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There are over 520 native languages spoken in Nigeria. [1] [2] [3] The official language is English, [4] [5] which was the language of Colonial Nigeria.The English-based creole Nigerian Pidgin – first used by the British and African slavers to facilitate the Atlantic slave trade in the late 17th century [6] – is the most common lingua franca, spoken by over 60 million people.
Nigeria is a very ethnically diverse country with 371 ethnic groups, the largest of which are the Hausa, Yoruba and the Igbo. [1] Nigeria has one official language which is English, as a result of the British colonial rule over the nation.
The culture of Nigeria is shaped by Nigeria's multiple ethnic groups. [ 1 ] [ 2 ] The country has 527 languages, [ 3 ] [ 4 ] seven of which are extinct. [ 5 ] [ 6 ] [ 7 ] Nigeria also has over 1,150 dialects and ethnic groups.
The Itsekiri are a people of mixed ethnic origins who speak a language very closely related to the Yoruba of south western Nigeria and the Igala language of central Nigeria [11] but which has also borrowed some cultural practice from the Ijebu people, Ile-Ife and Benin.
The Nupoid languages are a branch of Volta–Niger spoken in west-central Nigeria, particularly in southeastern Niger State and northern Kogi State. They include the Nupe, and Ebira languages, each with about 4 million speakers. Most Nupoid languages have 3 level tones. [1]
In the 1800s, Ma'azu's rule saw the Nupe Kingdom flourish, becoming the most powerful in Central Nigeria. Today, the Nupe people speak over 5 dialects: Central Nupe, Nupe Tako/Bassa-Nge, Kupa, Kakanda, and Dibo/Abawa/Gana-Gana. Nupe is the largest ethnic group in the Middle Belt, they are at the heart of Nigerian art and culture.
Today, there are at most 100,000 speakers of East Kainji languages, with almost all languages of the languages being threatened by larger languages such as Hausa and English. [1] Although they are morphologically simple, they have 4-level tones instead of the 3-level tones typical of the region.
It has asked state governments in Nigeria to allow local ethnic languages to be taught in the educational system. [11] It has also organized workshops and conferences across Nigeria relating to language development , language education , community development , and indigenous rights .