English? Non merci, French minister tells fellow citizens

[snoop1130]

English? Non merci, French minister tells fellow citizens

 

FILE PHOTO: French culture minister Franck Riester arrives at the Elysee Palace for the weekly cabinet meeting in Paris, France October 17, 2018. Francois Mori/Pool via REUTERS

 

PARIS (Reuters) - France’s culture minister has urged people to cut down on their increasing use of English, in the latest effort to protect the French language, even though President Emmanuel Macron himself often slips English idioms into his speech.

 

France has long been proud of its culture and language, and has constantly sought to defend it against the encroachment of the English language and the habits of the United States, which are often dismissively referred to as “Les Anglo-Saxons”.

 

Culture Minister Franck Riester made his plea to stick to French in a Twitter post published late on Sunday and marking the 25th anniversary of a law governing the use of French on television and radio.

 

Critics rounded on his patriotic views on Monday, pointing out that Macron regularly uses English idioms, such as the phrase “Start-Up Nation” to promote French innovation and technology, as do many of France’s top businesses.

 

“Macron himself uses Anglophone slogans!” said Didier VanStaevel, replying on Twitter to Riester, while others pointed to Macron having referred once to democracy as being a “bottom-up” system.

 

Cinema executive Christophe Courtois pointed out that top French companies regularly use English slogans rather than French, such as Renault’s adverts titled “Never Too Much” and Air France’s “France Is In The Air” posters.

 

The 1994 Toubon law made the use of French mandatory in all TV broadcasts, meaning all foreign-language programs are dubbed, while radio stations must play at least 40 percent of French music for most of the day.

 

“The Loi Toubon is 25 years old! It’s the interpretation of article 2 of our Constitution - “The Language of the Republic is French.” Our daily lives would be so different without this simple demand - say things in French!,” wrote Riester.

 

His tweet called for vigilance applying the law and was accompanied by a big picture of the country’s national flag, the “Tricolore”.

 

Officials at Riester’s culture ministry could not be immediately reached for further comment on the matter.

 

In 2006, French President Jacques Chirac walked out of a European Union summit briefly as a form of protest, when the French head of the EU’s industry lobby addressed leaders of the bloc in English.

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2019-08-05

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[PJPom]

One has to admire the French for their unshakable belief in their superiority, of course they are wrong, God is an Englishman.

[ratcatcher]

11 minutes ago, PJPom said:

One has to admire the French for their unshakable belief in their superiority, of course they are wrong, God is an Englishman.

"Probably educated at Eton".   ????????????????????????????

[Mavideol]

21 minutes ago, PJPom said:

One has to admire the French for their unshakable belief in their superiority, of course they are wrong, God is an Englishman.

the good thing about the French even when they are wrong they are right, thus always right, keep in mind the English burned Jeanne D'Arc and bad blood was spilled

[Mavideol]

12 minutes ago, ratcatcher said:

"Probably educated at Eton".   ????????????????????????????

maybe at Sorbonne... they used to cross La Manche to get good education and manners 555

[mercman24]

i just lobbed my fench brie in the bin as a protest, to be honest it was <deleted>

[Jingthing]

i just lobbed my fench brie in the bin as a protest, to be honest it was

Have a fake freedom fry on me Monsieur.

Sent from my Lenovo A7020a48 using Thailand Forum - Thaivisa mobile app

[noopin2014]

3 hours ago, PJPom said:

One has to admire the French for their unshakable belief in their superiority, of course they are wrong, God is an Englishman.

that's not all french thinking, only an idiot politician

[simon43]

There's a lot of French in us English speakers (er.. figuratively speaking of course).

 

Here's a very interesting statistical analysis of the origin of the most common words used in modern English.

 

https://medium.com/@andreas_simons/the-english-language-is-a-lot-more-french-than-we-thought-heres-why-4db2db3542b3

 

French comes in at about 29%, same as Latin.

 

My family came over to England with the Normans in 1066 - I still retain a French surname and I grew up in the UK learning French from 5 years old - both my parents wrote academic articles and biographies in French.

 

As an occasional teacher of English, I often have to explain the origin of words - so many of our common words are French in origin.

 

 

[baboon]

1 hour ago, simon43 said:

There's a lot of French in us English speakers (er.. figuratively speaking of course).

 

Here's a very interesting statistical analysis of the origin of the most common words used in modern English.

 

https://medium.com/@andreas_simons/the-english-language-is-a-lot-more-french-than-we-thought-heres-why-4db2db3542b3

 

French comes in at about 29%, same as Latin.

 

My family came over to England with the Normans in 1066 - I still retain a French surname and I grew up in the UK learning French from 5 years old - both my parents wrote academic articles and biographies in French.

 

As an occasional teacher of English, I often have to explain the origin of words - so many of our common words are French in origin.

 

 

Too thoughtful a response for yet another headline designed to provoke knee jerk anger and acrimony. 

[sunnyboy2018]

Its agony watching English language films and dramas in France. Badly dubbed into French with no subtitles. Pathetic.

[RickBradford]

Perhaps the culture minister is trying to channel Charles V, the 16th century Holy Roman Emperor, who (is reputed to have) said:

 

I speak Spanish to God, Italian to women, French to men, and German to my horse.

[animalmagic]

3 hours ago, sunnyboy2018 said:

Its agony watching English language films and dramas in France. Badly dubbed into French with no subtitles. Pathetic.

I really enjoyed watching an English movie dubbed into German in an Austrian run hotel I stayed in.

It was wonderful to hear the phrase, "Tom, Dick und Harry," in the movie the 'Great Escape".

 

[jesimps]

Stupid, flowery language, uses ten words to the English one. Takes forever to say something, which sounds like the speaker is trying to clear his throat. Ever watched a French movie? Perfect for insomniacs, guaranteed to send you to sleep with all the yapping.

[VocalNeal]

14 minutes ago, jesimps said:

Stupid, flowery language, uses ten words to the English one. Takes forever to say something, which sounds like the speaker is trying to clear his throat. Ever watched a French movie? Perfect for insomniacs, guaranteed to send you to sleep with all the yapping.

I'm currently translating some drawings from English into Spanish. Just the cut and pasting. Many of the translations won't fit into the space previously allotted for English.

[chilli42]

If you have to legislate the use of a language it’s already in the slippery side of the slope.

[bert bloggs]

The French hate it that we used to rule pats of France and that the global language is English ,while nobody outside France speaks French .it will never change .

ps i was in Big C the other day and at a table close to us were some French ,i think ex pats ,they kept breaking into English as they chatted . ????

[Almer]

Dont worry at the end of October we will be outcasts and the EU states will rise against us, until they have a problem they cant solve of course, they can have there horse meat and we can enjoy succulent Welsh lamb and fish and chip

[Almer]

59 minutes ago, bert bloggs said:

The French hate it that we used to rule pats of France and that the global language is English ,while nobody outside France speaks French .it will never change .

ps i was in Big C the other day and at a table close to us were some French ,i think ex pats ,they kept breaking into English as they chatted . ????

555

[lust]

I recommend France makes a trip to Quebec to pick up their French comrades to reunite themselves in these hard times. Canada doesn’t want them, and they don’t want Canada. Ironically, the French don’t even want the French.

[simon43]

Ever watched a French movie? Perfect for insomniacs, guaranteed to send you to sleep with all the yapping.

 

The first time that I watched a French movie was when I stayed with my English wife in a French hotel.  I switched on the TV and there was a Canal+ French porn movie...

 

It did not put us to sleep ????

[jesimps]

38 minutes ago, simon43 said:

 

 

 

The first time that I watched a French movie was when I stayed with my English wife in a French hotel.  I switched on the TV and there was a Canal+ French porn movie...

 

It did not put us to sleep ????

Yes that Canal+ is a bit naughty. I used to switch to it occasionally (by accident ???? ) when I lived in France.

[LazySlipper]

3 hours ago, jesimps said:

Stupid, flowery language, uses ten words to the English one. Takes forever to say something, which sounds like the speaker is trying to clear his throat. Ever watched a French movie? Perfect for insomniacs, guaranteed to send you to sleep with all the yapping.

Geez dude... judging a language like that shows your true ignorance and bigotry. I was raised in French and English simultaneously and I am a native speaker of both languages. To say something like that speaks miles about your openness to other cultures. French is a language that is very complicated in both its grammar and vocabulary, but it can be used to describe things in minute detail. 

 

Maybe you like sentences like, "Me Tarzan, you Jane."

[nahkit]

29 minutes ago, LazySlipper said:

French is a language that is very complicated in both its grammar and vocabulary, but it can be used to describe things in minute detail.

From someone who starts their post with "Geez dude"   ????

[nahkit]

18 hours ago, Mavideol said:

the good thing about the French even when they are wrong they are right, thus always right, keep in mind the English burned Jeanne D'Arc and bad blood was spilled

Jeanne D'Arc was convicted in a French court by a French judge, Pierre Cauchon, who was the Bishop Of Beauvais.

[Mavideol]

2 minutes ago, nahkit said:

Jeanne D'Arc was convicted in a French court by a French judge, Pierre Cauchon, who was the Bishop Of Beauvais.

what did my post said....

[LazySlipper]

10 minutes ago, nahkit said:

From someone who starts their post with "Geez dude"   ????

As I said, I am a native speaker of both languages. Using idiomatic spelling and collocations is common. 

 

Point is I don't get where your coming from with your comment.

[Tarteso]

But but ...what will the Americans do without French fries? [emoji848]

 

 

Joke apart, (Where in the world French is an official language?)

[Aforek]

1 hour ago, LazySlipper said:

Geez dude... judging a language like that shows your true ignorance and bigotry. I was raised in French and English simultaneously and I am a native speaker of both languages. To say something like that speaks miles about your openness to other cultures. French is a language that is very complicated in both its grammar and vocabulary, but it can be used to describe things in minute detail. 

 

Maybe you like sentences like, "Me Tarzan, you Jane."

I am French, you are right, French is a rich language but I don't say that it's better that the other languages; I like English language, too, and I use many English words even when I speak French, because it's a reality, from English and American historical influence , it's the "everywhere language "; it doesn't disturb me ; what makes me smile, is that when Britain leaves EU, guess in which language the other 27 countries will speak to understand each other ? ????

[Crossy]

There is an Englishmen, Irishmen and a Frenchman in the desert. They come across a lamp and rub it three times. A genie comes out.

"I shall grant each of you but a single wish" he intones.

"I want to go to back Ireland," pipes up the Irishman, "with a mug of ale that can never empty."

"Done!" said the genie, and with a puff of smoke, the the Irishman lives the rest of his days as a hero in Ireland.

Next came the Frenchman. "Genie," he said in a really thick French accent, "I am sick of these foreigners coming into my land and polluting our language. I want a great wall around France to let no one in or out, and I want to be inside when it happens."

"Done!" said the genie, and with a puff of snoke, the Frenchman returned to Paris and France was protected by the massive wall.

Finally came the Englishman. "Tell me more about this wall" he asked.

"Well, it is 2 kilometres high, surrounds the entire border of France and nothing can get in or out" replied the genie.

The Englishman thinks for a bit. "Fill it with water."