French language, alphabet and pronunciation. French is a Romance language spoken by about 354 million people.
It is the third most spoken language in Europe, after German and English, and is also spoken in parts of Africa, North America, South America, Asia and Oceania. French at a glance Native name: français [fʁ̥ɒ̃sɛ] Linguistic affliation: Indo-European, Italic, Romance, Western Romance, Gallo-Romance, Oïl Number of speakers: c. 354 million Spoken in: France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland, and many other countries First written: 842 AD Writing system: Latin script Status: official language in France, and also in Belgium, Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Canada, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Côte d'Ivoire, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Djibouti, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Guinea, Haiti, Luxembourg, Madagascar, Mali, Monaco, Niger, Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, Senegal, Seychelles, Switzerland, Togo, and Vanuatu Written French.
GCSE Bitesize - French. Learn French with free online lessons. French language. French (le français [lə fʁ̥ɒ̃sɛ] ( ) or la langue française [la lɑ̃ɡ fʁɑ̃sɛz]) is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the provinces of Quebec, Ontario and New Brunswick (Acadia region) in Canada also in Haiti, the Acadiana region of the U.S. state of Louisiana, the northern parts of the U.S. states of Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont in the New England region, and by various communities elsewhere.
Other speakers of French, who often speak it as a second language,[3] are distributed throughout many parts of the world, the largest numbers of whom reside in Francophone Africa.[4] In Africa, French is most commonly spoken in Gabon (where 80% report fluency),[4] Mauritius (78%), Algeria (75%), Senegal and Côte d'Ivoire (70%). French is estimated as having 110 million[3] native speakers and 190 million more second language speakers.[5] Geographic distribution[edit] Europe[edit]