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French

French

Summary

French is natively spoken by approximately 105 million people worldwide, primarily in France, Canada, Belgium, Switzerland, and parts of Africa and the Caribbean. It is a cornerstone of French cultural identity, renowned for its literature, cuisine, fashion, and art. Written in the Latin alphabet, French grammar features a subject-verb-object (SVO) word order, gendered nouns, and a system of verb conjugations that indicate tense, mood, and aspect.

Stats

  • Language Family: Indo-European

  • Writing System: Latin

  • Writing System Type: Alphabet

  • Writing Direction: L to R

  • Tones / Pitch Accent: N

  • Morphology: Partially Analytic

  • Cases: 0

  • Grammatical Gender / Noun Class: 2

  • Number of Verb Tenses: 16

  • Word Order: SVO

  • Number of Vowels (Monophthongs): 14

  • Number of Consonants: 20

Areas Where Spoken

  • Belgium (official) (41.1%) (4.87 mil)

  • Benin (official) (0.8%) (107 k)

  • Burkina Faso (official) (1.3%) (295 k)

  • Burundi (official) (0.3%) (39 k)

  • Cameroon (official) (3.0%) (837 k)

  • Canada (official) (22.0%) (8.57 mil)

  • Central African Republic (official) (7.5%) (418 k)

  • Chad (official) (2.3%) (408 k)

  • Comoros (official) (12.9%) (108 k)

  • Democratic Republic of the Congo (official) (12.0%) (11.9 mil)

  • Djibouti (official) (1.8%) (20 k)

  • Equatorial Guinea (official) (2.4%) (40 k)

  • France (official) (93.6%) (63.6 mil)

  • French Guiana (France) (official) (30.7%) (91 k)

  • French Polynesia (France) (official) (61.1%) (187 k)

  • Gabon (official) (4.0%) (96 k)

  • Guinea (official) (2.1%) (291 k)

  • Guadeloupe (France) (official) (20.0%) (76 k)

  • Haiti (official) (42.0%) (4.87 mil)

  • Ivory Coast (official) (2.1%) (591 k)

  • Luxembourg (official) (4.2%) (27 k)

  • Madagascar (official) (2.3%) (681 k)

  • Mali (official) (6.4%) (1.45 mil)

  • Martinique (France) (official) (80.0%) (280 k)

  • Mauritius (de facto official) (4.1%) (52 k)

  • Mayotte (France) (official) (20.3%) (65 k)

  • Monaco (official) (41.9%) (15 k)

  • Niger (official) (1.1%) (288 k)

  • New Caledonia (France) (official) (34.3%) (92 k)

  • Réunion (France) (official) (0.7%) (6 k)

  • Rwanda (official) (0.1%) (14 k)

  • Saint Barthelemy (France) (Official) (80.0%) (9 k)

  • Saint Martin (France) (official) (9.0%) (3 k)

  • Senegal (official) (1.4%) (242 k)

  • Seychelles (official) (0.7%) (900)

  • Switzerland (official) (21.3%) (1.87 mil)

  • Togo (official) (7.2%) (637 k)

  • Tunisia (16.0%) (1.98 mil)

  • Vanuatu (official) (0.6%) (2 k)

  • Wallis and Futuna (France) (official) (10.8%) (1 k)

Resources

Books

Grammar

Movies / TV Shows

Music

Reading Practice

Pronunciation

Websites

  • FrancaisFacile: French young children use this website to learn French

(French version https://www.francaisfacile.com// English version https://www.tolearnfrench.com/

Videos

YouTube Channels for Fun

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