| The Spanish Language |
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The Spanish-speaking communities in the
world are experiencing a tremendous growth in population. In
Latin American and the Caribbean there are now over 352
million people speaking Spanish.
After Mandarin Chinese, English is the most widely spoken
language today, but third on the list is Spanish. By the
year 2025, more than 40 million people in the
U.S.
will be of Hispanic heritage, ranking the
U.S.
ahead of
Spain
in terms of those who speak Spanish as a primary language.
More than 8,000 books a year are translated into Spanish. In addition, tens of thousands of medical,
technical and scientific publications are being translated from English
into Spanish. Obviously, these numbers will continue to increase as medical and technical advances grow to serve the
rapidly expanding Spanish-speaking population base.
Spanish traces it roots back to
Roman times, Latin was the spoken and written
language. In the 3rd century, the Visigoths, a
division of the Goths, came from the delta area of the
Danube River
(now Germany
), invaded Rome, and became the first barbarian nation within the Roman Empire. From the 4th to 7th
century A.D., the Visigoths invaded and occupied
Spain.
Translations were attempted from
Latin into Visigoth. However, the Visigoth language was gradually
abandoned in favor of Vulgar Latin (a more utilitarian dialect
of Classical Latin), spoken throughout the Roman Empire. From Vulgar Latin came the Romance Languages
we know today as: Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian and
Romanian.
An excellent history of the Spanish language can be
found in The Spanish Language in Medicine, written by Jack
Segura.
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