3 ms·

I can understand the reason for this. English has established a hegemony over the world, especially in science and technology. They are fighting this, and don’t

I can understand the reason for this. English has established a hegemony over the world, especially in science and technology. They are fighting this, and don’t want their language polluted with an increasing conglomeration of English words that are often unnecessary, as equivalent words exist in French.

chrisseaton 5y ago
Why are they fighting it? What’s the problem has to be fought against? What will happen if they don’t fight? Is it just a weird xenophobic thing?
- leephillips 5y ago
  Linguistic hegemony can be felt as related to cultural and political hegemony. Just as something would be lost if the world only had one language, it’s natural for people to ask why, if our language has a fine word for something already, we have to throw it out and use a foreign word instead. Language is bound up with history and culture. People have affection for these things, and don’t always want to toss them away willy-nilly. There also is the aesthetic dimension. It may be harder for us US people to understand. Ours is a dominant society, and English dominance is only gaining ground. We are not the ones losing our traditions. Preserving something of your heritage is not xenophobia.
  - wwtrv 5y ago
    Not sure if France, whose government eradicated many local languages and dialects in geographical France throughout the 19th & 20th centuries and is not very eager to protect what survives of them now is the best example in this case, though. e.g. in the mid 19th century 4/10 of all people in France spoke Occitan as their native language, how many do now?
- denton-scratch 5y ago
  It's not xenophobic, but it is nationalistic and atavistic. There was a time when French had a chance of establishing itself as a "Lingua Franca" (sic); French is still considered the primary language of international law, I believe. The distaste for loanwords seems to be a sort of harking back to what might have been.
nitwit005 5y ago
They wouldn't approve of a bunch of German words being used either. It just tends to be mostly English at the moment. They just view foreign influence on the language as bad, even though that's been going on since the dawn of time.

chrisseaton 5y ago

Why are they fighting it? What’s the problem has to be fought against? What will happen if they don’t fight? Is it just a weird xenophobic thing?

leephillips 5y ago
Linguistic hegemony can be felt as related to cultural and political hegemony. Just as something would be lost if the world only had one language, it’s natural for people to ask why, if our language has a fine word for something already, we have to throw it out and use a foreign word instead. Language is bound up with history and culture. People have affection for these things, and don’t always want to toss them away willy-nilly. There also is the aesthetic dimension. It may be harder for us US people to understand. Ours is a dominant society, and English dominance is only gaining ground. We are not the ones losing our traditions. Preserving something of your heritage is not xenophobia.
- wwtrv 5y ago
  Not sure if France, whose government eradicated many local languages and dialects in geographical France throughout the 19th & 20th centuries and is not very eager to protect what survives of them now is the best example in this case, though. e.g. in the mid 19th century 4/10 of all people in France spoke Occitan as their native language, how many do now?
denton-scratch 5y ago
It's not xenophobic, but it is nationalistic and atavistic. There was a time when French had a chance of establishing itself as a "Lingua Franca" (sic); French is still considered the primary language of international law, I believe. The distaste for loanwords seems to be a sort of harking back to what might have been.

nitwit005 5y ago

They wouldn't approve of a bunch of German words being used either. It just tends to be mostly English at the moment. They just view foreign influence on the language as bad, even though that's been going on since the dawn of time.