Portuguese language

The Iberian Peninsula in Europe is where the Portuguese language first emerged. Portuguese belongs to the Romance branch of the Indo-European language family. The countries of Portugal, Brazil, Cape Verde, Angola, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau, and So Tomé and Prncipe all recognise it as their official language, while East Timor, Equatorial Guinea, and Macau recognise it as a co-official language. Macau also recognises Portuguese as its official language. The term "Lusophone" (lusófono) refers to a person or country that speaks Portuguese as their primary language. A cultural presence of Portuguese speakers may be found all over the globe as a direct consequence of the spread of the language throughout the period of colonial rule. Portuguese is a member of the Ibero-Romance language family, which developed from multiple dialects of Vulgar Latin in the mediaeval Kingdom of Galicia and the County of Portugal. Despite its Ibero-Romance origins, Portuguese retains some Celtic phonology and vocabulary in its language.

There are around 230 million native speakers of Portuguese, and between 25 and 30 million people speak it as a second language. The total number of people who speak Portuguese is roughly 260 million. It is often ranked as the sixth most spoken language, the third most spoken European language in the world in terms of native speakers, and the second-most spoken Romance language in the world, with Spanish being the only Romance language that ranks higher. It is the official language of the European Union, Mercosur, the Organization of American States, the Economic Community of West African States, the African Union, and the Community of Portuguese Language Countries. In addition to being the language that is spoken the most in South America and the rest of the Southern Hemisphere as a whole, Portuguese is also the second-most spoken language in Latin America, after Spanish. It is also one of the 10 most widely spoken languages in Africa. In 1997, a rigorous academic research determined that Portuguese was one of the 10 languages that had the most significant impact on the globe.