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LANGUAGE AND CULTURE

What’s the state of health of the French language in 2017?

Is the French language slowly dying? Does it have a future? As France celebrates International French Language Day, The Local looks at the current status and future prospects of the language of Molière in the world today.

Those fanatical guardians of the French language over at the Académie Francaise have plenty to smile about these days.

Why? Because despite the dominance of English, the number of French speakers has actually shot up in recent years.

In 2014, there were an estimated 274 million speakers of the language – a 25 percent increase since 2010 – according to the most recent report by the International Organization of la Francophonie (OIF).

Of this number, 212 million spoke the language on a day-to-day basis, representing a rise of seven percent in four years.

Notably, countries in sub-Saharan Africa saw a 15-percent hike in French speakers, thanks to demographic growth and the prioritizing of French in the education system. 

Along with English, it's the only language to be spoken on all five continents.

Moreover, French was found to be the second most studied language in the world, (with 900, 000 French teachers world wide), the fifth most spoken language, the second working language in most organizations and the fourth language of the internet.

However, while the overall trend is positive, the French tongue is actually declining in its European homeland. Only 36 percent of French speakers can be found in Europe, with the majority, over 54 percent in Africa.

“We don’t have numbers for all countries, but this is a phenomenon that is affecting all foreign languages in Europe except English,” said Alexandre Wolff from the Observatory for the French Language.

This is partly due to the lack of foreign-language teaching in European schools, he told The Local.

“In the United Kingdom, for example, French is taught as a foreign language but it’s not obligatory at a higher level.

“In Germany, Italy and Sweden, English is usually the only obligatory language. As a result, other languages are suffering.”

Despite French being the second language of business according to OIF, it has been usurped by English in many international organizations where French used to be an official working language. 

Efforts to reinforce French as the working language of France can even be found on building sites. 

In March 2017, the Paris region passed a so-called Molière clause which orders builders on publicly-funded construction sites to speak in French, following similar regulations in the Normandy, Hauts-de-France and Auvergne-Rhone-Alpes regions.

But not all French officials have shared the view that French needs conservation. 

In an interview with The Local in 2015, former French culture minister Fleur Pellerin – who also speaks German and English fluently – said that she saw no point in protecting French from outside influences like English.


Orange = members of OIF (international organisation of Francophone states), Green = observing members

“We need a dynamic approach towards the language,” she said. “Of course I want to defend the French language – but not to the point of preventing any influence from outside.


“We need to be able to understand the world we are in, and that our language is enriched by external influences. French has always been a language that has been enriched by words from other languages.”

However Pellerin's stance was at odds with that of her fellow minister Annick Girardin.

The then Secretary of State for Francophone countries lamented the use of English in business settings at the expense of French in a tongue-in-cheek open letter peppered with anglicisms to make her point.

(Annick Girardi, is a bit touchy about use of English in business. Photo: AFP)

“Businesses that choose to teach French to their teams based abroad rather than customize the language of Shakespeare in France have seen the benefits, including economic ones,” read one part of the letter, which was addressed to the “business world”.

“On top of that our anglicisms are often incomprehensible for English speakers. Is the expression 'checker ses mails' clear to someone who works in the City of London?”

And French is being invaded by anglicisms more than ever before according to a 2016 study, and, to the shock of many, Paris's Olympic slogan for its 2024 bid was recently revealed to be in English

French language expert Jean Maillet says the reason so many Anglicisms are storming the French language is partly due to “linguistic laziness”, because many English words are shorter and more user-friendly than their French counterparts.

“They don’t sound nice on the ear, but we use them because they have become automatic,” said Maillet.

Few organizations, however, are investing much energy in protecting the French language from outside influences. Indeed, some – like the OIF – are pushing for a more multilingual approach.

“We don’t see English as a problem – for us, the future is multilingual,” said Wolff.

“So learning French is good, but it’s also good to learn other languages. If you limit yourself to just one foreign language, you are shutting yourself off from a rich cultural world.”

Multilingualism is especially important in international institutions like the EU, he says.

Currently, all official documents in the EU are still translated into the bloc’s 24 official languages. But the paperwork and negotiations that lead up to the drafting of these documents are often in English.

In the European commission, use of English has soared while French is plummeting. Only 3.6 percent of documents are edited in French (down from 37 percent in 1998) compared to 81 percent in English, according to a 2016 governmental report.

Problems arise, however, because the “international” English employed in EU business is not always correct, according to Wolff. And that, he says, can lead to misunderstandings that prove to be more costly that translating everything into other languages from the start.

In addition, he insists that the use of more languages leads to ‘richer’ discussions. A balance must be found, he says, between multilingualism and the monolingualism that is threatening to take over.

A multiplicity of foreign languages also brings considerable economic benefits, he says.

“Studies have proved that people who study several languages in a multilingual environment, such as Switzerland, have considerable economic advantages. And these advantages were particularly strong when it came to French,” said Wolff.

He points to a study conducted by Bloomberg in 2011, which showed French to be the third most useful language for conducting business around the world, after English and Mandarin.

So what does the future hold for French?

A 2014 study suggested that it could one day become the world’s most spoken language. 

Thanks to a population surge in sub-Saharan Africa, it’s possible that 750 million people could be speaking French by 2050.

“We are more or less optimistic,” says Wolff. “The challenge now is to have an effective education system [in Francophone countries] that is capable of taking on more and more children.

“Another challenge is to make sure that French remains the language of teaching in these countries.”

So plenty at stake for Molière and co. but also much reason to be optimistic that French language will remain alive and well.

Another version of this story was published in 2015

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LANGUAGE AND CULTURE

Le Havre rules: How to talk about French towns beginning with Le, La or Les

If you're into car racing, French politics or visits to seaside resorts you are likely at some point to need to talk about French towns with a 'Le' in the title. But how you talk about these places involves a slightly unexpected French grammar rule. Here's how it works.

An old WW2 photo taken in the French port town of Le Havre.
An old WW2 photo taken in the French port town of Le Havre. It can be difficult to know what prepositions to use for places like this - so we have explained it for you. (Photo by AFP)

If you’re listening to French chat about any of those topics, at some point you’re likely to hear the names of Mans, Havre and Touquet bandied about.

And this is because French towns that have a ‘Le’ ‘La’ or ‘Les’ in the title lose them when you begin constructing sentences. 

As a general rule, French town, commune and city names do not carry a gender. 

So if you wanted to describe Paris as beautiful, you could write: Paris est belle or Paris est beau. It doesn’t matter what adjectival agreement you use. 

For most towns and cities, you would use à to evoke movement to the place or explain that you are already there, and de to explain that you come from/are coming from that location:

Je vais à Marseille – I am going to Marseille

Je suis à Marseille – I am in Marseille 

Je viens de Marseille – I come from Marseille 

But a select few settlements in France do carry a ‘Le’, a ‘La’ or a ‘Les’ as part of their name. 

In this case the preposition disappears when you begin formulating most sentences, and you structure the sentence as you would any other phrase with a ‘le’, ‘la’ or ‘les’ in it.

Masculine

Le is the most common preposition for two names (probably something to do with the patriarchy) with Le Havre, La Mans, Le Touquet and the town of Le Tampon on the French overseas territory of La Réunion (more on that later)

A good example of this is Le Havre, a city in northern France where former Prime Minister, Edouard Philippe, who is tipped to one day run for the French presidency, serves as mayor. 

Edouard Philippe’s twitter profile describes him as the ‘Maire du Havre’, using a masculine preposition

Here we can see that his location is Le Havre, and his Twitter handle is Philippe_LH (for Le Havre) but when he comes to describe his job the Le disappears.

Because Le Havre is masculine, he describes himself as the Maire du Havre rather than the Maire de Havre (Anne Hidalgo, for example would describe herself as the Maire de Paris). 

For place names with ‘Le’ in front of them, you should use prepositions like this:

Ja vais au Touquet – I am going to Le Touquet

Je suis au Touquet – I am in Le Touquet 

Je viens du Touquet – I am from Le Touquet 

Je parle du Touquet – I am talking about Le Touquet

Le Traité du Touquet – the Le Touquet Treaty

Feminine

Some towns carry ‘La’ as part of their name. La Rochelle, the scenic town on the west coast of France known for its great seafood and rugby team, is one such example.

In French ‘à la‘ or ‘de la‘ is allowed, while ‘à le‘ becomes au and ‘de le’ becomes du. So for ‘feminine’ towns such as this, you should use the following prepositions:

Je vais à La Rochelle – I am going to La Rochelle

Je viens de La Rochelle – I am coming from La Rochelle 

Plural

And some places have ‘Les’ in front of their name, like Les Lilas, a commune in the suburbs of Paris. The name of this commune literally translates as ‘The Lilacs’ and was made famous by Serge Gainsbourg’s song Le Poinçonneur des Lilas, about a ticket puncher at the Metro station there. 

When talking about a place with ‘Les’ as part of the name, you must use a plural preposition like so:

Je suis le poinçonneur des Lilas – I am the ticket puncher of Lilas 

Je vais aux Lilas – I am going to Les Lilas

Il est né aux Lilas – He was born in Les Lilas  

Islands 

Islands follow more complicated rules. 

If you are talking about going to one island in particular, you would use à or en. This has nothing to do with gender and is entirely randomised. For example:

Je vais à La Réunion – I am going to La Réunion 

Je vais en Corse – I am going to Corsica 

Generally speaking, when talking about one of the en islands, you would use the following structure to suggest movement from the place: 

Je viens de Corse – I am coming from Corsica 

For the à Islands, you would say:

Je viens de La Réunion – I am coming from La Réunion 

When talking about territories composed of multiple islands, you should use aux.

Je vais aux Maldives – I am going to the Maldives. 

No preposition needed 

There are some phrases in French which don’t require any a preposition at all. This doesn’t change when dealing with ‘Le’ places, such as Le Mans – which is famous for its car-racing track and Motorcycle Grand Prix. Phrases that don’t need a preposition include: 

Je visite Le Mans – I am visiting Le Mans

J’aime Le Mans – I like Le Mans

But for a preposition phrase, the town becomes simply Mans, as in Je vais au Mans.

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