels have been derived by grouping levels in the Expanded Graded Intergenerational Disruption Scale (EGIDS), which is the more fine-grained scale that Ethnologue uses to assess the status of every language in terms of development versus endangerment; see Language Status for a description of the levels of that scale. See also the pages on Development and Endangerment for more discussion.