Kansas City, MO-KS

LANGUAGE

The Census asks questions about language use at home to locate groups of people who speak a language other than English. Their isolation or integration into a primarily English speaking community can be determined by their ability to speak English proficiently.

Language Spoken at Home, 1990-2000
1990 2000
Number Percent Number Percent
Only English 1,387,595 94.94% 1,523,333 92.42%
Spanish 33,716 2.31% 69,794 4.23%
Other Indo-European* 27,365 1.87% 29,530 1.79%
Asian Language** 10,612 0.73% 20,235 1.23%
Other 2,193 0.15% 5,345 0.32%
Total Population Age 5+ 1,461,481 100.00% 1,648,237 100.00%

Population Speaking English Less Than "Very Well" in 2000
Language Spoken at Home: Number Percent
Spanish 34,590 49.56%
Other Indo-European* 8,387 28.40%
Asian Language** 9,756 48.21%
Other Language 1,833 34.29%
Total 54,566 3.31%

Population Speaking English Less Than "Very Well" in 1990
Language Spoken at Home: Number Percent
Spanish 12,472 36.99%
Other Indo-European* 7,962 29.10%
Asian Language** 5,107 48.12%
Other Language 637 29.05%
Total 26,178 1.79%

* "Other Indo-European" excludes English and Spanish. "Indo-European" is not synonymous with "European." French, German, Hindi, and Persian are all classified as Indo-European. Hungarian, on the other hand, is lumped into "Other Language."

** "Asian Language" includes languages indigenous to Asia and Pacific islands areas that are not also Indo-European languages. Chinese, Japanese, Telugu, and Hawaiian are all classified here.

Also note that ability to speak English "very well" is based on the self-assessment of those responding to Census questions, not on a test of language ability.

Source: Census 2000 analyzed by the Social Science Data Analysis Network (SSDAN).

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