Montana
Languages
English in Montana fuses Northern and Midland features, the Northern proportion declining from east to west. Topography has given new meaning to basin, hollow, meadow, and park as kinds of clear spaces in the mountains.
In 2000, the number of Montanans who spoke only English at was 803,031, representing about 95% of the resident population five years of age or older. There was no change in the overall percentage of English speakers from 1990 to 2000.
The following table gives selected statistics from the 2000 census for language spoken at home by persons five years old and over. The category "Other Native North American languages" includes Apache, Cherokee, Choctaw, Dakota, Keres, Pima, and Yupik. The category "Scandinavian languages" includes Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish. The category "Other Slavic languages" includes Czech, Slovak, and Ukrainian.
| LANGUAGE | NUMBER | PERCENT |
| Population 5 years and over | 847,362 | 100.0 |
| Speak only English | 803,031 | 94.8 |
| Speak a language other than English | 44,331 | 5.2 |
| Speak a language other than English | 44,331 | 5.2 |
| Spanish or Spanish Creole | 12,953 | 1.5 |
| German | 9,416 | 1.1 |
| Other Native North American languages | 9,234 | 1.1 |
| French (incl. Patois, Cajun) | 3,298 | 0.4 |
| Scandinavian languages | 1,335 | 0.2 |
| Italian | 759 | 0.1 |
| Japanese | 711 | 0.1 |
| Russian | 610 | 0.1 |
| Other Slavic languages | 570 | 0.1 |
| Chinese | 528 | 0.1 |