3 ms·

I dunno, a ton of computer related words are translated in Spanish as well. Also, courriel is not the worst offender (I quite like it), I think logiciel vs maté

by carlob 11y ago

I dunno, a ton of computer related words are translated in Spanish as well. Also, courriel is not the worst offender (I quite like it), I think logiciel vs matériel is much worse than software vs hardware as it doesn't really show the dualism between mind and matter that Descartes (a Frenchman no less) invented. Res cogitans and res extensa would have been better in my opinion…

SwellJoe 11y ago
I don't think it is comparable, unless Spain has an organization whose purpose is to prevent the influx of outside cultural influences that formalizes use of the translated words. I don't know enough about Spain to know (one of my ex-girlfriends was a Francophile, so I have some familiarity with French culture on a number of fronts, though I'm definitely not an expert).
- carlob 11y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_Academia_Española https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_Academia_Española It's similar in terms of language, but very different in terms of culture. Since Spain is a multilingual country the language is does not play a big part in the nationalistic sentiment (though this was different under Franco). The French national identity revolves pretty much around the language and its uniformity: if you went to a French public school and speak French then you are as good as French (remember that France has jus soli). You can contrast this with Germany, where there are many different dialectal variants of German and they are all acceptable and the German identity is more focussed on blood. Or with the USA which don't even have an official language. Once you understand this, you'll understand why it's so important for the France to translate everything and why they spend so much money promoting French in other countries: to them the fact that a lot of people in, say, Senegal speak French means that Senegal is somewhat still under their influence. The more people speak English in France, the more they feel they are a colony of the US.

by carlob 11y ago

SwellJoe 11y ago

I don't think it is comparable, unless Spain has an organization whose purpose is to prevent the influx of outside cultural influences that formalizes use of the translated words. I don't know enough about Spain to know (one of my ex-girlfriends was a Francophile, so I have some familiarity with French culture on a number of fronts, though I'm definitely not an expert).

carlob 11y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_Academia_Española https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_Academia_Española It's similar in terms of language, but very different in terms of culture. Since Spain is a multilingual country the language is does not play a big part in the nationalistic sentiment (though this was different under Franco). The French national identity revolves pretty much around the language and its uniformity: if you went to a French public school and speak French then you are as good as French (remember that France has jus soli). You can contrast this with Germany, where there are many different dialectal variants of German and they are all acceptable and the German identity is more focussed on blood. Or with the USA which don't even have an official language. Once you understand this, you'll understand why it's so important for the France to translate everything and why they spend so much money promoting French in other countries: to them the fact that a lot of people in, say, Senegal speak French means that Senegal is somewhat still under their influence. The more people speak English in France, the more they feel they are a colony of the US.