Countries That Speak English As a Primary Languge

The Americas

Although continental North America has only two English-speaking countries (Canada and the United States) many of the island nations of the Caribbean also use English. It is the primary language in Antigua and Barbuda, the Bahamas, Trinidad and Tobago, Barbados, Dominica, Jamaica, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, St. Lucia, and Grenada. Belize is the lone country in Central America that uses English as its primary language, and Sierra Leone is the only South American nation that does so.

There are three European nations that use English as a primary language. Within Great Britain, both the United Kingdom and Ireland are English-speaking. Within the single nation of the United Kingdom, there is a great deal of dialectal variation, with some dialects verging on being unintelligible to speakers of other dialects. Outside of the islands of Great Britain, Malta is the only European nation to use English as a primary language.

In the nation building that took place in post-colonial Africa, English was often chosen to create a non-political lingua franca. The selection of an official language that did not preference one African ethnic group over another was arguably the main reason for the widespread adoption of English in Africa post-World War II. The following countries made the decision to to join the Anglosphere: Rwanda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Gambia, Ghana, Guyana, Kenya, Kiribati, Lesotho, Liberia, Malawi, Namibia, Nigeria, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Mauritius and the Seychelles.

The same sentiments led both India, Bangladesh and Pakistan to make English an official language. Though widely taught and commonly used in an official capacity, English is not the first language of their residents. The same is true in Israel and Singapore, where English is widely understood but rarely the mother tongue.

Although New Zealand and Australia are the most well known of the English-speaking South Pacific nations, the language has been widely adopted in a great many of the smaller island states. Residents of Fiji, Micronesia, Palau, the Marshall Islands, Rarotonga, Nauru, Niue, Papua New Guinea, Brunei, the Philippines, Samoa, Tonga, Tuvalu, and Vanuatu frequently speak English solely or in addition to other native languages.