Languages

Should national languages (in comparison to international languages such as English, French and Portuguese) be taken into account while carrying out strategic thinking and activities relating to regional integration? This chapter of the Atlas on Regional Integration in West Africa intends to contribute to the debate on this issue.

To that end, we have collected the best available data in order to provide a picture of the major language areas. The limitations of this exercise lie in the fact that West Africa is a region of extreme mobility. Due to old and contemporary migration [1], rapid urbanisation, as well as movements from vulnerable rural areas to other rural areas with greater potential, this region is constantly recomposing itself and thus it is difficult to present all the local subtleties at the macro-regional level.

The key issue we are addressing is that of areas within which population groups are able to understand each other (intercomprehension).

The first step in this approach consists of identifying, within language families [2], the language groups, and then the languages; each language being composed of several dialects. A dialect is a local variety of the same language. When a language is geographically widespread, dialects at the opposite extremes of its geographical area can vary considerably. In such cases, we speak of a language continuum. The second step consists of identifying the lingua franca or common languages known to be used as second language outside their homes. While this definition is clear, the list of lingua franca is always a subject of debate. Subsequent editions of this chapter of the Atlas will include additional information or aspects for discussion on this issue.

Regarding the classification and number of speakers, we refer to the works of Raymond Gordon of the Summer Institute of Linguistics of the University of Dallas (USA). The Department of African Studies of the University of Vienna (Austria) has contributed to studies on West African languages, under the supervision of Mr. Georg Ziegelmeyer, with the support of Erwin Ebermann and Habiboulah Bakhoum.