the Gothic cathedrals of the north to the Romanesque churches of the centre and west, the châteaux of the Loire, the Roman monuments of the south, the ruined castles of the English and the Cathars and the Dordogne's prehistoric cave-paintings.

French is one of the official languages of the United Nations and a large number of international organisations.

France is Europe’s foremost investor abroad.

France is the world’s major tourist destination.(76 million tourists visited France in 2007). French is also useful when visting countries like Switzerland, Belgium, North Africa and Canada.

After English and German, French is the third most used language on the Internet, ahead of Spanish.

French-speaking Africa represents an area larger than the U.S.A.

France is renowned for the quality of its high-tech.France will be the site of the world's first nuclear fusion reactor, the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor.

French is a good base for learning other languages, especially Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and Romanian.

French is the international language of cooking, fashion, theatre, the visual arts, dance and architecture. A knowledge of French offers access to great works of literature, as well as films and songs. French is the language of Victor Hugo, Molière, Léopold Sendar Senghor, Edith Piaf, Jean-Paul Sartre, Alain Delon and Zinedine Zidane.

Speaking French opens up study opportunities at renowned French universities and business schools, ranked among the top most higher education institutions in Europe and the world.

However, first and foremost, learning French means the pleasure of learning a beautiful, rich, melodious language, often called the language of love.

French belongs to the family of Romance languages meaning that it is descended from Latin. The Gauls were the earliest inhabitants of Gaul (present day France). They spoke a Celtic language. After the conquest of Gaul by Roman General Julius Caeser in the 1st century BC, the Latin language replaced the Celtic language in Gaul. The Latin spoken at that time was called Latin vulgar; this dialect was spoken by the Roman army and its agents while literary Latin was different at that time. From the third century on, Western Europe was invaded by Germanic tribes; some of these tribes settled in Gaul. The most important of these tribes who influenced the French language were the Franks who settled in northern France and the Alemanni on the German/French border, the Burgundians in the Rhone valley and the Visigoths in the Aquitaine region. These tribes introduced new words and perhaps 15% of French consists of these words. French of the period upto 1300 is referred to as old French by historians.
In 1539, by ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts, king Francois I made French the official language of France, ousting the Latin language. The dialect used at that time is referred to as middle French (français moyen) . In 1634, Cardinal Richelieu laid the foundation of the literary society Académie Française whose goals were to purify and preserve the French language. Following a period of unification, regulation and purification, the French of the period of the 17th to the 18th centuries is sometimes referred to as Classical French (français classique), although many linguists simply refer to French language from the 17th century to today as Modern French (français moderne).
From the 17th to the 19th centuries, French was the lingua franca of educated Europe, especially with regard to the arts, literature, and diplomacy; monarchs like Frederick II of Prussia and Catherine the Great of Russia could both speak and write in French. Because of the prestige of French culture and the richness of French literature, French continues to be one of the world's great languages.It remains one of the working languages of the Secretariat of the United Nations.

This placement test will help you determine the class which will be most appropriate to your present knowledge of French. If you are not a student of Alliance Francaise and want to enroll in our programe follow this link French placement test and we will evalute your French skills. You can then choose a suitable class from our calendar .

The student's corner contains useful links about learning French language grammar, vocabulary, dictionairies, etc. Follow this link to Student's corner .

The teacher's corner conatins useful links for teaching the French language . Its main goal is to help the teacher keep themselves updated. You can also send us your candidature if you are intrested in joining Alliance Francaise as a teacher.Follow this link to Teacher's corner .