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Pages in category "Languages of the Democratic Republic of the Congo" The following 163 pages are in this category, out of 163 total. This list may not reflect recent changes .
Four other languages, all of them Bantu based, have the status of national language: Kikongo-Kituba, Lingala, Swahili and Tshiluba. Democratic Republic of the Congo is a Francophone country, where, as of 2024, 55.393 million (50.69%) out of 109.276 million people speak French [2] and 74% report using French as a lingua franca. [3]
Kongo was the earliest Bantu language to be written in Latin characters. Portuguese created a dictionary in Kongo, the first of any Bantu language. A catechism was produced under the authority of Diogo Gomes, who was born in 1557 in Kongo to Portuguese parents and became a Jesuit priest. No version of that survives today.
Other languages are mainly Bantu languages, and the two national languages in the country are Kituba and Lingala, [1] followed by Kongo languages, Téké languages, and more than forty other languages, including languages spoken by Pygmies, which are not Bantu languages. Republic of Congo is a Francophone country, and in 2024, French is spoken ...
The most populous dialect, and the one most widely understood, is called Medje. Others are Aberu (Nabulu), Makere, Malele, Popoi (Mapopoi). The most divergent is Lombi; Ethnologue treats it as a distinct language. About half of the population speaks Bangala, a trade language similar to Lingala, and in southern areas some speak Swahili.
Christine Ahmed (1995) classifies the small "Bangubangu of Mutingua" apart from the rest, with the Luba rather than Hemba languages; this is presumably a Hombo dialect. One of the earliest scholars to study Bangubangu was A. E. Meeussen, who wrote a brief description of the grammar of the language as a result of a visit to the area in 1951. [3]
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West Teke is a Bantu language spoken in the Republic of Congo and Gabon. West Teke is a dialect continuum. The varieties are Tsaayi (Ge-Tsaya, Tyaye, Tsayi), Laali, Yaa (Yaka), and Tyee (Tee, Kwe). The dominant variety by far is Tsaayi.