3 ms·
The Académie française does not edict official rules. Nobody does, there is no official governing authority for the French language but the ministry of Educatio
by seszett 2y ago
The Académie française does not edict official rules. Nobody does, there is no official governing authority for the French language but the ministry of Education is the main reference in France. Their rules are generally used for official documents, and since they decide what gets taught to children that's what becomes the normal language when the children become adults.
Also, it costs about 1 million euros per year[0], I wouldn't call that very expensive on the scale of a country like France. Even if it's absolutely useless.
In practice, zero is normally singular in French unless you want to show that there is none of a number of things ("zéro produits artificiels", "zéro émissions").
[0]https://www.liberation.fr/checknews/2017/12/14/bonjour-combien-l-academie-francaise-coute-t-elle-au-contribuable-son-fonctionnement-est-il-soumis-a_1652756/ https://www.liberation.fr/checknews/2017/12/14/bonjour-combi...
- thrance 2y agoLast I heard it was closer to 5 millions, which regardless of the amount goes directly into the pockets of some reactionary old dudes. They don't make a rule book, but they often make blog posts in which they clarify how they want "proper french" to look like.
- seszett 2y ago> they often make blog posts in which they clarify how they want "proper french" to look like. Anybody has the right to do that, they're mostly writers so they have an opinion on the language, but at the same time they're not linguists so they can't really be a prescriptive source. They just give their (usually reactionary) opinion. I was just making clear that they don't make the rules. The Ministry of Education kinda does, and is often at odds with the Académie especially when it comes to the orthography reforms.