French (language)

French
français
Pronunciation	[fʁɑ̃sɛ]
Native to	France, now worldwide (See geographical distribution below)
Native speakers	80 million (2016) 274 million total speakers (2014)
Language family	Indo-European Italic Romance Western Romance Gallo-Romance Oïl French
Early forms	Old French Middle French French
Writing system	Latin (French alphabet) French Braille
Signed forms	Signed French (français signé)
Official status
Official language in	29 countries  Belgium  Benin  Burkina Faso  Burundi  Cameroon  Canada  Central African Republic  Chad  Comoros  Ivory Coast  Democratic Republic of the Congo  Djibouti  Equatorial Guinea  France  Gabon  Guinea  Haiti  Luxembourg  Madagascar  Mali  Monaco  Niger  Republic of the Congo  Rwanda  Senegal  Seychelles   Switzerland  Togo  Vanuatu Administrative/cultural  Algeria  Cambodia  Laos  Lebanon  Morocco  Mauritius  Mauritania  Tunisia 15 dependent entities  Aosta Valley (Italy)  French Guiana  French Polynesia  Guadeloupe  Jersey (United Kingdom)  Louisiana (United States)  Maine (United States)  Martinique  Mayotte  New Caledonia  Réunion  Saint Barthélemy  Saint Martin  Saint Pierre and Miquelon  Wallis and Futuna Numerous international organisations
Regulated by	Académie française (French Academy)
Language codes
ISO 639-1	fr
ISO 639-2	(B)  (T)
ISO 639-3
Glottolog	stan1290
Linguasphere	51-AAA-i
Regions where French is the main language   Regions where it is an official language   Regions where it is a second language   Regions where it is a minority language
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French (le français [lə fʁɑ̃sɛ] or la langue française [la lɑ̃ɡ fʁɑ̃sɛz]) is a Romance language of the Indo-European family. It descended from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire, as all Romance languages. French has evolved from Gallo-Romance, the spoken Latin 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) has 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 France's past overseas expansion, 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.

French is an official language in 29 countries, most of which are members of la francophonie, the community of French-speaking countries. It is spoken as a first language (in descending order of the highest number) in France, the Canadian province of Quebec, the region of Wallonia in Belgium, western Switzerland, Monaco, certain other regions of Canada and the United States, and by various communities elsewhere. As of 2015, 40% of the francophone population (including L2 and partial speakers) is in Europe, 35% in sub-Saharan Africa, 15% in North Africa and the Middle East, 8% in the Americas, and 1% in Asia and Oceania.