Saint Lucia

Summary

Official Name

International Conventions

CPPDCE (2007), CSICH (2007), UNCRPD (2020), UNDRIP (2007)

Population

182,000

Principal Languages

English

Literacy Rate

90% (Roser and Ortiz-Ospina 2018)

General References

Carrington 1984

Language Counts

The number of established languages listed for Saint Lucia is 3. All are living languages. Of these, 1 is indigenous and 2 are non-indigenous. Furthermore, 1 is institutional and 2 are developing. Also listed is 1 unestablished language.

Languages

American Sign Language ase: Scattered. Users: 200 in Saint Lucia (Parks and Williams 2011). Estimated 160–300 deaf signers (Parks and Williams 2011), 0.1%–0.2% of the total population. Status: 5* (Developing). Alternate Names: ASL Classification: Sign language, Deaf community sign language
English eng: Users: 41,700 in Saint Lucia, all users. L1 users: 1,700 in Saint Lucia (2021 Joshua Project). L2 users: 40,000 (Crystal 2003a). Status: 1 (National). De facto national language. Classification: Indo-European, Germanic, West, English
French fra: Users: 2,910 in Saint Lucia (Beck et al 2018), L2 users. Status: Unestablished. Classification: Indo-European, Italic, Romance, Italo-Western, Western, Gallo-Iberian, Gallo-Romance, Gallo-Rhaetian, Oïl, French
Lesser Antillean French Creole acf: Widespread. Users: 131,000 in Saint Lucia (2016). Total users in all countries: 702,353. Status: 5* (Developing). De facto language of national identity. Alternate Names: Créole, French Creole, French-lexicon Creole, French-lexified Creole, Patois, Patwa Autonym: Kwéyòl Classification: Creole, French based

Languages by Status

1 (National)

English

[eng] 1 (National). De facto national language. 41,700 in Saint Lucia, all users. L1 users: 1,700 in Saint Lucia (2021 Joshua Project). L2 users: 40,000 (Crystal 2003a).

5 (Developing)

Lesser Antillean French Creole

[acf] 5* (Developing). De facto language of national identity. 131,000 in Saint Lucia (2016). Total users in all countries: 702,353.

American Sign Language

[ase] 5* (Developing). 200 in Saint Lucia (Parks and Williams 2011). Estimated 160–300 deaf signers (Parks and Williams 2011), 0.1%–0.2% of the total population.