There are over 525 native languages spoken in Nigeria.[1][2][3] The official language and most widely spoken lingua franca is English,[4][5] which was the language of Colonial Nigeria. Nigerian Pidgin – an English-based creole – is spoken by over 60 million people.[5][6]
The major native languages, in terms of population, are Hausa (over 80 million when including second-language, or L2, speakers), Yoruba (over 54 million, including L2 speakers), Igbo (over 42 million, including L2 speakers), Efik-Ibibio cluster (over 15 million), Fulfulde (13 million), Kanuri (5 million), Tiv (5 million), Nupe (3 million) and approximately 2 to 3 million each of Karai-Karai Kupa, Kakanda, Edo, Igala, Idoma and Izon.[7] Nigeria's linguistic diversity is a microcosm of much of Africa as a whole, and the country contains languages from the three major African language families: Afroasiatic, Nilo-Saharan and Niger–Congo. Nigeria also has several as-yet unclassified languages, such as Centúúm, which may represent a relic of an even greater diversity prior to the spread of the current language families.[8]
^"Language data for Nigeria". Translators without Borders. Retrieved 2022-12-12.
^"Nigeria". Ethnologue. Retrieved 2017-07-14.
^Blench, Roger (2014). An Atlas Of Nigerian Languages. Oxford: Kay Williamson Educational Foundation.
^"Language data for Nigeria". Translators without Borders. Retrieved 2022-12-12.
^ ab"Nigeria: languages by number of speakers 2021". Statista. Retrieved 2023-02-24.
^"Africa: Nigeria". The World Factbook. Central Intelligence Agency. Retrieved 2020-06-21.
native languages spoken in Nigeria. The official language and most widely spoken lingua franca is English, which was the languageof Colonial Nigeria. Nigerian...
of ethnic groups in Nigeria. "Africa: Nigeria". The World Factbook. Central Intelligence Agency. Retrieved 2020-06-21. "Top 10 Most Spoken Languages in...
Nigerian Pidgin, also known as Naija or Naijá in scholarship, is an English-based creole language spoken as a lingua franca across Nigeria. The language...
widely spoken of the three main languages spoken in Nigeria. With the majority ofNigeria's populace in the rural areas, the major languagesof communication...
of Hausa speakers to an estimated 88 million. In Nigeria, the Hausa film industry is known as Kannywood. Hausa belongs to the West Chadic languages subgroup...
is a language that is spoken in West Africa, primarily in Southwestern and Central Nigeria. It is spoken by the ethnic Yoruba people. The number of Yoruba...
sign language varieties of ASL in countries other than the US and Canada, languages based on ASL with substratum influence from local sign languages, and...
counts at over 3,000. Nigeria alone has over 500 languages (according to SIL Ethnologue), one of the greatest concentrations of linguistic diversity in...
Kirdi of northern Cameroon and northeastern Nigeria. Several names are applied to the language, just as to the Fula people. They call their language Pulaar...
Chadic languagesof the Afro-Asiatic family are spoken principally in Niger and Nigeria. They include Hausa, the most populous Chadic language and a major...
widely used Nigerianlanguages. Nigerian Pidgin is used widely as an unofficial medium of communication, especially in the Nigerian cities of Warri, Sapele...
Izon languages (/ˈiːdʒɔː/), otherwise known as the Ịjọ languages, are the languages spoken by the Izon people in southern Nigeria. The Ijo languages were...
The Ekoid languages are a dialect cluster of Southern Bantoid languages spoken principally in southeastern Nigeria and in adjacent regions of Cameroon...
languages (pronounced [ɡ͡bè]) form a cluster of about twenty related languages stretching across the area between eastern Ghana and western Nigeria....
the largest of the Tivoid languages, a group oflanguages belonging to the Southern Bantoid languages Tiv is widely spoken in the States of Benue, Nasarawa...
language in the Gbe languages group. It is spoken by the Ogu people in Benin, as well as in south-western Nigeria. Gun is part of the Fon cluster of languages...
The South Bauchi languages (also called the B.3 West Chadic or Barawa languages) are a branch of West Chadic languages that are spoken in Bauchi State...
and in other parts ofNigeria. Edo is an Edoid language. This languages are also spoken in Rivers State and Bayelsa State, Nigeria. There are seven vowels...
Ibibio is the native languageof the Ibibio people ofNigeria, belonging to the Ibibio-Efik dialect cluster of the Cross River languages. The name Ibibio...
native language cluster of the Igbo people, an ancient ethnicity in the Southeastern part ofNigeria. Igbo Languages are spoken by a total of 45 million...
classified in the same zone.[citation needed] Nigeria is made up of approximately 400 ethnic groups and 450 languages. There was a need for the government to...
indigenous languages outside their own indigenous language. Nigeria portal British Nigerian Demographics ofNigeriaNigerian Americans List ofNigerians "The...
native languages in Nigeria, there are many titles for traditional rulers. In the northern Muslim states, Emir is commonly used in the English language, but...
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