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variants of english

Varieties of English

Today all the English-speaking nations have their own national variants of pronunciation and each of them has peculiar features that distinguish it from other varieties of English.

English is the dominant language in the United Kingdom, the United States, many Commonwealth nations including Australia, Canada, New Zealand and other former British colonies. It is the second most spoken language in the world. It is estimated that there are 380 million native speakers and 300 million who use English as a second language and a further 100 million use it as a foreign language. It is listed as the official or co-official language of over 45 countries.

Majority English speaking populations are in: United Kingdom and its dependencies, United States of America and its dependencies, Antigua, Australia, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Bermuda, Canada (with French), Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Ireland (with Irish Gaelic), Jamaica, New Zealand, South Africa (with Afrikaans, Xhosa and Zulu), Trinidad and Tobago.