In the US, speaking more than one language fluently is not very common — except in Los Angeles, California. The city has one of the largest populations in the US of young people between the ages of 18 and 34. More than half of them in Los Angeles are bilingual (会两种语言的), which means they speak more than one language.

Maria Elena Burgos, a mother of two American born daughters, is cooking a Mexican breakfast. She says making Mexican food is just one of the many traditions in her home. Another is speaking Spanish to her children. “We want to keep the Spanish somewhere in their learning too, not only at home.” She says being bilingual will give them more opportunities in the future. Knowing Spanish also means the children can talk with their relatives in Mexico.

Msburgos’ daughters both want to know their family’s culture. “We are doing this in order to go back to our roots because that’s part of who we are.” they say.

The US Census Bureau says more than half the adults in the Los Angeles area between 18 and 34 years old speak a language other than English at home. For the whole country, the number of bilingual adults is only 25 percent. The number of bilingual speakers has gone up since the 1990s.

“In the past, the children and grandchildren of immigrants (移民) did not continue to speak the parents’ native language. But now the opposite is true”, says University of California Los Angeles professor Raul Hinojosa.

More immigrant parents say they want their children to keep speaking their native language. Mr. Hinojosa calls their choice the “path of pride”. The decision to keep a native language is clear in Los Angeles now. And, as the number of minorities in the US continues to grow, he thinks bilingualism will spread to the rest of the country.

It is one of the most annoying words in the English language and it seems there is no escaping it. The word “huh?” is in worldwide use, a study found.

Researchers discovered that languages spoken in countries from Ghana and Laos to Iceland and Italy all include “huh?”, or something that sounds very like it. They said that while the study may sound silly, the word is an absolutely necessary part of speech. Without it and similar words, it would be impossible to show that we haven’t heard or understood what had been said and this would lead to constant misunderstandings.

But while other words used in the same context, such as “sorry” or “what”, vary widely across languages, “huh?” remains unchanged.

The Dutch researchers carefully studied ten languages from around the world, including Siwu, which is spoken in Ghana, and an Australian Aboriginal language, as well as Italian, Spanish, Dutch and Mandarin Chinese.

They analysed tapes of recorded conversations for words that sounded like “huh?” and were used to request that whatever had just been said be repeated. All contained a version of “huh?”. The word was also found in another 21 languages. While there were subtle differences in each country, all sounded basically the same.

This is surprising because normally unrelated languages will use very different words to describe the same thing. For instance, the Japanese for “dog” is “inu”, while the French is “chien”. It is thought that languages around the world have developed their own version of “huh?” because the sound is quick and simple to form, as well as being easily understood.

The researchers, said that it might seem unimportant to carry out scientific research into a word like “huh?” but in fact this little word is an essential tool in human communication. They also have an answer for those who claim that “huh?” isn’t a word. They say that it qualifies because of the small differences in its pronunciation in different languages. It also can be considered a word because it’s something we learn to say, rather than a grunt or cry that we are born knowing how to make.