Editing Corsican language (section)

== Number of speakers ==
The situation of Corsican with regard to French as the country's [[national language]] is analogous to that of many other French regions and provinces, which have or used to have a traditional language of their own, even though the islanders' switch from their local idiom to [[Varieties of French|regional French]] has happened relatively later and the presence of Corsican, albeit declining, is still strongly felt among the population.<ref>{{Harvnb|Dalbera-Stefanaggi|2002|p=17}}: "Dans l'ensemble, la situation est donc comparable à celle de bon nombre de provinces françaises, avec sans doute un retard dans l'application de la dernière étape, c'est-à-dire le passage du dialect au français régional: la conservation du dialecte, en Corse, est en effet un fait d'évidence, même si la régression est égalment évidente."</ref> In 1980, about 70 percent of the island's population "had some command of the Corsican language."<ref>{{cite web|title=Corsican language use survey|url=http://www.uoc.es/euromosaic/web/homean/index1.html|publisher=Euromosaic|access-date=2008-06-13}} To find this statement and the supporting data click on List by languages, Corsican, Corsican language use survey and look under ''INTRODUCTION''.</ref> In 1990, out of a total population of about 254,000, the percentage had declined to 50 percent, with 10 percent of the island's residents using it as a first language.<ref name=cif/> The language appeared to be in serious decline when the French government reversed its unsupportive stand and initiated some strong measures to save it.

The January 2007 estimated population of Corsica was 281,000, whereas the figure for the March 1999 census, when most of the studies—though not the linguistic survey work referenced in this article—were performed, was about 261,000. Only a fraction of the population at either time spoke Corsican with any fluency.

According to an official survey run on behalf of the [[Territorial Collectivity of Corsica]] which took place in April 2013, in Corsica, the Corsican language had a number of speakers between 86,800 and 130,200, out of a total population amounting to 309,693 inhabitants.<ref name=inch>{{cite web|title=Inchiesta sociolinguistica nant'à a lingua corsa|url=http://www.corse.fr/linguacorsa/Inchiesta-sociolinguistica-nant-a-a-lingua-corsa_a123.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150401174800/http://www.corse.fr/linguacorsa/Inchiesta-sociolinguistica-nant-a-a-lingua-corsa_a123.html |archive-date=2015-04-01 |publisher=Collectivité territoriale de Corse |access-date=4 December 2014|language=co}}</ref> 28% of the overall population was able to speak Corsican well, while an additional 14% had a capacity to speak it "quite well." The percentage of those who had a solid oral understanding of the language varies between a minimum of 25 percent in the 25–34 age group and the maximum of 65 percent in the over-65 age group: almost a quarter of the former age group reported that they were not able to understand Corsican, while only a small minority of the older people did not understand it.<ref name=inch/> While 32 percent of the population of Northern Corsica was reported to speak Corsican quite well, this percentage dropped to 22 percent for Southern Corsica.<ref name=inch/> Moreover, 10 percent of the population of Corsica spoke only French, while 62 percent [[code-switch]]ed between French and at least some Corsican.<ref name=inch/> 8 percent of the Corsicans knew how to write correctly in Corsican, while about 60 percent of the population did not know how to write in Corsican.<ref name=inch/> While 90 percent of the population was in favor of a Corsican-French bilingualism, 3 percent would have liked to have only Corsican as the official language in the island, and 7 percent would have preferred French to have this role.<ref name=inch/>

[[UNESCO]] classifies Corsican as a "definitely endangered language."<ref>{{Cite book |editor-last=Moseley |editor-first=Christopher |date=2010 |title=Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger |edition=3rd |location=Paris |publisher=UNESCO Publishing}}</ref> The Corsican language is a key vehicle for Corsican culture, which is notably rich in [[proverb]]s and in [[polyphony|polyphonic]] song.