Description

MTONGHU indicates the mother tongue or language spoken at home of persons in Hungary.

Comparability — General

MTONGHU indicates the first language learned in childhood and which the person's family spoke at home. (The 1970 census did not explicitly mention the "first language" criterion). It is unclear how respondents were to handle situations where mother tongue (language of childhood) was not spoken in the home. The instructions emphasized self-identification by the respondent.

The data are comparable apart from extra detail among "other" languages in 1990. Even more detail is available in the 1990 unharmonized source variable.

The 1990 census asked a separate question on language spoken in addition to mother tongue, recorded in LANGHU1.

The mother tongue question was asked in 2001, but is not included in the sample data.

Universe

Availability

• Hungary: 1970, 1980, 1990