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The Académie Française tries really hard to be prescriptive, and perhaps that works for the handful of elitist writers hanging out around Saint-Germain-des-Prés
by cmehdy 7y ago
The Académie Française tries really hard to be prescriptive, and perhaps that works for the handful of elitist writers hanging out around Saint-Germain-des-Prés but it definitely can't keep up with the connected world, the language that is actually spoken and used by everyone, and often gives in by being descriptive with a noticeable lag and awkwardness. It is more of a self-congratulatory circle of elites trying to uphold a (400 year-old) tradition for the fun of it, and the population often decides to use vastly different words regardless of what is considered a "real word" in French.
- huhtenberg 7y agoIt also happens a (400 year-old) tradition that was quite intentionally set up to be overly complex so to prevent unwashed gray masses from learning "proper" written French and to keep it reserved for the elite. I can't find a link right now, but there was an interview with a French linguist who explained the history of the grammar and how it came about. Was quite an eye opener and helped making some sense of why it is so bizarre.
- qwerty456127 7y agoIt's easy enough for a foreigner to learn it in a year (so all what's left is to expand the vocabulary and polish the pronunciation). How can it be hard enough to prevent natives from learning "proper" written French? Was it also illegal to teach them so being hard enough to be impossible to figure out intuitively was sufficient?