Language
The official language of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, of which Kinshasa is the capital, is French (See: Kinshasa French vocabulary). Kinshasa is the second largest officially Francophone city in the world although Lingala is widely used as a spoken language. French is the language of street signs, posters, newspapers, government documents, schools; it dominates plays, television, and the press, and it is used in vertical relationships among people of uneven rank; people of equal rank, however, speak the Congolese languages (Kikongo, Lingala, Tshiluba or Swahili) among themselves. Thus, while the culture is dominated by the Francophonie, a complex multilingualism is present in Kinshasa.
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Famous quotes containing the word language:
“Though language forms the preacher,
‘Tis “good works” make the man.”
—Eliza Cook (1818–1889)
“Language is filled
with words for deprivation
images so familiar
it is hard to crack language open
into that other country
the country of being.”
—Susan Griffin (b. 1943)