Language Museum

Wait – that should be madame.

A town in France has banned the word “mademoiselle” (the French word for “miss”), instead saying that all women should be addressed as “madame”.

In Cesson-Sevigne, official documents no longer say “mademoiselle” as it is argued that women should not be defined by their marital status. But when women face bigger issues, why does this matter?

Professor of applied linguistics Dr Penelope Gardner-Chloros, of Birkbeck University, says that a society’s language – and how it chooses its terms of address – can reflect deeply ingrained attitudes.

“[Language] it is a sensitive indicator of the distinctions that a society makes – so if it is important to know if a woman is married or not, then it will be indicated in language,” she explains.

“‘Mademoiselle’ was a courteous title and there was even a male equivalent – ‘Mondamoiseau’, though it was very rarely used,” and later fell out of use completely. (The word “damoiseau” can be translated as “squire”.) (Source: BBC News)

The Academie Francaise, protector of the French language and notoriously hostile to English encroachments, has been challenged to accept new words into their dictionary.

Members of the public have been invited to make suggestions for additions to the language as part of the 2011 Festival XYZ, now in its tenth year. The festival of new words was founded by a French sociologist who says the idea is to bring new life to the language.

The festival’s word of the year was announced as “attachiant(e) – a combination of attachant (captivating, endearing) and the slang word chiant (bloody nuisance) to denote someone you cannot live with but cannot live without” (Source: The Guardian).

Other offerings include bête seller (a book that is badly written but a best seller) and eurogner – euro plus rogner (to cut down).

Let’s hope the Academie sees sense and adds these delightful new words!

A girl aged just 10 has become an interpreter for the European Parliament… although just for a day.

Alexia Sloane has been blind since the age of two, and is fluent in four languages – English, French, Spanish and Mandarin. She is currently also learning German. Her mother is half French and half Spanish whilst her father is English, and Alexia has been trilingual since birth. By the age of four, she was reading and writing in Braille.

After winning a young achiever of the year award, Alexia chose to visit the European Parliament as her prize. East of England MEP Robert Sturdy invited her as his guest and Alexia worked with the head of interpreting to get hands-on experience of life as an interpreter.

She continues to harbour ambitions of becoming a full-time interpreter, revealing: “The trip was more than a dream come true. Unfortunately, I have to wake up to reality now.

“I am now more determined than ever to become an interpreter in the future and to return to Brussels in the not too distant future – to see all the wonderful people I met.” (Source: Digital Spy)

What incredible ambition from someone so young!

NewsBiscuit seems to be coming up with some great language-related satirical news at the moment. Last month there was Nicolas Sarkozy admitting that French is a hoax, and now an article announces that Cockney Rhyming Slang is to be the third official language of the 2012 London Olympics.

The origins of Cockney Rhyming Slang are in the East End of London, the site for many Olympic venues. Organisers of the Games often talk about the ‘local legacy’ of the Olympics.

‘The inclusion of rhyming slang forms a key part of the celebration of the local culture. It will add a real sense of fun to proceedings with local marshals offering directions and answering queries in their finest cockney,’ explained Lord Coe. ‘OK, the more fluent guides may hinder more than help at times, but you never know its origins as a means for residents to communicate freely without interlopers understanding might come in handy if Olympic officials and other VIPs need to be on their toes to Steve Cram [scram] down the Sally [Gunnell -- Blackwall Tunnel] in the event of a suspected Roger [Black -- terrorist attack].’ (Source: NewsBiscuit)

English and French are the two official languages of the Games, and there was a small outcry last year when it was announced that French would take precedence over English during Olympic fortnight. Perhaps Cockney is the solution??

An amusing article from NewsBiscuit (“the news before it happens”) has French President Nicolas Sarkozy admitting that the French language is “a one thousand year old hoax”.

Apparently French is complete gibberish and all French people really speak English, except in front of British people of course. From the article:

During a speech given in received pronunciation, the French President came clean, stating that it all started off as a joke during William the Conquerer’s invasion to make the aggressors seem a bit more exotic. “What was initially a prank snowballed and after a few years we realised we’d look silly revealing the truth, so we had to keep up the façade,” said the Premier. “In the company of any Brits we would try to make convincingly “French” sounds, a mixture of guttural grunts and rapid-fire syllables.

But as soon as we were on our own we’d all heave a huge sigh of relief and revert to English. We developed a heavy reliance on hand gestures to cover up when we ran out of likely noises, and the shrug was a particular boon if inspiration dried up. In the end we became quite the raconteurs, with an impressive array of supposed vocabulary. So what began as a game for the élites, became a hobby across all levels of society, and it shocked us that the Brits were so naïve as to not see through the charade.”

It’s certainly nice to poke some fun at languages for a change!

There’s an interesting opinion piece in The Observer today about the demise of the study of French in universities in the UK, and why this should not be allowed to happen.

A lot of the writer’s arguments could also be applied to other languages. French isn’t just spoken in France, it’s spoken in countries as far apart as Canada and Senegal – Spanish is an example of another language whose speakers are spread all over the world. So just as the French of Senegal won’t be the same of the French of Quebec, so the Spanish spoken in Spain isn’t the same as spoken in Peru – different cultures and different meanings.

I also like what Hussey has to say about the benefits of studying another language:

What studying French has really done for me is to provide me with a new mental landscape. French writing, from Voltaire to Sartre to Houellebecq, has a hard, confrontational edge to it, driven by big ideas, which does not exist in the same way in the English-speaking world. This is why French literature has appealed to English writers of a certain “outsider” stripe, from George Orwell to Will Self. This is a political phenomenon as much as anything else. For a working-class intellectual (which was how I rather cockily fancied myself as a student) to speak and understand French is to short-circuit many of the stupidities of class prejudice in the UK.

Studying another language not only enables you to connect with speakers of that language, it allows you to “access the world beyond the Anglosphere”. You may learn something new – you may start to see the world in a different way. So what are you waiting for?

Continuing my occasional series of reviewing language books, here’s a slightly less serious one than before – Talk to the Snail by Stephen Clarke.

Clarke’s witty book doesn’t deal with subjects as weighty as dying languages; instead he tackles (as the book’s subtitle says) Ten Commandments for Understanding the French. Through themed chapters such as ‘Thou Shalt Be Wrong’ and ‘Thou Shalt Not Be Served’, readers are guided through how to get what they want from the French.

Helpfully each chapter ends with a list of phrases (including phonetic spellings) for visitors to France to use to get their way. Clarke clearly adores the French, for all their idiosyncratic ways, and gently mocks the national character throughout the book whilst providing handy tips on say, how to get served in a restaurant.

Definitely aimed at the British – a number of stereotypes are used) – the book is a good read, and perhaps a good accompaniment, to any trip across the Channel.

Over at the LanguageHat blog I saw a post about a live translation event taking place as part of the London Review Bookshop’s World Literature Weekend.

The challenge has been set by the francophone novelist Alain Mabanckou – two translators will offer up their translation of his short text, and then discuss and debate the differences with the author and each other. The idea is to bring out aspects of the text that aren’t normally paid attention to as well as paying attention to the process of translation itself.

Audience members will receive a copy of the French text as well as the two English translations to help them follow along.

The event is being held at the British Museum in London on Saturday 19th June. Definitely looks well worth attending!

A cool new application from Google will soon be able to help you translate from written words.

Google Goggles users can point their phone at a word or phrase they wish to have translated, and then fine-tune their onscreen selection to a smaller area. Using the phone’s camera, the application will recognise the language and give you an option to translate it. This makes the application perfect for globetrotters – whether you need a menu or sign translated, you can do so without the hassle of searching through a guide book or dictionary.

The application can only translate languages based on the Latin alphabet such as English, French, Italian, German and Spanish at the moment, but once the text is captured it can be quickly translated to other languages. Google are apparently confident that other languages, including Chinese, Arabic and Hindi will soon be added to the app.

Whilst the app is free, you’ll need a mobile device running Android 1.6 or higher. I’ll definitely be giving this a try on my trip to Italy next month!

The internet is a great resource for language learning, but only if you can find the information you need.

Good news for English speakers and language learners as English is the language most used by internet users. According to research by Internet World Stats, English is the language used by almost 30% of users. This is quite closely followed by Chinese and then Spanish. Japanese, French, Portuguese, German, Arabic, Russian and Korean round out the top 10.

Keeping this in mind, try out this game to see if you can guess the world’s top 20 most spoken languages. I think the number one will surprise you!