#frenchcountries

28 days

Finally got my plane ticket

So I'm officially going to Paris, no doubt about it.

Boo-yah ;)

This post I'm going to take a break from food. Just for a moment.

Because with my love for food, and the French's love for food, I can spend the rest of my countdown LITERALLY TALKING ABOUT ALL OF THEIR FOOD.

But let's talk about all the places that speak le français!

les pays francophones - french speaking countries

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7b/Map-Francophonie_organisation_2012-fr.svg

Did you know there are over 220 MILLION FRENCH SPEAKERS IN THE WORLD?! (First & Second language)

Bet you thought only France & Canada speak French. 

THINK AGAIN!

-French is the official language of 29 countries

-There are 75 million native speakers

-As of 2010, French is the 11th most spoken language in the world

-French is an official language of the United Nations

-Francophone=french speaker

-French comes from the Indo-European Language Family, descending from Latin and is considered a Romance language (related to Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, Romanian, and more). However, French was also influenced by native Celtic languages and Germanic Frankish languages. 

-France has the French Overseas Departments and Territories, or départements et territoires d'outre-mer aka DOM/TOM. Just as the U.S. owns territories (Puerto Rico, The Virgin Islands, Guam, etc.), so does France! Some of those places being Martinique, Guadeloupe, and Wallis & Futuna.

Where French is officially spoken (as the official or one of the official languages) 

European Union

France

Belgium

Switzerland (western part)

Luxembourg

Monaco

Italy (only in a small region, Aosta Valley, Italy)

French is the 4th most widely spoken language in the European Union. However, in the photo below, it's showing the knowledge of French across the EU, not necessarily it's official status as a language. All the black and some of the deep blue have French as an official language.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3b/Knowledge_of_French_EU_map.svg

The Americas

North America

Canada (Québec)

Louisiana, U.S.A.

Caribbean + South America 

French Guiana

Guadeloupe

Haiti

Martinique

Saint Barthélemy

Saint Martin

Saint Pierre & Miquelon

Africa (some countries French is official, others is just widely spoken)

Algeria

Benin

Burkina Faso

Burundi

Cameroon

Central African Republic

Chad

Comoros

Congo, Republic of

Côte d'Ivoire/Ivory Coast

Democratic Republic of Congo

Dijibouti

Equatorial Guinea

Gabon

Guinea

Madagascar

Mali

Mauritania

Mauritius

Morocco

Niger

Réunion

Rwanda

Senegal

Seychelles

Togo

Tunisia

Oceania + Antartica

French Polynesia

French Southern and Antarctic Lands 

Wallis and Futuna

-Just like with English (and any other language for that matter), French also have a vaaaast amount of dialects. In English, we have New Yorker, Southern, British, Australian, Scottish - it goes on! Well, so do the French, with Parisian French, Canadian, Creole, Haitian, Senegalese, etc.! If you're interested more in the dialects, check this link out:

http://french.about.com/od/dialects/French_Dialects_Patois_and_Regional_Languages.htm

It just became a frenchier world...

& of course, if you're interested more in the global presence of French...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_language

http://www.worldatlas.com/french.htm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_where_French_is_an_official_language

http://french.about.com/od/francophonie/ss/whatisfrench_2.htm