Editing Czech language (section)

==Geographic distribution==
[[File:Vojvodina rusyn croatian czech map.png|thumb|upright|alt=Map of Vojvodina, a province of Serbia, with Czech in official use in one southeastern municipality|Official use of Czech in [[Vojvodina]], [[Serbia]] (in light blue)]]
Czech is spoken by about 10 million residents of the [[Czech Republic]].<ref name="Cerna 2007 26"/><ref>{{Harvnb|Naughton|2005|p=2}}</ref> A [[Eurobarometer]] survey conducted from January to March 2012 found that the [[first language]] of 98 percent of Czech citizens was Czech, the third-highest proportion of a population in the [[European Union]] (behind [[Greece]] and [[Hungary]]).<ref name="eu"/>

As the official language of the Czech Republic (a member of the [[European Union]] since 2004), Czech is one of the EU's official languages and the 2012 Eurobarometer survey found that Czech was the foreign language most often used in Slovakia.<ref name="eu">{{cite web|url=http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/ebs/ebs_386_en.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120622051915/http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/ebs/ebs_386_en.pdf |archive-date=2012-06-22 |url-status=live|publisher=[[Eurobarometer]]|title=Europeans and Their Languages|date=June 2012|access-date=July 25, 2014}}</ref> Economist Jonathan van Parys collected data on language knowledge in Europe for the 2012 [[European Day of Languages]]. The five countries with the greatest use of Czech were the [[Czech Republic]] (98.77 percent), [[Slovakia]] (24.86 percent), [[Portugal]] (1.93 percent), [[Poland]] (0.98 percent) and [[Germany]] (0.47 percent).<ref>{{cite web|url=http://languageknowledge.eu/languages/czech|publisher=Language Knowledge|title=Language knowledge in the European Union|date=2012|last=van Parys|first=Jonathan|access-date=July 23, 2014}}</ref>

Czech speakers in Slovakia primarily live in cities. Since it is a recognized [[minority language]] in Slovakia, Slovak citizens who speak only Czech may communicate with the government in their language in the same way that Slovak speakers in the Czech Republic also do.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://alppi.vedeckecasopisy.cz/publicFiles/00131.pdf|title=Language Policy of Slovak Republic|last=Škrobák|first=Zdeněk|publisher=Annual of Language & Politics and Politics of Identity|access-date=July 26, 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140726095459/http://alppi.vedeckecasopisy.cz/publicFiles/00131.pdf|archive-date=July 26, 2014|url-status=dead}}</ref>

===United States===
{{see also|Czech American|Czech Texan}}
[[File:Praha texas.jpeg|thumb|right|Praha, Texas (Note the absence of diacritics. In standard Czech, it would be {{lang|cs|Vítáme Vás […] Matička Praha}}.)]]
Immigration of Czechs from Europe to the United States occurred primarily from 1848 to 1914. Czech is a [[Less Commonly Taught Languages|Less Commonly Taught Language]] in U.S. schools, and is taught at Czech heritage centers. Large communities of [[Czech American]]s live in the states of [[Texas]], [[Nebraska]] and [[Wisconsin]].<ref name="cal">{{cite web|url=http://www.cal.org/heritage/pdfs/briefs/czech-language-programs-in-the-united-states.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130302223205/http://www.cal.org/heritage/pdfs/briefs/czech-language-programs-in-the-united-states.pdf |archive-date=2013-03-02 |url-status=live|publisher=[[University of California, Berkeley]]|last=Hrouda|first=Simone J.|title=Czech Language Programs and Czech as a Heritage Language in the United States|access-date=July 23, 2014}}</ref> In the [[2000 United States Census]], Czech was reported as the most common [[Language Spoken at Home in the United States of America|language spoken at home]] (besides [[English language|English]]) in [[Valley County, Nebraska|Valley]], [[Butler County, Nebraska|Butler]] and [[Saunders County, Nebraska|Saunders]] [[County (United States)|Counties]], Nebraska and [[Republic County, Kansas]]. With the exception of [[Spanish language|Spanish]] (the non-English language most commonly spoken at home nationwide), Czech was the most common home language in more than a dozen additional counties in Nebraska, Kansas, Texas, [[North Dakota]] and [[Minnesota]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.census.gov/population/www/cen2000/censusatlas/pdf/8_Language.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081006211125/http://www.census.gov/population/www/cen2000/censusatlas/pdf/8_Language.pdf |archive-date=2008-10-06 |url-status=live|publisher=[[United States Census|Census.gov]]|title=Chapter 8: Language|date=2000|access-date=July 23, 2014}}</ref> {{As of|2009|post=,}} 70,500 Americans spoke Czech as their first language (49th place nationwide, after [[Turkish language|Turkish]] and before [[Swedish language|Swedish]]).<ref>{{cite web|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090220090800/http://www.usefoundation.org/userdata/file/Research/languages_of_the_usa.pdf|url=http://www.usefoundation.org/userdata/file/Research/languages_of_the_usa.pdf|archive-date=February 20, 2009|publisher=[[U.S. English (organization)|U.S. English]]|title=Languages of the U.S.A|access-date=July 25, 2014|url-status=dead|df=mdy-all}}</ref>