---
title: "Languages of science"
chunk: 2/13
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_science"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T03:11:33.946594+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

=== European and auxiliary languages (1800–1920) ===
The gradual disuse of Latin opened an uneasy transition period, as more and more works were accessible only in local languages. Many national European languages held the potential to become a language of science within a specific research field: some scholars "took measures to learn Swedish so they could follow the work of [the Swedish chemist] Bergman and his compatriots."
Language preferences and use across scientific communities were gradually consolidated into a triumvirate or triad of dominant languages of science: French, English, and German. While each language could be expected to be understood for international scientific communication, each also followed "different functional distributions evident in various scientific fields". French had been almost acknowledged as the international standard for European science in the late 18th century, and it remained "essential" throughout the 19th century. German became a major scientific language during the 19th century, since it "covered portions of the physical sciences, particularly physics and chemistry, in addition to mathematics and medicine." English was used largely by researchers and engineers because of the seminal contribution of English technology to the Industrial Revolution.
In the years preceding the First World War, the linguistic diversity of scientific publications increased significantly. The emergence of modern nationalities and early decolonization movements created new incentives to publish scientific knowledge in one's national language. Russian was one of the most successful developments as a new language of science. During the 1860s and 1870s, Russian researchers in chemistry and other physical sciences ceased publishing in German in favor of local periodicals (in Russian), following major work in adapting and creating names for scientific concepts or elements (such as chemical compounds). A controversy over the meaning of Dmitri Mendeleev's periodic table contributed to acknowledging original publications in Russian in global scientific debate: the original version was deemed more authoritative than its first "imperfect" translation in German.
Linguistic diversity became framed as a structural problem that ultimately limited the spread of scientific knowledge. In 1924, the linguist Roland Grubb Kent underlined that scientific communication could soon be significantly disrupted by the use of as many as "twenty" languages of science:

Today with the recrudescence of certain minor linguistic units and the increased nationalistic spirit of certain larger ones, we face a time when scientific publications of value may appear in perhaps twenty languages [and] be facing an era in which important publications will appear in Finnish, Lithuanian, Hungarian, Serbian, Irish, Turkish, Hebrew, Arabic, Hindustani, Japanese, Chinese.
The definition of an auxiliary language for science became a major issue discussed in emerging international scientific institutions. On January 17, 1901, the newly established International Association of Academies created the Delegation for the Adoption of an International Auxiliary Language "with support from 310 member organizations". This delegation was tasked with finding an auxiliary language that could be used for "scientific and philosophical exchanges", and it could not be any "national language". In the context of increased nationalistic tensions, any of the dominant languages of science would have appeared as a partisan choice. The delegation consequently had a limited set of options: these included the unlikely revival of a classical language such as Latin, or a new constructed language such as Volapük, Idiom Neutral, or Esperanto.
Throughout the first part of the 20th century, Esperanto was seriously considered as a potential international language of science. As late as 1954, UNESCO passed a recommendation to promote the use of Esperanto for scientific communication. In contrast with Idiom Neutral—or the simplified version of Latin, Interlingua—Esperanto was not conceived primarily as a scientific language. Yet, by the early 1900s, Esperanto was by far the most successful constructed language, with a large international community and numerous dedicated publications. Starting in 1904, the Internacia Science Revuo aimed to adapt Esperanto to the specific needs of scientific communication. The development of a specialized technical vocabulary was a challenging task, since Esperanto's extensive derivation system made it complicated to directly import words commonly used in German, French, or English scientific publications. In 1907, the Delegation for the Adoption of an International Auxiliary Language seemed close to retaining Esperanto as its preferred language. Nevertheless, significant criticism was still addressed at a few remaining complexities of the language, as well as its lack of scientific purpose and technical vocabulary. Unexpectedly, the delegation supported a new variant of Esperanto, Ido, which was submitted late in the process by an unknown contributor. While this decision was framed as a compromise between the Esperantist and the anti-Esperantist factions, it ultimately disappointed all proponents of an international medium for scientific communication, and it durably harmed the adoption of constructed languages in academic circles.