Everyone in Russia is expected to be able to speak Russian, but the country has other official languages. There are yet other languages that are probably official, and some that aren't official but are protected, and yet others that are marked as very endangered.
The named official languages of Russia are: Anaza, Adyghe, Avar, Altai, Bashkir, Buryat, Chechan, Chukchi, Chuvash, Chinese Tatar, Erzya, Ingush, Kabardian, Kalmyk, Karachay-Balkan, Knakas, Komi-Zyrian, Hill Mari, Meadow Mari, Moksha, Nogai, Ossetian, Tatar, Tuvan, Udmurt, Ukrainian and Yakut.
(These languages come from a wide variety of language families: Caucasian, Uralic, Turkic, Mongolic, Indo-European, and Chukotco-Kamchatkam.)
Then there are the languages Aghul, Avar, Azerbaijani, Dargwa, Kumyk, Lezgian, Rutal, Tabasaran, Tat and Tsakhur, which are languages spoken in Dagestan. The implication is that these are all official languages, even though they're not actually named in parliamentary law.
The languages Karelian, Vepsian and Finnish also have some protection.
Then we have some very local, but still protected languages: Dolgan, Even, Evenki, Kazakh (local in Russia, that is), Khanty, Komi-Pennyak, Mansi, Nenets, Selkup, Veps, and the Yukaghir languages.
Then there are the languages of migrants: Armenian, Uzbek, Kyrgyz, Tajik, Georgian, and Romanian.
There are some other languages that are near extinction: Enets, Medriy-Aleut, Negidal, Orok, Ter Sami, Tofalar, Udege, Votic and Yupik.
Such treasure, such a variety of cultures.
It makes it difficult to believe that they all always think the same way, doesn't it?
Word To Use Today: according to Wikipedia, only two people speak Ter Sami. The Ter Sami word for tongue is ныкчым, which is transliterated nıkçım.
How about that?
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