Help save the French language

Now you can do your bit to save the French language. Christine Albanel, the Culture Minister [above] has just opened a site on la toile (better known as le web) which seeks French equivalents for the American-English jargon that has invaded the language. Featured words today are coach, gender and podcasting.

Franceterme.culture.fr is a new weapon in an ancient battle. Les Anglo-Saxons, whose own vocabulary has been part Gallic since the 12th century, are always amused by the attempts of the French state and its language police to defend the purity of the tongue.  Why, wonder smug foreigners, don't the French just laissez faire like the Anglophone nations and allow people to use foreign terms if they think they sounds more chic.

After living for some time on the front line in this war, let me defend France's rear-guard campaign. Yes, I share "Anglo-saxon" antipathy to the idea of policing language. It's silly, smacks of oppressive regimes and it costs a fortune -- hundreds of millions of euros a year are spent on the language bureaucracy and promoting the French language abroad.

Yet... why shouldn't a country seek ways to resist pressure from more powerful cultures -- in this case the USA? Sometimes it works.  In honour of tomorrow's International Day of the French-speaking World, I shall explain:

Albanel cited Albert Camus to make the case for defence this week. "Naming things badly means taking part in the misfortune of the world." Applying a bit of artificial respiration to a language can be effective, as Greece, Israel and many other nations showed in the 20th century (cue outraged comments). For all the time wasted in seeking French expressions that never get adopted, France's official language bodies have scored some hits over the years.

This has been the case when the coinages are elegant and concise. For example, while much of the world was learning to say 'computer', France came up with ordinateur, from Latin (the original ordinateur was God). Jacques Perret, the Sorbonne Professor of Latin, proposed the word in 1954 at the request of IBM France when it was introducing its 650 "data processing machine". Ordinateur stuck in French but never took off in other Romance languages apart from European Spanish. So did logiciel, a brainy coinage for the typically prosaic English software. The French informatique is so much more stylish than information technology that some American startups like to say they do informatics.

Influenced by Quebec's muscular language policies, the French committee on new words has had more recent hits. It knocked out the Japanese-American Walkman with baladeur in the 1990s. (balader is to go for a stroll. It also meant dance in provençal and this gave ballade or what you sing while you do it). The state has been making some headway with courriel ( a contraction of courrier electronique) although le mail  still dominates. Courriel, invented in Quebec, is used by by law on state broadcast networks and has been adopted by le Monde and other journals. Pourriel, for le spam, may also work too. It's a clever contraction of pourri (rotten) and courriel.

Politics is never far away. For example, altermondialisme ('other-worldism'), is now standard for what in English is known as anti-capitalist or anti-globalisation. An altermondialiste, in the French mind, is a progressive type who promotes a fairer, if unrealistic, vision of society (think José Bové). An anti-capitalist, in the Anglo-American mind, is a loser with a mask and a petrol bomb (Think Black Blok). The French libéral has a pejorative sound to many ears compared with the positive sound of "free market" in English. They have other pro-market words, though. Remember the joke that George W Bush is supposed to have remarked that "The French don't have any word for entrepreneur".

Gender is another case. French has started using the American-inspired gender in its feminist political sense such as  "gender politics" or gender role". The language authority hates this and points out, as English-language purists also do, that gender means grammatical category, masculine or feminine, and it is a French word to begin with (gendre in old French which became genre).

The Terminology Commission wants you to say sexe if that's what you mean or explain further using the words "hommes et femmes". That's obviously too long-winded so please send a better idea to Madame Albanel's site (Carla Bruni, the new Madame Sarkozy, has been doing her bit on this front. Posing for a photograph last week at the Elysée Palace with President Peres of Israel, she said she never says the smile-inducing English word 'cheese' for the camera, as the French usually do. Instead, she told him "Je dis sexe")

The Commission générale de terminologie et de néologie, which reports to the Prime Minister, needs help to find replacements for the inventions that have not taken off.  Some are just too cumbersome to be adopted, even though civil servants are supposed to use them. These are usually much longer than the English. For example, everyone except the state broadcasters, talks about le podcasting rather than the officially decreed la diffusion pour baladeur. No-one will learn to say "piraterie routière" instead of le car-jacking.

Away from these interesting word games, you can make a good case for saying that French does not need defending because it is in healthy shape . The language may be on the retreat around the world, but it is thriving at home, enriched by its foreign borrowings  -- from Arabic and African languages as well as English.

Alain Rey, a famous language expert and editor of the popular Robert dictionary, has been singing its praises as the country marks its annual French Language Week. French is enjoying a vigour not seen since the 16th century, he said. "It's flowing in from everywhere, a real melting pot". Rey,  79, a charming iconoclast, says that he does not mind that grammar is being trashed by the young. The main thing is that they are being inventive with words. Last year he helped a group of banlieue kids publish a dictionary of their slang, called Lexik des Cites. [My article on it here]

In le Parisien, last week, Rey said he especially liked the banlieue kids' coinage for the American phrase "I'm cool". They say "Je suis moelleux". That means soft and runny. The English borrowed moelleux in the middle ages and turned it into mellow.  In the San Francisco of 60s flower power that of course came to mean I'm cool (As in "I'm just mad about Saffron" video)

If you've read as far as this, you must be curious about French. So here's the list of 10 words that are being officially celebrated in this year's Semaine de la Langue Française (14-24 March). They are chosen as illustrating some aspect, usually delightful, of French civilisation. 

-- apprivoiser (to tame)
-- boussole (navigation compass)
-- jubilatoire (exhilarating, jubilatory)
-- palabre (endless talk)
-- passerelle (footbridge, gangway)
-- rhizome (horizontal stem of a plant. Figuratively, something with no beginning or end, like a network)
-- s'attabler -- to sit down to a meal
-- tact [borrowed by English, who did not have the concept]
-- toi (you singular, familiar)
-- visage (face)

[below: L'Académie française, guardian and official arbiter of the French language]

Comments

[dot king]

"tact" borrowed by English who did not have the concept" (CB)

c'est de la provoc!

apprivoiser - very useful when you work in estate agency, no, make that "nécessaire"

but what a strange selection of words to celebrate a whole week on!

and do we celebrate them by usage? if so, "toi" could be un vrai champs de mines! à utiliser avec tact . . .

[John]

"The language may be on the retreat around the world" (Ch. Bremner)

If by that Mr. Bremner means that French is on the retreat in Louisiana or Indochina, this is a rather narrow view of the world. In Africa, which has become the continent with most French speakers, French has made great advances since the end of colonization, and there are now more French speakers in Africa than ever before.

According to the latest Francophonie Report, in 2006 there were 115 million French-speakers in Africa spread across 31 francophone countries. These 31 francophone African countries currently have 321 million inhabitants, but the UN forecasts they will have 733 million inhabitants by 2050. With progress in schooling, the proportion of French speakers in these countries is bound to rise further, which means the absolute number of French speakers will rise tremendously (rising proportion of French-speakers * natural growth of population). In other words, by the middle of this century there should be more French speakers worldwide than Spanish speakers (Latin American is at the end of its demographic transition). French will thus become the most spoken Romance language in the world.

Talk of a retreat!

[Thanks, as always, John. But I'll stand by what I said. French is unquestionably in retreat around the world. Far fewer are learning it than they used to everywhere except Africa and fluent French speakers are in sharp decline internationally. Read Olivier Poivre d'Arvor, Directeur de Culturesfrance in today's Figaro, for example. Far from crowing over this, I am deploring it. OPDA, by the way, thinks the solution is to do more to help the elites of the world get an education in French. A good idea. CB]

[Robert Marchenoir]

As usual with such government initiatives, that's caring about details and missing the big picture.

What use is it nit-picking about the French translation of podcast, if an enormous, and growing, proportion of school-leavers can barely read, write, and even speak their own language?

[John]

Oh, and another thing, in 2050 the country with the most French speakers in the world won't be France anymore, it will be the Democratic Republic of Congo (with a 2050 population as large as today's Brazil). Already today, despite all the wars, epidemics and whatnot, there are 24 million French speakers in Congo according to a recent survey by the Université de Kinshasa. This is four-times higher than was previously thought (there hadn't been any survey conducted since the fall of Mobutu).

These findings by the Université de Kinshasa are quite remarkable because they show that even in a country torn by war, people feel the need to learn French, the State language, for their social advancement. In the school year 2005-2006 there were 6,140,000 kids attenting French-only primary schools in the Democratic Republic of Congo, almost as many as in France where there were 6,317,000 kids enrolled in primary schools (écoles primaires). As things go, by the end of this decade there should be more kids in the French-only primary schools of Congo than in those of France.

[Helen]

'boussole' is never used on a ship; instead seamen use the word 'compas'...
on board a ship, 'la passerelle' is the 'wheelhouse'.
I really liked the phrase 'je suis moelleux', I had never heard it used!

[John]

[I'll stand by what I said. French is unquestionably in retreat around the world. Far fewer are learning it than they used to everywhere except Africa and fluent French speakers are in sharp decline internationally. CB]

I'm sorry but I have to disagree. What you mean is there are fewer French speakers among the world elites than there used to. World elites, however, by their very definition, are only a very small layer of the world population. The loss of a few tens of thousands of French speakers among the world elites is largely compensated (numerically at least) by the millions of new French speakers in the middle and lower classes worldwide.

At the moment, if we count 1st and 2nd language speakers of French as well as people who learnt the language as a foreign language such as you, then we have a total of about 500 million people worldwide who can speak French. There has never been as many French speakers as today, never, not even in the 1930s when French was the language of diplomacy and world elites.

True, you can say that the millions more French speakers of mainly Africa don't have the same influence as the tens of thousands of French speakers lost in world elites, but personally I prefer the current situation. The position of French was always fragile due to its tiny base. Now, French is doing it the hard way, like Spanish, building up an extremely numerous base of mainly poor people, but eventually the descendants of these poor essentially African people will also become rich as Africa will eventually enter the developped world, and then French will certainly be a language to reckon with due to its sheer numbers.

Those who think French is in decline are simply blind to the realities of what's going on: a shift from a tiny elite language to a mass third-world language.

PS: I also note that even in Europe French is not as in retreat as we are always told. Just to mention England, back in the 1930s when French was paramount in international diplomatic circles, there were far fewer English people able to speak French than today. Back then few English kids went beyond primary school, and foreign languages were not as massively taught as they have been since the 1960s to the English middle-class. Let's keep a sense of history.

[Daisy]

One of the things I love about English is that it is truly a global language in that it incorporates words from other languages and cultures. That makes it useful, which is what a language should be. In trying to keep a language pure, you can end up destroying it. And, I agree, that we shouldn't put too much empahsis on purity when people don't even know the basics.

How many of those Africans who speak french, speak a pure form of the language (that the Academie can be proud of) or is it intermingled with local African dialects?

[Juliette]

I have never heard the word "gender" in a French conversation. Sure thing for podcast and coach, but gender? People still use the word "genre".

Anyway, Albanel understood something: evolution of the language is a bottom-up process, so instead of having the Académie Française thinking of words, having actual human beings (you know, those that are not immortal) doing it is pretty smart.

[me]

Carla Bruni [...] told him "Je dis sexe"

Le 'telephone arabe' probably reported this wrong. The correct sentence to use while looking at a camera is "ouistiti sexe". Practice it, you'll see it has the same effect as "cheese" in english, it appear that you smile while you say it.

[You're probably right, that's what she must have meant, but le Canard Enchaîné today quoted her as saying "Je ne dis pas cheese, mais sexe". CB]

[Stuart Shields]

You wrote, "Ordinateur stuck in French but never took off in other Romance languages."

Might I point out that, here in Spain, the common word is "ordenador". And, although I am no expert on the matter, I believe they say "computadora" in Latin America.

[Thanks. I'll correct it. I learnt my Spanish in Mexico where it was computadora and I checked with a French reference book before writing today, because I have heard both in Spain. My mistake. CB]

[peter kinsley www.peterkinsley.com]

At least the Banlieu kids try to get as near as possible to the meaning of "cool" (cool cat; Cool Hand Luke;) but the Allsorts we have in England get it wrong, so that Funky, which is an American negro jazz word, meaning smelly "I ain't no funky-butt") has come to mean the opposite: "I felt really funky on the cat-walk" said the mannequin. And now that D.H. Lawrence and Norman Mailer and their fight for four letter words is part of life, they may even go out of usage, the origins twisted into a term of abuse. Again, U.S. negro talk: it means someone who is lucky, a stud who lives with a woman on Welfare and does not have to support either her or the children.
Slang is one thing, but the destruction of language is another, and "the kids" now say "I would of" instead of "I would have". Try telling them it is a verb and they look at you as if you are mad. About 10 days ago Britain's Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, said it on TV : "I would of..."
No one is wasting their time fighting for the purity of the French language.
Exercise: Take your TV magazine and go through it page by page and circle every English word in it. Each week, haver a count-up. The rot is setting in.

[John]

"How many of those Africans who speak french, speak a pure form of the language (that the Academie can be proud of) or is it intermingled with local African dialects?" (Daisy)

Check the African French article on Wikipedia for more details:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_French

Basically, in French as in any other language there are different registers. When someone from Glasgow speaks with people in his/her street, you and me would have trouble understanding what they say, but when that same person from Glasgow meets someone from California he/she switches to a more standard register that we can all understand. It's the same in Africa. People in the street in Abidjan speak French in a register that a person from France will need time to adjust to, but when meeting someone from France or Québec a person from Abidjan would switch to a more standard register that we can all understand (except if the person is completely uneducated).

Actually, in my experience I've had a harder time understanding people in Glasgow than in Abidjan. Lol.

[James]

The English word I hate the most - when used by the French - is : AWARDS

Seriously, I live in France and every year it's the NRJ AWARDS - said with the most bizarre french accent.

What's wrong with Prix?

I love the french language and the more they can remove these "cuckoo" english/american words - that just don't sound good - the better.

[Christine]

"enriched by its foreign borrowings -- from Arabic and African as well as English"
I am not sure there is any language called "African"... There is also quite an influence from Italian and Spanish

What is really interesting (and shows indeed the vitality of the french language) is the way the suburbs slang has been using expressions from foreign languages, inventing new words, but most surprisingly reviving old "argot" words that had actually disappeared. Les voies de la langue sont impénétrables...

[Romain]

It strikes me how educated Africans who learned French in their homeland can speak wonderfully well, compared to second generation immigrants and even many French people who were taught by the Republican School. On top of it they often carry some delightful archaich expressions, high in color and rich of fragrance.
My most unexpected experience was to talk with an Irish man living in Marseille(s) who learned French in Belgian Congo. He was conjugating all his accents in a syncretic vernacular which I could still understand, inspite of his very own uncartesian Irish way of thinking.
It was hilarious.

[dot king]

"How many of those Africans who speak french, speak a pure form of the language (that the Academie can be proud of) or is it intermingled with local African dialects?" (Daisy)

Language and dialect are separate, indeed some dialects should have the status of a language. Francophones (and Anglophones for that matter) who live outside of mainstream language communities all know the difference between when the two - they might use the dialect at home or amongst their peers, but never in a situation where a common language is required.

Peter K, I think the people you mention, including Gordon Brown, are saying "would've" which is correct, but when they write it "would of" it's not only incorrect, it's nonsense.

When I need to know the gender of a French noun, if I ask a question based around "quel genre?" I get either a blank stare or (depending on where I am when I ask) an answer such as "nom commun" or "nom abstrait" - and a questioning, pitying look :). The question to ask is "masculin ou féminin?"
As I've understood it, "genre" is used to mean exclusively (?) "type" and "gendre" is son-in-law and necessarily masculine!

Alain Rey is a fascinating person. this has made me notice that his daily "word slot" on TV and radio has disappeared. Or maybe he's on a station I don't tune in to?
En tous cas, je le kiffe grave.

[No Dot, France-Inter dumped him about three years ago because they found him too high-brow for drive-time listeners. I agree, his slot was great. He was, however, on the radio (France-Inter, I think) last Sunday morning talking about his delight in language. CB]

[Valentin]

"the NRJ AWARDS - said with the most bizarre french accent."

C'est parce que c'est COOL, et en plus ça a l'air très BRITISH-EUX, James :))

[Romain]

Christine

I know at least one African language, that is Nigerian. I often called a friend of mine in Lagos to invite him for lunch. His secretary was sometimes answering "Mazda 'e no de', 'e de go for chop" meaning "Master is not there, he went out for lunch" (all bosses were addressed to as master).
Once my friend was calling me while I was having a "kidney pause",
my secretary replied "Mazda 'e de' like 'e no de'" (Master is there like he is not there"), much more elegant than: he has gone to the jones.

[peter kinsley www.peterkinsley.com]

No, Dot: I wish you were right, but the P.M. said "would of". My stepson and all his teenage friends said "I would of" because they hear it on radiio and TV. I must have corrected him 50 times, to no avail. If asked to write "would've" they would not have known what you were talking about. The same applies to "restauranteur", used constantly by journalists, TV presenters, food and restaurant critics. A dozen times I have said: "Please tell so-and-so there is no such word as restauranteur. It is restaurateur."
Again,to no avail. It is in the language now. If I had a lot of hair left, I'd tear it out!
I used to sing the songs of George Brassens -- with some mistakes --when I was in the army in France but when I did so at a party, a few years ago, in a town near Sete, a Parisian turned up next day with all the words written out by hand!
I was flattered. Vive les troubadors!

[LesC]

Yeah, just try telling the French they can't put on a "t-shirt" this "weekend" or chew "chewing gum."

[French Blue]

Great stuff Charles - I'm really glad you favour the vigorous defence of the French language. I've always enjoyed the idea of the Academie Francaise as being endearingly nutty, as well as simultaneously being profoundly important. To care about language is to care about thought, about communication, about elegance and precision of expression. Why should we put up with sloppiness, inelegance and imported banal Americanisms?

[HdF]

You forgot to mention the acronyms which are increasingly produced from english words. ADSL (Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line), which by the way has no specific meaning in english since all the telecom lines today are digital, is so common nowadays that nobody would propose to use LPNA, the suggested french equivalent when the technology was initially introduced.

I agree that this policy is not a complete failure, but if all policies are deemed a success because they have had some hits then the world is driven by succesful-only policies.

When we see how incapable the policiticians are to understand today's technological mutations and their cultural implications, it is a pity to see so much energy wasted for an endeavour that is already producing very questionable results (I went to the web site and I'm not impressed).

Charles, may I recommend that you tune to "La nouvelle star" on M6 and look at the amazing proportion singing in english with, as far as I can appreciate, a good accent.

Hurry up, Albanel may soon produce a law banning english from the reality shows produced in France.

[PJB]

My French teacher at the lycée taught us that language was defined by grammar rather than vocabulary. So while the académie watches over the imparfait du subjonctif (incidentally far more used in Italian, where no such institution prevails), carry on using your emails, your webs and your walkmans (incorporated by Renaud in 'Mon beauf'). How many english words come from French? A large %.

[Donald]

[I'll stand by what I said. French is unquestionably in retreat around the world. Far fewer are learning it than they used to everywhere except Africa and fluent French speakers are in sharp decline internationally. CB]

As evidence of the decline, an article on French in Canada:

http://frenchculturenow.com/politics-and-society.php

which contains this quote:

"Only 31 per cent of Quebec immigrants are inclined to adopt French as their main language."

[peter kinsley www.peterkinsley.com]

Nothing new about Franglais either: Strolling in a street off the Bou Mich in 1954 I saw a blazer on sale in a shop window with this notice:
BIEN ANGLAIS
TRES SNOB
PRESQUE CAD

[Francois D]

Some remarks:

-It's true, I feel, that Quebequois are better that French for inventing new words in french. French seems to be divided between "moderns" who import shamelessly english words and "classics" who use expressions instead of new words or wait "académie française"'s authorisation (but Académie Française needs 25 years for revisiting its dictionnary from A to Z).
"Quebecois" are very good for inventing new words like they know how composing beautiful songs.

- Grammar remains osssature for a language. You must be likely to know that the best book in French grammar is the "Grévisse": "Bon usage". Don't imagine that Mr Grévisse is french; he is (was?)professor at Louvain, Belgium.

When you want to write in French without (too much) mistakes, two books are needed: the "Petit Robert" for words, and the "Grevisse" for grammar.

And sorry for my mistakes in English, for words and grammary.

[Dominique, angry teacher]

Charles writes :

"Rey, 79, a charming iconoclast, says that he does not mind that grammar is being trashed by the young. The main thing is that they are being inventive with words."

Rey is a typical demagog who cares about the language only and does not give a darn shxxt about the poor kids not being able to express themselves properly and who lack words.

Rey, like linguists in general, only care for the language : they put the language on a stage, study it, praise it, and consider it as an end instead than a mean. For him, the important thing is that the language changes in the long run. Kids? who cares?

Rey should know that knowing 10 words of the dictionnary is more usefull and socially more efficient than knowing 3 words known in you backyard only. So many linguists do share the same cult toward the language within the educationnal system and forget the main goal : educating children, allowing them to express themselves with language rather than muscles.

Vocabulary? pfff! gramar? who cares? syntax? who needs that? That is typical demagogy from those who perfectly speak the language, know very how to express themselves and deny our kids of the suburb to do the same.

That is eiher postcolonialism or sicial apartheid at it's best!

[Dominique, angry teacher]

Policy, law regarding the french language a failure?

What was the édit de Villers-Cotterêts made in 1539 by François Ier? It did set up french as the official language, launching french litterature for the next 5 centuries.

That was clearly a political decision defining a complete succesfull national frame. The very opposite of a political mistake.

[paul]

Regarding computing/informatics most of the technical terms are not translated but put into italics. You see clocker /overclocker/burst/pipeline in French.
By the way the French are the only country to translate bite by octet.

"the French are the only country to translate bite by octet."

It's bYte, and since its made of 8 bits, I find octet better framing it than the original name!

[Valentin]

"Only 31 per cent of Quebec immigrants are inclined to adopt French as their main language"

Because French is much more difficult to learn than English, we've been through that before. Thats proof less of decline and more of a certain (relative) elitism of the French language - either that, or people laziness :)

[Mary Fernandez]

1. "Away from these interesting word games, you can make a good case for saying that French does not need defending because it is in healthy shape. The language may be on the retreat around the world, but it is thriving at home, enriched by its foreign borrowings -- from Arabic and African languages as well as English."

Isn't this a contradiction? The policing was to reduce foreign borrowings.

2. "Carla Bruni, the new Madame Sarkozy, has been doing her bit on this front. Posing for a photograph last week at the Elysée Palace with President Peres of Israel, she said she never says the smile-inducing English word 'cheese' for the camera, as the French usually do. Instead, she told him "Je dis sexe"

YOU left out the punctuation, Charles. Considering her history and career, are you sure didn't more accurately say, "Je dis, sex?"

3. "-- tact [borrowed by English, who did not have the concept]"

Never heard of it. :-)

[Richard]

In Québec they've been using baladodiffusion for some years for "Podcast"

http://www.radio-canada.ca/baladodiffusion/

[Francois D]

"the French are the only country to translate bite by octet."

Explanation may be simpler: phonetically "bit" has the same meaning than "penis" in vulgar language. Maybe it is not very correct to pronounce this word constantly during a work session (for children, in a classroom, it's a source of fun guaranteed)

[Richard Huxley]

Living on the border here in Strasbourg it is surprising how few people speak french and german, let alone english.

Luckily if we have kids (in germany just over the Rhine) they will naturally speak english, german and french...then maybe learn a new languauge like chinese.

In europe English in business is very important...I feel that the French kids generally dislike this! :)) However if you do try to speak French they are very welcoming.

I find it far less precise to use than English..more romance and guilded semantic frippery...but fair enough I have to use it living here.

[Romain]

You may not realise very few African children have access to school, not to mention proper schools. Their motivation is very strong because they know mastering languages is opening a future for themselves. Rama Yade is a living example of an African lady who did grammary school in Senegal. When I compare francophone and anglophone countries in Africa, I see that French is much better spoken than English. Anglophone countries had too much complacency with broken English or pidgin English (in my opinion). I would say French has better dynamics in Africa.

[alan morgan]

Graham Robb , in his elegant book " The Discovery of France " clearly records the journey through the France of the 1860's when Patois was widely spoken to the France of today. To say that French became a common tongue quickly is only partly true. Even as late as the 1970's Pompidou said " there is no place for regional languages in a France destined to set its mark on Europe ". The Government has and continues to use the notion of a common language to unite France. Any foreign wodks; from any language, external as well as internal are suspected of undermining unity. In the land of a thousand tongues monolingualism is the mark of an educated person.Yet the provincial langauges refuse to die out and are rising in current usage. So why get interested in a few English words. Its the local patois the Parisian minority should watch out for!

[Lily]

[Yeah, just try telling the French they can't put on a "t-shirt" this "weekend" or chew "chewing gum."] (LesC)

Le temps risque de se dégrader en fin de semaine. Il faudra mettre le gros tricot; celui à manches courtes n'ira pas. Il est interdit de mâcher des bonbons moelleux!

[Mortimer]

As you stated early on, we anglos find the concept of a government language police very Orwellian, not just risible but scary. Beyond the pathetic and arrogant reasoning behind such overweening government pretentiousness, there is something both totalitarian and frankly racist implied by such legislation. Where do you draw the line between the cleansing of foreign words and the cleansing of foreigners?

Lexical and ethnic engineering were both very popular in the Soviet Union. Only in places like Paris or Moscow do you see cultures with such servility to the central, all-powerful state. Language is a tool, part of that statist intimidation.

In a similar vein, until very recently the French state routinely was able to dictate to parents which names they could give to their children. This form of totalitarianism is now blessedly defunct. Maybe through contact with the outside democratic world the French government will one day prove it is able to adapt to the times as for the naming other things beyond children.

Mortimer

[john o'doe]

Living in France you have to understand the local French meaning given to apparently familiar English words or expressions.
e.g. 'un people' = a celebrity,
'un book' = pressbook
'le bookmaker' = London-based betting operation
'overbooké' = extremely busy
'le turnover' = why is everyone leaving?,
'le marketing' = meretricious hype or spin of an unworthy product or service,
'le business' = doubtful transactions
'le dealer' = drug dealer
'hype' = fashionable,
'un fashion' = fashion victim or fashionista,
le coaching = tactical substitution (in football or rugby),
anglo-saxon = not latin, probably English speaking,
Fuck, fucking = Anglo-Saxon expressions used for amusement by trendy French wordsmiths with no idea of their power to shock and offend.
and finally there's
Oooh, I am shocking (pronounced shock-eeeeng) = I'm shocked or I'm gently mocking you for your uncool moralising attitude to our Gallic ways which are the product of a superior civilisation.

[dot king]

"Vocabulary? pfff! gramar? who cares? syntax? who needs that?"
(dominique angry teacher)

Dominique you are not alone - I am just now teaching the PRS and the CO and PCO to two English girls in 5ème. We are, as one, captivated! Double lessons are best. ;0

I think you are a little unjust on Alain Rey, I saw him present the above-mentioned dictionnaire des "djeunesss" - he was approving of it not as a replacement for "conventional" language, but as an interesting addition and just for love of words, which I can relate to wholeheartedly.
It's also gratifying to find some "djeunesss" who take enough interest in language (as a general concept) to go to the trouble of compiling a dictionary - and an etymological one at that.

Of course I agree with you that a good sound "mainstream" linguistic education is necessary, but there's room for "alternatives" as well.
Remember that this kind of "non-standard" language is often fashion-linked. In the UK in the 1970's everything was "fab" "the gear" you might have been "square" "a cat" (liste non-exhaustive) - No-one uses those words now, it would be very "non-U" (that for the even older bloggers!).
At that time too, it was fashionable to affect a Liverpool accent too, now it's more likely to be Essex (or maybe last time I was au courant). In any case what I mean to say is that language is dynamic, it adapts, changes, goes through phases, and at base the accepted standard remains, unsullied.

[Emlyn]

This isn't a new problem by any means: the classic book on the subject is Etiemble's "Parlez-vous franglais?", published in 1961 and still very relevant and highly entertaining.

[dot king]

"You may not realise very few African children have access to school, not to mention proper schools. Their motivation is very strong because they know mastering languages is opening a future for themselves."
(Romain)

YO!

[dot king]

"celui à manches courtes n'ira pas"
(Lily)
quoi, je ne pourrais pas mettre mon petit haut?

[Ros]

Charles, I've never heard the expression "drive-time listeners.", did you invent it? I presume it means people who only listen to the radio while driving?
DOT KING:" The question to ask is "masculin ou féminin?" Yes, but I ask "le ou la"? - even more simple.
LESC: "Yeah, just try telling the French they can't put on a "t-shirt" this "weekend" or chew "chewing gum." - I'm afraid the war for" t-shirt & "chewing-gum"
is lost as it's been going on for too long but there's still a chance that "week-end" could go back to "fin de semaine".
On the other hand, I think computer language could just as well be left in english & I think many French people would agree.
All the same, I am old enough to remember London before, during and after WW2 - in the smarter restaurants there were always "hors-d'oeuvre" written on the menus - now everyone says "starter" but have never noticed how it's written on menus.
DOT KING also says "but what a strange selection of words to celebrate a whole week on!" - I certainly agree and wonder who chose them?

[Roger Goodacre]

As a part-time translator, and son of a professional translator who worked on international treaties, legal documents etc, I disagree that French is less precise than English.

English is very sloppy and imprecise, the meaning of words constantly eroded or altered by new generations who are not interested in their etymology (or badly taught). When translating a word or phrase from English into French, it's often necessary to use several French words to convey the precise meaning, which is often implied or ambiguous.

We're in the process of seeing English language and grammar shift before our eyes: the incorrect use of "it's" and "its", as a minor example, is frighteningly common, even in the pages of The Times.

[Seb]

Semaine de la Francophonie oblige, le Francais s'impose pour commenter ce post (article en ligne ?) meme si les claviers qwerty n'aident pas vraiment la manoeuvre...
Le sport aussi a du mal a se défaire de l'influence anglaise. Peu de commentateurs osent aujourd'hui le coup de pied de coin (corner) ou le coup de pied de réparation (penalty). Idem en rugby pour le pick and go et le up and under (chandelle de récupération).
Heureusement, le discours d'ouverture des JO de Pékin se fera dans la langue de Manaudou.

[Romain]

Roger Goodacre
I've heard it so many times on both sides that one word may have half a dozen different meanings, English or French, making either of them imprecise.
The fundamental difference between French and English is that syntax carries more meaning in French, and vocabulary in English.
You will find that a one page contract in French will take three pages in English, with so many repetitions and redondancies around words. I've given up trying to translate words, I rather concentrate on meaning when I have to.

[Edward Johns]

I'm astounded that no-one from across the Atlantic has as yet pointed out that had had it not been for anglophones, the population of Europe would all be speaking German by now !
At the end of the day, are the French (as a generalisation) a little too docile in following government diktats as to what language they can use ? Or is it, as some might suggest, an example of their chauvinism?
Surely understanding is far more important than the origins of the language used.

[john o'doe]

@Seb
C'est qui ce Mamadou?