The Austronesian languages are a language family that is widely dispersed throughout Maritime Southeast Asia, Madagascar and the islands of the Pacific Ocean, with a few members in continental Asia. Austronesian languages are spoken by about 386 million people, making it the fifth-largest language family by number of speakers, behind only the Indo-European languages, the Sino-Tibetan languages, the Niger-Congo languages, and the Afroasiatic languages. It is on par with Indo-European, Niger–Congo, and Afroasiatic as one of the best-established language families. Major Austronesian languages with the highest number of speakers are Malay (Indonesian and Malaysian), Javanese, and Filipino (Tagalog). The family contains 1,257 languages, which is the second most of any language family. 

Similarities between the languages spoken in the Malay Archipelago and the Pacific Ocean were first observed in 1706 by the Dutch scholar Adriaan Reland. In the 19th century, researchers (e.g. Wilhelm von Humboldt, Herman van der Tuuk) started to apply the comparative method to the Austronesian languages, but the first comprehensive and extensive study on the phonological history of the Austronesian language family including a reconstruction of Proto-Austronesian lexicon was made by the German linguist Otto Dempwolff. The term Austronesian itself was coined by Wilhelm Schmidt (German "austronesisch") which comes from Latin "auster" "south wind" plus Greek "nêsos" "island". The family is aptly named, as the vast majority of Austronesian languages are spoken on islands: only a few languages, such as Malay and the Chamic languages, are indigenous to mainland Asia. Many Austronesian languages have very few speakers, but the major Austronesian languages are spoken by tens of millions of people and one Austronesian language, Malay (including Indonesian and Malaysian), is spoken by 250 million people, making it the 8th most spoken language in the world. Approximately twenty Austronesian languages are official in their respective countries (see the list of major and official Austronesian languages). QUESTIONS:

Q1:
1. When were similarities between Austronesian languages first noticed?
2. When did people first start to take note of similarities between Austronesian languages?
3. In what year were similarities between Austronesian languages first noticed?
Q2:
1. Who discovered the similarities between Austronesian languages?
2. Who first took note of the similarities between Austronesian languages?
3. Who was the first person to see points of similarity between Austronesian languages?
Q3:
1. Where are Austronesian languages spoken?
2. Where do people speak Austronesian languages?
3. In what areas are Austronesian languages active?
Q4:
1. does anyone speak Austronesian languages in Asia?
2. Are there speakers of Austronesian languages in Asia?
3. Are Austronesian languages active in Asia?
Q5:
1. How many Austronesian languages are native to Asia?
2. How many Austronesian languages are spoken on the Asian continent?
3. What is the number of Austronesian languages active in Asia?
Q6:
1. How many speakers of Austronesian languages are there?
2. How many people speak an Austronesian language?
3. What is the amount of people who speak Austronesian languages?
Q7:
1. Are Austronesian languages the largest spoken languages?
2. Do Austronesian languages have the largest amount of speakers?
3. Aer Austronesian languages the most widely spoken in the world?
Q8:
1. What are the four largest language families?
2. What are the four biggest families of languages?
3. Which language families are the four largest?
Q9:
1. How many languages does the Austronesian language family contain?
2. How many languages are in the Austronesian language family?
3. What is the number of languages contained with in the Austronesian language family?
Q10:
1. Does the Austronesian language family have the third most languages in it?
2. Does the Austronesian language family have the third highest amount of languages in it?
3. Is there the third highest amount of languages in the Austronesian language family?
Q11:
1. Where does the Austronesian language family stand in ranks of number of languages?
2. What is the ranking of the Austronesian language family in terms of number of languages in it?
3. 
