Afro-Asiatic languages facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Afroasiatic
Geographic distribution:	Horn of Africa, North Africa, Sahel, and Middle East
Linguistic classification:	One of the world's major language families
Proto-language:	Proto-Afroasiatic
Subdivisions:	Semitic Berber Cushitic Chadic Egyptian (extinct) Omotic
ISO 639-2 and 639-5:	afa

Afro-Asiatic is a large language family. Almost all of the languages in the Afro-Asiatic family are spoken in Africa and southwestern Asia. Most linguists believe that the origins of Afro-Asiatic lie somewhere in eastern Africa, particularly around the Horn area; this is because Afro-Asiatic languages are the most diverse there. The Afro-Asiatic language family is divided into several smaller groups such as:

• Semitic (only Afro-Asiatic subgroup with Asian members; also spoken in Ethiopia)
  • Arabic
  • Hebrew
• Egyptic
  • Ancient Egyptian
• Chadic (spoken in North African countries such as Chad and Nigeria)
  • Hausa
• Berber (spoken in northwest Africa)
  • Tuareg
• Cushitic (spoken in northeast Africa)

Images for kids

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  A map showing the linguistic tree of Afroasiatic languages (Ehret 2006)

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  Distribution of the Afroasiatic/Hamito-Semitic languages in Africa

See also

In Spanish: Lenguas afroasiáticas para niños