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Ethnologue > Web version > Country index > Asia > Bahrain

Languages of Bahrain

State of Bahrain, Dawlat al-Bahrayn. 725,000. National or official language: Standard Arabic. Literacy rate: 49%–75%. Immigrant languages: English, Kerinci (25,000), Korean (1,200), Malayalam (23,600), Northern Kurdish, Tamil (18,000), Telugu (13,000), Urdu (28,800), Western Farsi (48,000). Also includes languages of the Philippines (22,000). Information mainly from M. Al-Tajir 1982; W. Fischer and O. Jastrow 1980; C. Holes 1990; T. Johnstone 1967. Blind population: 62. Deaf population: 35,529. The number of individual languages listed for Bahrain is 3. Of those, all are living languages.

Arabic, Baharna Spoken	[abv] 300,000 in Bahrain (1995). Population total all countries: 310,000. Also in Oman. Alternate names: Baharna, Baharnah, Bahraini Shi’ite Arabic.  Classification: Afro-Asiatic, Semitic, Central, South, Arabic  More information.
Arabic, Gulf Spoken	[afb] 100,000 in Bahrain (1995).  Alternate names: Gulf Arabic, Khaliji.  Dialects: Bahraini Gulf Arabic.  Classification: Afro-Asiatic, Semitic, Central, South, Arabic  More information.
Arabic, Standard	[arb]  Middle East, North Africa. Classification: Afro-Asiatic, Semitic, Central, South, Arabic  More information.