Parlez vous Franglais? A historical study on the detrimental influence of the English language in France and Quebec

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18-12-11 ENG SL Lang & Lit             Vienna International School              Pablo del Pino 11B    

Parlez vous Franglais? A historical study on the detrimental influence of the English language in France and Quebec

Language planning is the attempt to influence how a language is used. Language planning in my opinion is the tool governments have to protect or revitalize their languages.

In Europe, it is done in countries such as France, the Netherlands, Belgium. For instance, there is an intergovernmental treaty, the Taalunie between the Netherlands and Belgium to protect and promote the Dutch language.  The two countries agreed to pursue a common policy on the Dutch language. The policy was set by the Committee of Ministers (comité van ministers), a commission comprising the Dutch and Flemish ministers for education and culture and a representative from Surinam.

In Europe, there is also a network of European language planning boards for minority languages such as Catalan, Galician and Basque from Spain, Frisian from the Netherlands, Gaelic from Ireland, Swedish from Finland, and Welsh from the United Kingdom.

These are all examples of the use of language planning in Europe. Nonetheless, in t

 his study, my focus will be on the influence of the English language on France and Quebec, particularly the overflow of Americanisms in French and Quebecer society because of its leading in importance and controversial nature to its inhabitants.

Words have always been imported and exported from one language to another. They are called loans. Empires come and go. Nowadays, the United States of America is the leading economic and military power. Before that, there was the British Empire. Before that, it was France and even before that there was the Spanish empire. They all exported their words for the objects or ideas that they created into other languages that demanded their use.

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Being a leading economic power gives you the ability to create products that are going to be used all around the world (e.g. the computer, the radar, the scanner, etc). In some cases, the name of these products will be translated in other languages. For instance, computer was translated into French as ordinateur. However, in other cases, the word will not suffer any changes. It is called computer also in Italian, Dutch or Russian.

The problem in many languages is what the French call anglomanie, that is to say, many French people use English words, not because ...

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