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France National Library Attacks Google Book Effort
An anonymous reader writes "The National Library of France is not happy with Google's effort to scan and integrate millions of books into its Web search. Jean-Noel Jeanneney, President of the library, wrote in an editorial that he is concerned Google's initiative to digitalize volumes at five leading libraries will reflect a unipolar worldview dominated by the English language and American culture. Jeanneney is pushing for European libraries to follow in Google's footsteps. Google said it was surprised by Jeanneney's remarks and noted, 'This is a first step for us; we can't do everything at once.'"
http://gallica.bnf.fr/
I speak french and read the editorial. The guy basically says that if the french governement doesnt invest more cash digitizing old books, english literature will totaly dominate the future of the net, even in the francosphere. He doesnt biatch about google at all.
True, they have been general dicks when it comes to supporting America. They helped us out during the American revolution, and we helped them out during WWII, so I guess its somewhat even. It just disappoints me that all those snooty French hate Americans so much....
From my experience, they don't. They even wonder why we Americans think that the French hate us. They were really confused by the freedom-fries debacle. OTOH, the Parisians are different, and more difficult, but that's not just towards Americans.
One man's Funny is another man's Offtopic.
oh la la!
French scientists are not allowed to write publications in any language other than French
First, I worked for a French scientific institute last year (I am French), and I wrote some publications in English (proof here).
Moreover, I read an article 2 days ago saying that, in France, a lot of mathematical publications are writting in French and in the other scientific domains in English... No law here!
the french government decreed that the word e-mail is to be forbidden and replaced with made-up "courriel"
Wrong. French government has no power over the langage... It's the "Academie Française" which is supposed to tell how to spell words, and which words are French. The government wants its administration to speak French, and so wants it to use the word "courriel" which was declared French by the Academie Française - so it's logical. What would be your reaction if the American government doesn't want its administration to speak English?
I had to say that the Academie Française is sometimes not really well understood by a lot of French people (me included)...
There is a slight subtelty here:
The first point, government sponsored research papers MUST be written in french first. The official papers must be in french, but any number of translations can be made afterward. It's usually the same with universities and such. Since most research are sponsored by govt or uni, well, most papers are written in french. You know, when a french speaking govt. sponsors a research, is it weird for them to ask that the results are in french, for the benefit of the french people? How would you like, as an american uni, to sponsor someone for a research and he would submit a paper in arabic?
The second point is similar. They said that government related communications must use "courriel" instead of "email". I'd say it's a good thing, official communications should use the correct vocabulary. Using "email" would be the same as using leet speak in official govt. communications for example.
French is firstly a litterary language, while english became a business/everyday language and lots most of its litterary roots. English is made to be interroperable. French will usually use french, latin or greek roots to "invent" new words instead of adopting a foreign word. This usually preserves the litterary properties of the language. That's the big difference. Yeah, they can be anal about it sometimes, but then, who isn't?
Disclaimer: IAAFM (I am a Frenchman)
;) Thus they do have some power over the language used after all...
:)
French government has no power over the langage
Not quite right. The currently applied Toubon law forces e.g. every advertisement material using non-French language to provide a translated version somewhere in the ad (even as a footnote, that's why so many ads in France have footnotes
The government wants its administration to speak French, and so wants it to use the word "courriel" which was declared French by the Academie Française - so it's logical.
The word "courriel", though official French, is never used, either in administrative circles or other circles. That word is just too ugly. Everybody says "email" or "mail" like everyone else. The Académie Française can scream all they want, they won't change that one, just as they couldn't turn "bowling" into "boulodrome"or "week-end" into "fin de semaine".
Languages are doomed to evolve. French is a language that does not want to evolve very much, but it is hopeless. It is never a good thing to try and resist evolution
Karma cannot be described by words alone.
You're being sort of silly. French is most certainly not dying -- it is, if I recall correctly, the 11th most natively spoken language in the world, and ranks 5th or 6th when people who speak it as a second language are considered (primarily because this includes most of North Africa).
It isn't about language, it's about culture. It isn't that the French see no value in American culture, it's that they see value in their own culture. Furthermore, they most definitely are not keeping it static -- it continues to evolve in interesting ways.
I can't comment on Canada, as I've never lived there. But France is a very interesting country, and their policy of cultural protectionism is not "enforced". The truth is that the French people care deeply about their language, their culture, etc, and they support taking active steps to protect it from an increasingly ubiquitous American cultural influence.
Frankly, it shows. When you're in France, you can hear a lot of French music on the radio, there's a lot of French literature, and just a general feeling of pride in their culture. Across the border in Germany, radios play mostly American/English music, local bands often sing in English (despite being German) because it's considered "cool", and people seem a bit embarassed by things that are German. Sweden is even worse. My impression, as an outsider, is that French culture is vibrant, and the rest of Europe is being Americanized.
And I think this fact is not lost on the French, who understand that preventing American corporate interests (ie, the RIAA and MPAA, for example) from culturally subverting them by, say, forcing some percentage of music played on the radio to be in French, by promoting French films, etc, has had a net positive effect. Young people in France are much more "French", it seems -- in the sense that they are connected to the culture of their country -- than people from Germany or say, England are.
Which is not to say that other European countries are not considerably different from America or anything. Just that the French, as a people, care more about their culture, and take steps to protect it.
And it seems to be working.
Anyway, with respect to this article, the title was mistranslated.
I have read TFA, and the guy IN NO WAY attacks Google. He is simply worried about the availability of primarily European literature online and argues that an effort should be made by Europeans to digitise non English languages as well, because, as he says, American English dominates this field completely and offers a very American centric view of the world.
That's all he says. Nothing more and nothing less. It's not an attack on Google, and it's not an attack on English and it's not an attack on the US.
But that wouldn't stop the rabid morons from posting an inflammatory anti-French article, now would it.