Languages of Chad
Chad has two official languages, Arabic and French, and over 120 indigenous languages. A vernacular version of Arabic, Chadian Arabic, is a lingua franca and the language of commerce, spoken by 40–60% of the population. The two official languages have fewer speakers than Chadian Arabic. Standard Arabic is spoken by around 615,000 speakers. French is widely spoken in the main cities such as N'Djamena and by most men in the south of the country. Most schooling is in French. The language with the most first-language speakers is probably Ngambay, with around one million speakers.
| Languages of Chad | |
|---|---|
Signage in Arabic and French at the University of N'Djamena | |
| Official | Arabic, French |
| Indigenous | Chadic languages, Nilo-Saharan languages, Adamawa languages |
| Vernacular | Français populaire africain, Chadian Arabic |
| Foreign | English |
| Signed | Nigerian Sign Language |
| Keyboard layout | French AZERTY |
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Chad submitted an application to join the Arab League as a member state on 25 March 2014, which is still pending.
Chadian Sign Language is a variant of Nigerian Sign Language, a dialect of American Sign Language; Andrew Foster introduced ASL in the 1960s, and Chadian teachers for the deaf train in Nigeria.