Gascon (Occitan: [ɡasˈku], French: [ɡaskɔ̃]) is a dialect of Occitan. It is mostly spoken in Gascony and Béarn in southwestern France (in parts of the following French départements: Pyrénées-Atlantiques, Hautes-Pyrénées, Landes, Gers, Gironde, Lot-et-Garonne, Haute-Garonne, and Ariège) and in the Aran Valley of Catalonia. It has about 250,000 speakers worldwide.Only Aranese, a southern Gascon variety, is spoken in Catalonia. Aranese has been greatly influenced recently by Catalan and Spanish.