Editing Languages of Gabon (section)

{{Short description|none}} <!-- "none" is preferred when the title is sufficiently descriptive; see [[WP:SDNONE]] -->
{{Languages of
|country = Gabon
|image=Musee National Libreville 1.JPG
|caption=Sign in [[French Language|French]] at the Musée National in [[Libreville]]
|official =[[French Language|French]]
|unofficial=[[Fang language|Fang]], [[Mbete language|Mbete]], [[Myene language|Myene]], [[Nzebi language|Nzebi]]
|indigenous =  [[Baka language|Baka]], many [[Bantu languages]]
|foreign = [[English language|English]], Portuguese, Spanish
|sign =  [[Francophone African Sign Language]]
 |keyboard       =French [[AZERTY]]
 |keyboard image = [[File:KB France.svg|200px]]
}}

French is the official language in [[Gabon]], spoken natively in large metropolitan areas and in total by 320,000 people or 14% of the country.<ref>{{Cite web |website=Ethnologue |date=September 8, 2024 |title=French |url=https://www.ethnologue.com/language/fra/}}</ref> 32% of the people speak [[Fang language|Fang]] as a mother tongue.<ref name="ulaval">
{{cite web
 |last=Ouellon 
 |first=Conrad 
 |title=Gabon 
 |language=fr 
 |url=http://www.tlfq.ulaval.ca/axl/afrique/gabon.htm 
 |access-date=2012-11-19 
 |url-status=dead 
 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100529221022/http://www.tlfq.ulaval.ca/axl/afrique/gabon.htm 
 |archive-date=2010-05-29 
}}</ref> 
French is the medium of instruction. Before [[World War II]] very few [[Gabonese people|Gabonese]] learned [[French language|French]], nearly all of them working in either business or government administration. After the war, [[France]] worked for universal primary education in [[Gabon]], and by the 1960-61 census, 47% of the [[Gabonese people|Gabonese]] over the age of 14 spoke some [[French language|French]], while 13% were literate in the language. By the 1990s, the literacy rate had risen to about 60%.

Gabon is a [[Francophone]] country, where, as of 2024, 1.683 million (66.3%) out of 2.539 million people speak French.<ref name="ODSEF">{{cite web| url=https://www.outils-odsef-fss.ulaval.ca/francoscope/ |title=Accueil-Francoscope |department=ODSEF (Observatoire démographique et statistique de l'espace francophone de l'[[Université Laval]]) |language=fr |agency=[[Organisation internationale de la Francophonie]] |location=[[Laval, Quebec|Laval]], [[Quebec|Québec]]}}</ref>

It is estimated that 80%<ref name="2007_report">{{in lang|fr}} [https://www.amazon.fr/dp/2098821778 ''La Francophonie dans le monde 2006-2007''] published by the [[Organisation internationale de la Francophonie]]. [[Nathan (publisher)|Nathan]], [[Paris]], 2007</ref> of the country's population can speak the language competently and one-third of residents of [[Libreville]], the capital city, had become native French speakers.<ref name = "ulaval"/> 

Across major metropolitan areas, French is increasingly being spoken as a native language as well.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Hugues Steve Ndinga-Koumba-Binza |first=Hugues Steve Ndinga-Koumba-Binza |date=August 2011 |title=From foreign to national: a review of the status of French in Gabon |url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/267327159_From_foreign_to_national_a_review_of_the_status_of_French_in_Gabon}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Ursula Reutner |first=Ursula Reutner |title=Gabon |url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/376319724_Gabon}}</ref> 

More than 10,000 [[French people]] live in [[Gabon]], and [[France]] predominates the country's foreign cultural and commercial influences. Outside the capital, French is less commonly spoken, though it is used by those who have completed a secondary or university education.

The indigenous languages are all members of the [[Bantu languages|Bantu]] family, estimated to have come to [[Gabon]] about 2,000 years ago, and differentiated into about 40 languages. They are generally spoken but not written; while missionaries from the [[United States]] and [[France]] developed transcriptions for a number of languages based on the [[Latin alphabet]] starting in the 1840s, and translated the [[Bible]] into several of them, French colonial policy officially promoted the study of French and discouraged African languages. The languages continue to be transmitted through family and clan, and individuals in cities and other areas where different people may learn several Bantu languages.

The Gabonese government sponsored research on the Bantu languages starting in the 1970s.

The three largest languages are [[Fang language|Fang]], [[Mbere language|Mbere]], and [[Sira language|Sira]] (Eshira), each with about 25–30% of the speakers. The remainder of the languages (including [[Teke languages|Teke]], [[Vili language|Vili]], [[Punu language|Punu]], [[Myene language|Myene]] and [[Kota language (Gabon)|Kota]]) are single-digit percentages, and some have only a few thousand speakers.

Education for the deaf in [[Gabon]] uses [[American Sign Language]], introduced by the deaf American missionary [[Andrew Foster (educator)|Andrew Foster]].  (See [[Francophone African Sign Language]].)