Languages of Indonesia

More than 700 living languages are spoken in Indonesia. Most belong to the Austronesian language family, with a few Papuan languages also spoken. The official language is Indonesian (locally known as Bahasa Indonesia), a modified version of Malay, which is used in commerce, administration, education and the media, but most Indonesians speak local languages, such as Javanese, as their first language. Many Indonesians living in urban areas are also taught English as a second language beginning at the elementary school level. There are approximately 735 languages spoken across the Indonesian archipelago, the largest multilingual population in the world only after Papua New Guinea. Based on Summer Institute of Linguistic 637 languages are endangered with less than 100,000 native speakers. It is due to Indonesian language more dominant and many scholars belief that associate local languages with ancient values as opposed to modernity. So multilingualism is endangered. It is more like a battlefield of linguistic survival than a melting pot of languages.