French is still the 5th most spoken language – after English, Chinese, Hindi and Spanish – and the second most taught foreign language in the world. This is the result of the new report on the French language published by the International Organization of La Francophonie (OIF).
This Sunday, March 20, is International Francophone Day, an opportunity to take stock of the situation of the French language in the world, following the publication of the new OIF report, published by the Galllimard editions, which prepares a four-year the state of the Frencha language in progress in the number of speakers, according to its author.
Alexandre Wolff, head of the French Language Observatory, noted some strong points in this report. , we are now 321 million French speakers, the fifth most spoken language, the fourth language on the Internet, it is still a very important language in the field of cultural and creative industries.
No conflict between French and national languages Alexandre Wolff talks about the Senegalese authorMbougar Sarr [révélé en 1994 par le prixRFI Stéphane Hessel de la Jeune écriture francophone, NDLR]Prix Goncourt 2021, “Senegalese who writes in French who also speaks Wolof perfectly and who is inspired by his roots and his culture; this is how the French language manifests its power.
Today, 60% of the daily French speakers are on the African continent and they speak several languages, so there is no conflict or competition between French and the national languages, but each one contributes to the citizen being able to develop, do business, travel, go on internet, get information, get educated and that is what makes the strength of francophony.
The majority of French speakers in Africa use the language daily, the OIF report points out. And it is the area of the sub-Saharan Africa-Indian Ocean that has shown the largest increase in French since 2018 by + 15%. The future of the French language on this continent nevertheless continues to depend on certain conditions linked in particular to education in the countries of the South, where it is the language of instruction for almost 75 million pupils and students.
