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ISO 639-2:1998,Codes for the representation of names of languages — Part 2: Alpha-3 code, is the second part of theISO 639standard, which listscodes for the representation of the names of languages. The three-letter codes given for each language in this part of the standard are referred to as "Alpha-3" codes. There are 487 entries in thelist of ISO 639-2 codes.
The USLibrary of Congress is the registration authority for ISO 639-2 (referred to as ISO 639-2/RA). As registration authority, the LOC receives and reviews proposed changes; they also have representation on the ISO 639-RA Joint Advisory Committee responsible for maintaining the ISO 639 code tables.[1]
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Work was begun on the ISO 639-2 standard in 1989, because theISO 639-1 standard, which uses only two-letter codes for languages, is not able to accommodate a sufficient number of languages. The ISO 639-2 standard was first released in 1998.[2]
In practice, ISO 639-2 has largely been superseded byISO 639-3 (2007), which includes codes for all the individual languages in ISO 639-2 plus many more.[3] It also includes the special and reserved codes, and is designed not to conflict with ISO 639-2. ISO 639-3, however, does not include any of the collective languages in ISO 639-2;[4] most of these are included inISO 639-5.
While most languages are given one code by the standard, twenty of the languages described have two three-letter codes, a "bibliographic" code (ISO 639-2/B), which is derived from the English name for the language and was a necessarylegacy feature, and a "terminological" code (ISO 639-2/T), which is derived from the native name for the language and resembles the language's two-letter code in ISO 639-1.[5] There were originally 22 B codes;scc andscr are deprecated.[6]
In general the T codes are favored;ISO 639-3 uses ISO 639-2/T.
The codes in ISO 639-2 have a variety of "scopes of denotation", or types of meaning and use, some of which are described in more detail below.
Macrolanguages and collective languages are defined in ISO 639-3/RA:Scope of denotation for language identifiers.[7]
Individual languages are further classified as to type:
Some ISO 639-2 codes that are commonly used for languages do not precisely represent a particular language or some related languages (as the above macrolanguages). They are regarded as collective language codes and are excluded fromISO 639-3.
The collective language codes in ISO 639-2 are listed below. Some language groups are noted to be remainder groups, that is excluding languages with their own codes, while other are not. Remainder groups areafa,alg,art,ath,bat,ber,bnt,cai,cau,cel,crp,cus,dra,fiu,gem,inc,ine,ira,khi,kro,map,mis,mkh,mun,nai,nic,paa,roa,sai,sem,sio,sit,sla,ssa,tai andtut, while inclusive groups areapa,arn,arw,aus,bad,bai,bih,cad,car,chb,cmc,cpe,cpf,cpp,dua,hmn,iro,mno,mul,myn,nub,oto,phi,sgn,wak,wen,ypk andznd.[5]
The following code is identified as a collective code in ISO 639-2 but is (at present) missing from ISO 639-5:
Codes registered for 639-2 that are listed as collective codes in ISO 639-5 (and collective codes by name in ISO 639-2):
The interval fromqaa toqtz is "reserved for local use" and is not used in ISO 639-2 nor inISO 639-3. These codes are typically used privately for languages not (yet) in either standard.Microsoft Windows uses theqps language code forpseudo-locales generated automatically from English strings, designed for testing software localization.[8]
There are four generic codes for special situations:
These four codes are also used inISO 639-3.
.Likewise, elements other than collections listed in ISO 639-2 are a subset of those listed ISO 639-3; each non-collective element in ISO 639-2 is included in ISO 639-3, but not necessarily vice versa. ... The language code in this part of ISO 639 does not include collective language code elements.
of the ISO 639-2 Language Coding Agency at theLibrary of Congress
