Afroasiatic Languages

Afroasiatic Languages

Afroasiatic (alternatively Afro-Asiatic), also known as Hamito-Semitic (Chamito-Semitic), is a large language family, including 300 or so living languages.

Afroasiatic languages are spoken predominantly in the Middle East, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, and parts of the Sahel. More than 300 million people speak an Afroasiatic language.

The most widely spoken Afroasiatic language is Arabic (including all its colloquial varieties), with 230 million native speakers, spoken mostly in the Middle East and North Africa. Berber languages are spoken in Morocco, Algeria, Libya and across the rest of North Africa and the Sahara Desert by about 25 to 35 million people. Other widely spoken Afroasiatic languages are Hausa, the dominant language of northern Nigeria and southern Niger, spoken as a first language by 25 million people and used as a lingua franca by another 20 million across the Sahel; Amharic and Oromo of Ethiopia, with 25 million speakers apiece; Somali, spoken by 15 million people in Greater Somalia; and Modern Hebrew, spoken by about seven million people worldwide. In addition to languages spoken today, Afroasiatic includes several important ancient languages, such as Ancient Egyptian, Akkadian and Biblical Hebrew.