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e. A man from Labé, Guinea, speaking Pular and West African French. African French ( French: français africain) is the generic name of the varieties of the French language spoken by an estimated 167 million people in Africa in 2023 or 51% of the French-speaking population of the world [6] [7] [8] spread across 34 countries and territories.
French is an official language in 32 independent nations which is the second most geographically widespread official language in the world after English.French is also the second most geographically widespread language in the world after English, with about 60 countries and territories having it as a de jure or de facto official, administrative, or cultural language.
The French language became an international language, the second international language alongside Latin, in the Middle Ages, "from the fourteenth century onwards".It was not by virtue of the power of the Kingdom of France: '"... until the end of the fifteenth century, the French of the chancellery spread as a political and literary language because the French court was the model of chivalric ...
Madagascar, [a] officially the Republic of Madagascar [b] and the Fourth Republic of Madagascar, is an island country comprising the island of Madagascar and numerous smaller peripheral islands. Lying off the southeastern coast of Africa, it is the world's fourth largest island, the second-largest island country and the 46th largest country in ...
Major Horn of Africa languages are Somali, Amharic and Oromo. Lingala is important in Central Africa. Important South African languages are Sotho, Tswana, Pedi, Venda, Tsonga, Swazi, Southern Ndebele, Zulu, Xhosa and Afrikaans. [36] French, English, and Portuguese are important languages in Africa due to colonialism.
French Equatorial Africa. Chad (1900–1960) Oubangui-Chari (currently Central African Republic) (1905–1960) Dar al Kuti (protectorate) (1897) (in 1912 its sultanate was suppressed by the French) Sultanate of Bangassou (protectorate) (1894) Present-day The Republic of Congo, then French Congo (1875–1960)
In international relations, Françafrique ( French pronunciation: [fʁɑ̃safʁik]) is France's sphere of influence (or pré carré in French, meaning 'backyard') over former French and (also French-speaking) Belgian colonies in sub-Saharan Africa. [9] The term was derived from the expression France-Afrique, which was used by the first ...
French is still a lingua franca in most Western and Central African countries and an official language of many, a remnant of French and Belgian colonialism. These African countries and others are members of the Francophonie. French is the official language of the Universal Postal Union, with English added as a working language in 1994.