Human languages (Earth-5875)

Humans have a plethora of languages used to communicate between each other. Being a space-faring species, many of their languages were spread through colonies. By the 30th century, English serve as the primary language of the Unified Earth Government, which is widely spoken through human-controlled space, but despite this, many other languages are still used with secondary roles in society. Through human's historical contact with the Covenant, members of the hegemony studied and learned English to interpret human communication. The VISR for MJOLNIR GEN2 features a translation software with the data of hundreds of human languages.

English
English is a language of West Germanic language origin, which first appeared in England. During most of human history, it was also the first language of Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America, all encompassing what was known as the Anglosphere. By the 21st century, English started to become more widespread with globalization, and by the 26th century, it became the lingua franca of the Unified Earth Government and humanity as a whole, both on Earth and its colonies.

The Covenant made use of translation software to communicate and learn the languages of its member species through their expansion in the efforts to make them fluent at the Covenant's lingua franca Digom; this software were also used by the hegemony upon first contact with humanity on Shanxi, and so they were able to quickly learn English. The Prophet of Tolerance assembled a team of eight hundred Unggoy and sangheili warriors to study and translate English. They initially were able to speak English among themselves, and later taught it to other Covenant warriors. During the First Contact War, the Covenant would rarely use English to converse or actively talk to humans, but mostly to taunt or intimidate them. Aside from the unggoy and the sangheili, the kig-yar, jiralhanae, and san'shyuum were also able to speak English, albeit with some difficulties duo to their diverse phisiologies. The Covenant's other species, the yanme'e, lekgolo and huragok, are unable to speak English duo to their biology. Xenomorphs are able to speak English and other human languages, but only with the formation of a Gravemind, who absorbs the knowledge of the xenomorphs' hosts and communicates through all other xenomorph forms.

The UNSC's own translation software was able to translate the sangheili's main language (and as a result, the language of the Covenant): Digom, as well as the languages of the other Covenant species', such as that of the unggoy, the kig-yar, jiralhanae, and san'shyuum, and by 2531, the software was installed in the equipment of all members of the UNSC Navy and the UNSC Marine Corps, being able to automatically translate anything all these species said. The languages of the yanme'e, the lekgolo, and the huragok still remained untranslated by the UNSC, duo to their wildly different biology and forms of communication.

Spanish
Spanish is one of the main secondary languages of the UEG and the UNSC. One of the Romance languages derived from Latin, Spanish has many similarities to English. The language is mostly spoken in locations where it was formerly prominent, such as Latin America and Spain. The human colonies of Madrigal and Verge, upon its foundation, received a population of mostly Hispanic humans, who brought with them Spanish and made it a part of the planets' cultures.

Notable fluent Spanish speakers include Mickey Crespo, Jenette Vasquez, Manuel Mendoza, Tim Perez, and Teresa Aquila.

Chinese
Chinese comprise numerous different dialects spoken across China: these include Mandarin Chinese, spoken in the country's northeast and west, Wu Chinese, and Cantonese, the latter which is spoken in the Guangdong province. Chinese, alongside Portuguese, was one of the secondary languages of Shanxi, as the planet was originally settled by colonists from China and Brazil.

Notable fluent Chinese speakers include Junjie Chen (Mandarin) and Lian Devereaux (Cantonese).

Indian languages
India is the origin of hundreds of different languages, such as Hindi and Urdu, both of which exist in some human colonies, like Andesia. The ancient Indian language Sanskrit is regarded as a sacred language to both Hinduism and Buddhism. Dr. Catherine Halsey is well versed in Sanskrit, having read the Rivgeda, as she noted in her diary.

Arabic
Arabic is a Central Semitic language from the Arab world and the Middle-East, on Central Asia. It is present in some Earth countries, such as Pakistan, as well as colonies like New Jerusalem.

Notable fluent speakers include Jilan al-Cygni.

Russian
The Russian is a language originating from Russia, but which is also spoken in colonies such as New Harmony.

Notable fluent speakers include Kat-B320, Jun-A266, and Vasily Beloi.

Portuguese
Portuguese is a Romance language which originated from Portugal and spread to Brazil and a number of African countries and Macau, on China, following Portugal's maritime expansion. Portuguese was the secondary language of Shanxi, alongside Mandarin Chinese, as the planet was originally settled by colonists from Brazil and China.