Inside France is our weekly look at some of the news, talking points and gossip in France that you might not have heard about. It’s published each Saturday and members can receive it directly to their inbox, by going to their newsletter preferences or adding their email to the sign-up box in this article.

Storm in a dictionary

This week a real storm – Storm Ciaran bringing 200km/h winds and leaving a trail of destruction in northern France – has somewhat overshadowed the political storm, in which a right-wing Senator opened the culture war playbook and tried to ban ‘inclusive writing’.

The motion has little chance of being passed by the Assemblée nationale – the parliamentary chamber with the real power – but has revived the debate about how French (and indeed all grammatically gendered languages) can become more gender-inclusive.

It’s true that the median point – writing les étudiant·es to include male and female students – is complicated and confusing, especially to French learners, but I see no reason not to have masculine and feminine versions of job titles, for example. And I’m not just saying that because my own feminine job title – rédactrice en chef – trips off the tongue so beautifully with its repeated rolling French ‘R’.

OPINION Making French fully inclusive is a grammatical and political nightmare

Pint power

The first accounts are in from the Rugby World Cup and it seems to have been a financial success, netting France an estimated profit of €2 billion.

From my experience it seemed like an organisational success too – a fabulous tournament with a great atmosphere at matches and in fan zones (although the steam did go out of things once France were knocked out).

Ireland might be disappointed at also being knocked out at the quarter final stage but at least they can take comfort in this stat – Irish and Scottish fans set a new record for beer sales at Stade de France during their pool stage game, with an impressive 137,000 pints sold. Santé !

Animal instinct

The Talking France podcast is taking a short break this week – you can catch up on previous episodes here – so instead I have some scary film French recommendations, courtesy of the lovely people at Lost in Frenchlation. I enjoyed Le Règne Animal which is not really scary in ‘make you jump’ way, despite involving a mysterious illness that makes humans mutate into terrifying creatures.

Instead it looks at the extremely pertinent (and terrifying in their own way) themes of how we deal with epidemics and how we co-exist with the animal kingdom. 

Widening horizons

And perhaps not strictly related to France, but I have been struck this week as I watched the UK’s Covid inquiry by how insular UK planning and emergency responses were. 

Former French health minister Olivier Véran recalls in his book Par-delà les vagues (beyond the waves) that, in February 2020, he was having meetings with fellow health ministers around Europe. In Downing Street, meanwhile, the only mention made so far of how other European countries were dealing with the crisis was Boris Johnson reportedly ‘laughing at the Italians for over-reacting’. Tragically, the Italians were not over-reacting. 

Véran’s book was, incidentally, my beach reading last summer – because obviously I know how to relax and enjoy myself . . . 

Inside France is our weekly look at some of the news, talking points and gossip in France that you might not have heard about. It’s published each Saturday and members can receive it directly to their inbox, by going to their newsletter preferences or adding their email to the sign-up box in this article.