Fact File – Schools and Languages (Fiji)

Over 90 percent of Fiji’s people can read and write. Fijians are not required to go to school, but almost all children attend primary school. Education is free for the first 8 years. Students must pay for grades 9 to 12, but most are still able to attend. After secondary school, some students go on to a trade school, and some go on to a university or medical school.

Fiji’s official language is English, and almost everyone can speak it. But Indo-Fijians often speak to each other in a dialect of Hindi (HINdee), and Indian language. Fijians often speak to each other in Fijian.

Fijian was not written language until Christian missionaries put spoken Fijian in writing. The missionaries used some English letters in unusual ways – for example c sounds like th, b sounds like mb and q sound like ng! The name of the 1800s Fijian leader Cakobau is pronounced “thank-OM-bau.”

Source: Stevens, Kathryn. Admit One Fiji. Chanhassen: The Child’s World, Inc.