French language
French (français, French: [fʁɑ̃sɛ], or langue française, French: [lɑ̃ɡ fʁɑ̃sɛːz]) is a Romance language of the Indo-European family. It descended from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire, as did all Romance languages. French evolved from Gallo-Romance, the Latin spoken in Gaul, and more specifically in Northern Gaul. Its closest relatives are the other langues d'oïl—languages historically spoken in northern France and in southern Belgium, which French (Francien) largely supplanted. French was also influenced by native Celtic languages of Northern Roman Gaul like Gallia Belgica and by the (Germanic) Frankish language of the post-Roman Frankish invaders. Today, owing to the French colonial empire, there are numerous French-based creole languages, most notably Haitian Creole. A French-speaking person or nation may be referred to as Francophone in both English and French.
Not to be confused with Lingua franca.French
France, Belgium, Switzerland, Monaco, Francophone Africa, Canada, and other locations in the Francophonie
Signed French
(français signé)
- Algeria
- Burkina Faso
- Cambodia
- Laos
- Lebanon
- Mali
- Mauritania
- Mauritius
- Morocco
- New Hampshire (United States)
- Tunisia
- Vietnam
Académie Française (French Academy, France)
Office québécois de la langue française (Quebec Board of the French Language, Quebec)
Direction de la langue française (Belgium)
51-AAA-i
French is an official language in 28 countries and is spoken across all continents.[2] French is also the second most geographically widespread language in the world after English, with about 50 countries and territories having it as a de jure or de facto official, administrative, or cultural language.[3] Most of these countries are members of the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie (OIF), the community of 54 member states which share the official use or teaching of French. French is also one of six official languages used in the United Nations.[4] It is spoken as a first language (in descending order of the number of speakers) in France; Canada (especially in the provinces of Quebec, Ontario, and New Brunswick); Belgium (Wallonia and the Brussels-Capital Region); western Switzerland (specifically the cantons forming the Romandy region); parts of Luxembourg; parts of the United States (the states of Louisiana, Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont); Monaco; the Aosta Valley region of Italy; and various communities elsewhere.[5]
In 2015, approximately 40% of the francophone population (including L2 and partial speakers) lived in Europe, 36% in sub-Saharan Africa and the Indian Ocean, 15% in North Africa and the Middle East, 8% in the Americas, and 1% in Asia and Oceania.[6] French is the second-most widely spoken mother tongue in the European Union.[7] Of Europeans who speak other languages natively, approximately one-fifth are able to speak French as a second language.[8] French is the second-most taught foreign language in the EU. All institutions of the EU use French as a working language along with English and German; in certain institutions, French is the sole working language (e.g. at the Court of Justice of the European Union).[9] French is also the 16th most natively spoken language in the world, fifth most spoken language by total number of speakers and is on the top five of the most studied languages worldwide (with about 120 million learners as of 2017).[10] As a result of French and Belgian colonialism from the 16th century onward, French was introduced to new territories in the Americas, Africa and Asia. Most second-language speakers reside in Francophone Africa, particularly Gabon, Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Mauritius, Senegal and Ivory Coast.[11]
French is estimated to have about 76 million native speakers; about 235 million daily, fluent speakers;[12][1][13] and another 77–110 million secondary speakers who speak it as a second language to varying degrees of proficiency, mainly in Africa.[14] According to the OIF, approximately 321 million people worldwide are "able to speak the language",[15] without specifying the criteria for this estimation or whom it encompasses.[16] According to a demographic projection led by the Université Laval and the Réseau Démographie de l'Agence universitaire de la Francophonie, the total number of French speakers will reach approximately 500 million in 2025 and 650 million by 2050.[17] OIF estimates 700 million by 2050, 80% of whom will be in Africa.[6]
French has a long history as an international language of literature and scientific standards and is a primary or second language of many international organisations including the United Nations, the European Union, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the World Trade Organization, the International Olympic Committee, the General Conference on Weights and Measures, and the International Committee of the Red Cross. In 2011, Bloomberg Businessweek ranked French the third most useful language for business, after English and Standard Mandarin Chinese.[18]
Current status and importance
A leading world language, French is taught in universities around the world, and is one of the world's most influential languages because of its wide use in the worlds of journalism, jurisprudence, education, and diplomacy.[94]
In diplomacy, French is one of the six official languages of the United Nations (and one of the UN Secretariat's only two working languages[95]), one of twenty official and three procedural languages of the European Union, an official language of NATO, the International Olympic Committee, the Council of Europe, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, Organization of American States (alongside Spanish, Portuguese and English), the Eurovision Song Contest, one of eighteen official languages of the European Space Agency, World Trade Organization and the least used of the three official languages in the North American Free Trade Agreement countries. It is also a working language in nonprofit organisations such as the Red Cross (alongside English, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Arabic and Russian), Amnesty International (alongside 32 other languages of which English is the most used, followed by Spanish, Portuguese, German, and Italian), Médecins sans Frontières (used alongside English, Spanish, Portuguese and Arabic), and Médecins du Monde (used alongside English).[96] Given the demographic prospects of the French-speaking nations of Africa, researcher Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry wrote in 2014 that French "could be the language of the future".[97]
Significant as a judicial language, French is one of the official languages of such major international and regional courts, tribunals, and dispute-settlement bodies as the African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights, the Caribbean Court of Justice, the Court of Justice for the Economic Community of West African States, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, the International Court of Justice, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea the International Criminal Court and the World Trade Organization Appellate Body. It is the sole internal working language of the Court of Justice of the European Union, and makes with English the European Court of Human Rights's two working languages.[98]
In 1997, George Weber published, in Language Today, a comprehensive academic study entitled "The World's 10 most influential languages".[99] In the article, Weber ranked French as, after English, the second-most influential language of the world, ahead of Spanish.[99] His criteria were the numbers of native speakers, the number of secondary speakers (especially high for French among fellow world languages), the number of countries using the language and their respective populations, the economic power of the countries using the language, the number of major areas in which the language is used, and the linguistic prestige associated with the mastery of the language (Weber highlighted that French in particular enjoys considerable linguistic prestige).[99] In a 2008 reassessment of his article, Weber concluded that his findings were still correct since "the situation among the top ten remains unchanged."[99]
Knowledge of French is often considered to be a useful skill by business owners in the United Kingdom; a 2014 study found that 50% of British managers considered French to be a valuable asset for their business, thus ranking French as the most sought-after foreign language there, ahead of German (49%) and Spanish (44%).[100] MIT economist Albert Saiz calculated a 2.3% premium for those who have French as a foreign language in the workplace.[101]
In English-speaking Canada, the United Kingdom, and Ireland, French is the first foreign language taught and in number of pupils is far ahead of other languages. In the United States, French is the second-most commonly taught foreign language in schools and universities, although well behind Spanish. In some areas of the country near French-speaking Quebec, however, it is the foreign language more commonly taught.
Vowel phonemes in French
Although there are many French regional accents, foreign learners normally use only one variety of the language.
French pronunciation follows strict rules based on spelling, but French spelling is often based more on history than phonology. The rules for pronunciation vary between dialects, but the standard rules are: