How many Americans know French? Who are they? We answer these and related questions in this post.
Roughly speaking,
1.6 million Americans age 5+ speak French at home. Six times as many adults (age 18+), about
10 million, can converse in French, and comprise 4.4 percent of US adults. In
contrast, in the UK, a fraction twice as large, about 9% of adults (age 15+) have more than basic French skills. In France, about 20 percent of adults (age 15+), and 33 percent of those ages 15-29 have more than basic English skills.
In America, over 13 million people report their dominant ancestry as French. About HALF as many
Canadians, 6.6 million, speak French at home, 91% resident in Québéc. About 3 million Québécois, some 41%, are bilingual. The
population of metropolitan France is 63 million, about five times as numerous as nominal Franco-Americans.
<big><big>French surnames - provincial per capita densities</big></big>
The continuing advance of English has
academic fallout. Only 44% of US high school students and less than 8% of US university undergrads study foreign languages. The fraction of
European Union high school students who study a foreign language is 48% in the UK, 81% in Ireland and 96% to 100% in other nations.
In the US, French is spoken mainly by the Louisiana Creole, native French, Cajun, Haitian, and French-Canadian populations. French is the second de facto language in the US state of Louisiana (where the French dialect of Cajun/Creole predominates). The largest [at-home] French-speaking communities in the United States reside in Northeast Maine; Hollywood and Miami, Florida; New York City; certain areas of rural Louisiana; and small minorities in Vermont and New Hampshire. Among US adults who can
converse in French, WOMEN OUTNUMBER MEN ALMOST (23/12) TWO TO ONE. The proportion of Americans who speak French as a second language increases with advanced education
<big><big>US regions where French is spoken at home</big></big>
<table width="435" align="center"><tr><td>At-home French language distribution in the United States. Counties and parishes marked in yellow are those where 6% to 12% of the population speak French at home; brown, 12% to 18%; red, over 18%. Cajun French and French-based creole languages are not included even though the Creole dialects are spoken throughout the U.S. and taught in many U.S. schools.</td></tr></table>