Tuesday, Jul 13, 2004
French language fights for a place in new Europe
By Amelia Gentleman
PARIS, JULY 12. In a chateau near Avignon, ambassadors and senior government officials from Europe's newest member states have been brought together over breakfast to discuss French verbs.
The meeting is followed by several hours of one-to-one grammar drill and tutorials in telephone technique, before officials reunite for a crash course on the glories of French culture.
This linguistic boot camp for eastern Europe's diplomatic elite is one of the most innovative projects launched to date by France's Francophonie agency as part of its campaign to stem the decline of the French language.
No one has yet calculated the impact which the entry in May of 10 new states into the European Union has had on the already waning presence of French speakers in Europe's institutions, but the indications are not good.
The creation of the school in Avignon reflects mounting anxiety in Paris that the E.U. - originally a primarily French body, with its key headquarters in Francophone countries, formed along the lines of French administrative structures, with French as its core language - is drifting further from its roots with every expansion.
Between 1997 and 2002, the use of French in European Council documents, for example, dropped 24 per cent while there was a 32 per cent rise in English.
A survey of officials from the new member states this year showed that almost 70 per cent had English as their second language. English is expected to become more heavily relied upon to help bridge the divide between languages as diverse as Portuguese and Hungarian or any other of the 400-odd combinations now possible.
"This isn't a question of distaste for the English language or culture, nor is it tied up with anti-American sentiment,'' said Stephane Lopez, the agency official in charge of persuading the new member states to take up French.
"We think it is dangerous to encourage uniformity. The English language is a predator which destroys other languages. When people use English, other languages get crushed.''
So far, the programme has proved very popular.
- Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004
Copyright © 2004, The Hindu.