Languages
Italian and French are the region's official languages and are used for the regional government's acts and laws, though Italian is much more widely spoken in everyday life, and French is mostly spread in cultural life. Of the population of the valley 96% speaks Italian as either a first or second language. Of the population 70% speaks French as either first or second language. School education is delivered equally in both Italian and French so that everyone who went to school in Aosta Valley can speak French at least at a medium-high level or better.
The regional language is a dialect of Franco-Provençal called Valdôtain (locally, patois). It is spoken as native tongue and as second language by 68,000 residents, about 58% of the population, according to a poll taken by the Fondation Émile Chanoux in 2002. The residents of the villages of Gressoney-Saint-Jean, Gressoney-La-Trinité and Issime, in the Lys Valley, speak two dialects of Walser German origin called Titsch and Töitschu respectively.
Read more about this topic: Aosta Valley, Culture
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