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France Says 'Au Revoir' to the Word 'Smartphone' (smithsonianmag.com)
Hoping to prevent English tech vocabulary from entering the French language, officials have suggested 'mobile multifunction' as an alternative. An anonymous reader shares a report: The official journal of the French Republic, the Journal officiel, has suggested "internet clandestin" instead of dark net. It's dubbed a casual gamer "joueur occasionnel" for messieurs and "joueuse occasionnelle" for mesdames. To replace hashtag, it's selected "mot-diese." Now, as the Local reports, the latest word to get the official boot in France is smartphone. It's time to say bonjour to the "le mobile multifonction." The recommendation was put forth by the Commission d'enrichissement de la langue francaise, which works in conjunction with the Academie Francaise to preserve the French language. This isn't the first time that the commission has tried to encourage French citizens to switch over to a Franco-friendly word for "smartphone." Previous suggestions included "ordiphone" (from "ordinateur," the French word for computer) and "terminal de poche" (or pocket terminal). These, it seems, did not quite stick.
which works in conjunction with the Academie FranÃaise to preserve the need of UTF8
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`echo $[0x853204FA81]|tr 0-9 ionbsdeaml`@gmail.com
C'est le meilleur choix
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
I used to think, being a Canadian, that it was just the Quebec francophones with the hyperactive inferiority complex which manifested like that. In Quebec they are anal about signage to the point of there being ordinances outlining the maximum size of English print on your store front in order to preserve their language (which I won't actually insult France enough to call French and will just call "Quebecois"). They were so adamant about it they had to use a special constitutional opt-out Canadian provinces have called the notwithstanding clause to make it legal notwithstanding a person's right to freedom of expression.
Now I realize this is just endemic to all French everywhere.
...they don't even have a word for "entrepreneur"
i don't speak French but even I can figure out that's a big mealy mouthful... hard for six or seven syllables to come up with two... couldn't they even compromise with a more streamlined "multifonc" ?
French IT specialist complained about not being able to find jobs abroad. International companies we asked cited "a lack of knowledge of fundamental IT terms they even know in third world countries" as a reason.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
They can get back at us for "French Fries".
This sort of French language and cultural identity protection has been going on for years. I remember once talking to a colleague from Quebec about this. He told me that he had initially been reticent about the idea of moving to the US because there is a sense among the Quebecers that the rest of us English-speaking Americans are out to destroy their cultural heritage. At the time of the conversation he had already been in the US for several years and so I asked him, "well, what is your assessment of American culture trying to destroy French culture?" His response boiled down to, "most of you don't even know who we are. We've been paranoid about nothing."
I don't know why France gets so much credit for linguistic preservation. Seriously, it's 2018 and they're just now getting around to formalizing a French word for smartphone? And like usual, I imagine few people will use the new word.
When telephones came out, Icelandic quickly adopted the word "sími", resurrecting an old word for "thread". Cell phones came out, and they became "farsímar". Smartphones came out, and they quickly became "snjallsímar". I mean, it doesn't happen immediately. People were calling tablets "tablets" at first, but when it came out that the proper word was "spjaldtölva", people switched over pretty quickly. Tölva (computer), by the way, comes from "tala" (number) plus "völva" (prophetess). :)
A fun experiment is to go to Wikipedia and enter a bunch of random science terms in different science fields - preferably ones not named after a person or whatnot (which tends to carry over between *any* language) - and for each one, look at the in-other-languages sidebar to see what the word is in other languages. Because as a general rule, in almost every language the terms very strongly resemble the English.... except Icelandic. You know, you look up photon, and it's a bunch of entries like "photon", "foton", "fotona", "futun", etc, etc.... then you get to Icelandic, and it's "ljóseind". ;) It's "tyrannosaurus", "tiranozaurus", "turanosaurus", etc, etc.... then Icelandic, "grameðla". But it's actually quite useful. For example, in some members of my family there's a condition called ankylosing spondylitis. Unless you're a doctor who's familiar with the field, or someone in your family has it, odds are you have no clue what that is. But in Icelandic, it's "hryggigt" - that's "hryggur" (spine) + "gigt" (arthritis). Anyone can see that term and immediately have a rough idea of what the primary symptoms are like (the spine slowly fuses, among other things).
That's not like Icelandic is "pure" or anything. "Hæ" is essentially embedded in the language, for example. "Basically" is pretty much becoming that way. Etc,. But at least in general, people try. And for most - not all, but most - new science/tech terms, the Icelandic terms stick.
Santa Ana Winds: Like the Dustbowl, but with awards shows.
You mean like when we say things like despite the constant negative press covfefe, Trump is still popular?
#DeleteFacebook
I think the main reason why english became so popular world-wide is because it's one of the easiest language to learn.
#DeleteFacebook
Close, very close.
The short answer is: trade.
The slightly longer answer: Trade, due to the fact that there has been large amounts of English speakers since the spread that happened shortly after modern English first was a pidgin language ( again because of trade ). Trade - and wealth in general - drives the cultural and military conquests 95% of the time.
Imagine two countries separated by a decent amount of traveling time. They want to trade, but don't speak the others language. It's likely, especially these days, that both have people trained in speaking English for trade with English speaking countries. Boom, instant trade language between the two countries. Now they can trade as much as they want without having to hire yet another translator / learn another new language.
To err is human; effective mayhem requires the root password!
Surely this must be sarcastic. Especially with the grammar error.
I have studied a handful of languages and taught English. English is a train wreck to learn.
It is extremely flexible and expressive but the grammar rules and spelling are the linguistic equivalent of the worst spaghetti code.
French: ... Sixty-seven, sixty-eight, sixty-nine, sixty-ten... ...sixty-eleven, sixty-twelve, sixty-thirteen... ...sixty-sixteen, sixty-ten-seven... ..sixty-ten-eight, sixty-ten-nine... ...four twenties! :) Four twenties one...
Other languages: **stares**
French: **stares back**
French:
French:
Other languages: *shutting eyes*
French:
Other languages: *hands over face*
French:
I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar.