Editing Svan language (section)

==Distribution==
Svan is the native language of fewer than 30,000 [[Svan people|Svans]] (15,000 of whom are Upper Svan dialect speakers and 12,000 are Lower Svan), living in the mountains of [[Svaneti]], i.e. in the districts of [[Mestia]] and [[Lentekhi]] of Georgia, along the [[Enguri River|Enguri]], [[Tskhenistsqali]] and [[Kodori River|Kodori]] rivers. Some Svan speakers live in the [[Kodori Valley]] of the de facto independent republic of [[Abkhazia]]. Although conditions there make it difficult to reliably establish their numbers, there are only an estimated 2,500 Svan individuals living there.<ref name="DoBeS">[http://www.mpi.nl/DOBES/projects/svan DoBeS (<u>Do</u>kumentation <u>Be</u>drohter <u>S</u>prachen, Documentation of Endangered Languages)]</ref>

The language is used in familiar and casual social communication. It has no written standard or official status.<ref>{{Cite book|chapter-url= https://brill.com/view/title/33702 |title=Endangered Languages of the Caucasus and Beyond |chapter= Language and emergent literacy in Svaneti |pages=226–243|last=Tuite|first=Kevin|date=2017|location=Montréal|publisher=Brill|isbn=978-90-04-32564-7|editor-last1= Korkmaz | editor-first1= Ramazan |editor-last2= Doğan | editor-first2= Gürkan}}</ref> Most speakers also speak [[Georgian language|Georgian]]. The language is considered endangered, as proficiency in it among young people is limited.