Mother tongue linguistic diversity index

This map shows the mother tongue diversity index in each region. The diversity index is the probability that any two randomly chosen people in a region have different mother tongues. The census lists information on 269 different mother tongues, including five categories for combinations of multiple mother tongues, which for the purpose of this map we treat as separate categories contributing to language diversity. Among the larger metro area Toronto stands out with an index of 74%, followed by Vancouver with 72%, Ottawa with 69% and Montréal with 62%. Within those regions some cities have significantly higher values, Richmond Hill takes the top spot with a 84% chance that two randomly selected people have a different mother tongue. We restrict the map to census tract and higher geographies to reduce bias due to statistical rounding and increase map performance.

Author: CensusMapper Team

Dataset: CA21