Languages of Algeria
, particularly the Algerian Arabic dialect, is the most widely spoken language in Algeria, but a number of regional and foreign languages are also spoken. The official languages of Algeria are Arabic and Berber, as specified in its constitution since 1963 for the former and since 2016 for the latter. Berber has been recognized as a "national language" by constitutional amendment since 8 May 2002. In February 2016, a constitutional resolution was passed making Berber an official language alongside Arabic. Arabic is spoken by about 81% of Algerians, while Berber languages are spoken by 17%. French, though it has no official status, is still used in media and education due to Algeria's colonial history. Kabyle, with 3 million speakers, is the most spoken Berber language in the country, is taught and partially co-official in parts of Kabylie.
The 1966 Algerian census, the last to include a question about the mother tongue, showed that 81.5% of the population spoke Arabic as a native language, with about half of the Berber population also speaking it as a second language, while 17.9% spoke Berber languages natively.
Malika Rebai Maamri, author of "The Syndrome of the French Language in Algeria," said "The language spoken at home and in the street remains a mixture of Algerian dialect and French words." Due to the number of languages and complexity involving those languages, Maamri argued that "oday the linguistic situation in Algeria is dominated by multiple discourses and positions."
Currently spoken languages
Arabic
The majority of Algerians are Arabophones. Results from 2009 showed that 72% of Algerians spoke Arabic: 60% spoke Algerian Arabic ; 11.3% of Arabic speakers spoke Hassaniyya; 0.4% spoke Moroccan Arabic; 0.1% spoke Saharan Arabic; a smaller number spoke Egyptian Arabic or Iraqi Arabic. Non-native speakers learn Literary Arabic at school, and as such a relative majority of the population understands Standard Arabic or the Algerian Arabic dialect. Algerian Arabic is spoken by 60% of the total population.The 1963 constitution of Algeria made Arabic the official language, and this was retained in the 1976 constitution. The 1976 constitution states in Article 3 "Arabic is the national and official language". Neither constitution mentions Berber. The Permanent Committee on Geographical Names for British Official Use stated "Arabic was chosen at the outset as the language which was to represent Algeria’s identity and religion, and official attitudes towards both Berber and French have been largely negative." The PCGN stated that French, not Arabic, is the actual lingua franca of Algeria. Arabic is not commonly used in the Kabylie region.
In Algeria, as elsewhere, spoken Arabic differs very substantially from written Arabic; Algerian Arabic has a much-simplified vowel system, a substantially changed vocabulary and does not have the case endings of the written Arabic. Algerian Arabic does not necessarily stem from written Arabic. Within Algerian Arabic itself, there are significant local variations; Jijel Arabic, in particular, is noteworthy for its pronunciation of qaf as kaf and its profusion of Berber loanwords, and the dialects of some ports show influence from Andalusi Arabic brought by refugees from al-Andalus. Algerian Arabic is part of the Maghrebi Arabic dialect continuum, and fades into Moroccan Arabic and Tunisian Arabic along the respective borders.
In the Sahara, more conservative Bedouin dialects, grouped under the name Saharan Arabic, are spoken; in addition, the many Sahrawi refugees at Tindouf speak Hassaniya Arabic. Most Jews of Algeria once spoke dialects of Arabic specific to their community, collectively termed Judeo-Arabic.
After Algeria became independent in 1962, it tried to improve fluency by importing Arabic teachers from Egypt and Syria. Martin Regg Cohn of the Toronto Star said that many of the instructors were unqualified. In 1963, of the 1,300,000 literate people in Algeria, an estimate of 300,000 read literary Arabic. Mohamed Benrabah, author of "Language maintenance and spread: French in Algeria," said that during that year, "linguistic competence in Standard Arabic was relatively low." Malika Rebai Maamri, author of "The Syndrome of the French Language in Algeria," said that as of 2009, "classical Arabic is still not mastered even at higher educational levels" and that "dialectical Arabic cannot express things in writing."
As of 2012, remaining generations educated under the French colonial system are unable to read or write Arabic.
Berber
The Berber languages are considered the native language of Algeria since antiquity. They are spoken in five major dialects in many parts of the territory, but mainly in Kabylia, in the Awras, and in the Algerian Sahara desert.Before, during and after Phoenician settlers' arrival, Berber remained spoken throughout ancient Algeria, as later attested by early Tifinagh inscriptions, and as understood from Latin and Greek historical sources. Despite the presence or growth of Latin, and later Arabic, in some urban areas, Berber remained the majority language of Algeria since ancient times until well after the French invasion in 1830.
Arabic remained Algeria's only official language until 2002, when Berber was recognized as a second national language. And in 2016 Berber was recognized as a second official language of Algeria.
The 1963 constitution and the 1976 constitution do not mention Berber and French. The Permanent Committee on Geographical Names for British Official Use stated "official attitudes towards both Berber and French have been largely negative" and "The Algerian authorities have even at times rejected use of the very word “Berber”, either on the secular grounds that the term undermines national unity, or on the religious grounds that it is a term hostile to Identity and prefer to call it Tamazight another name for Berber." Berber and French are the two languages commonly used in the Kabylie region.
| Census year | Percentage |
| 1906 | 30% |
| 1948 | 17% |
| 1966 | 17.8% |
The Berber languages/dialects spoken in Algeria include:
In the north
- Kabyle, about 3 million speakers mostly in Kabylie and surrounding regions.
- Shawiya in the Aurès, with about 2 million speakers.
- Shenwa, in the Dahra region, particularly of Jebel Chenoua in Algeria, just west of Algiers near Tipaza province and Cherchell and the Chlef., estimated 56,300 speakers. Two main dialects: Beni Menacer, west and south of Mount Chenoua area, in the Mount Chenoua area, 55,250 speakers.
- The Tamazight of Blida, traditionally spoken in the wilaya of Blida.
- The Matmata dialect, spoken in some villages of the Ouarsenis region.
In the extreme northwest
- Beni Snous and Beni Said, dialects of Berber spoken in various villages of the wilaya of Tlemcen.
In the Sahara
- Mozabite in the M'zab
- language of Touat-Gourara
- language of Touggourt and Temacine
- Tamahaq, among the Tuareg of the Hoggar
French
The 1963 and 1976 constitutions do not mention Berber and French. The PCGN stated "official attitudes towards both Berber and French have been largely negative". French and Berber are the two languages commonly used in the Kabylie region.
French is a part of the standard school curriculum, and is widely understood Some two-thirds of Algerians have a "fairly broad" grasp of French, and half speak it as a second language. French is widely used in media and commerce. French is widely used and spoken in everyday life in Algeria's larger cities, in diglossic combination with Algerian Arabic. Malika Rebai Mammri, author of "The Syndrome of the French Language in Algeria," said "French continues to be the dominant language in business and professional circles" and that "certain aspects of formal education and research are still carried in the French language and a great part of the economic and industrial sectors and press still use French extensively."
French is the most widely studied foreign language in the country, and a majority of Algerians can understand it and speak it. Since independence, the government has pursued a policy of linguistic Arabization of education and bureaucracy, which has resulted in limiting the use of Berber and the Arabization of many Berber-speakers. The strong position of French in Algeria was little affected by the Arabization policy. All scientific and business university courses are still taught in French. Recently, schools have begun to incorporate French into the curriculum as early as children are taught written classical Arabic. French is also used in media and business. After a political debate in Algeria in the late 1990s about whether to replace French with English in the educational system, the government decided to retain French. English is taught in the first year of middle schools.
In spite of its widespread use of French, Algeria has not joined the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie, an international organization of French-speaking countries. Although not a member, they attend for it.
In 2014, 76% of Facebook users in Algeria posted in French, while 32% posted in Arabic. In 2016 68% used Facebook in French, while 43% used it in Arabic.