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02/03/2007French Connection - March 2007

French Connection - March 2007 In our monthly French language column, intrepid Douglas Campbell scours the media and tracks down the Hoodies, neologisms and 'Turkishness'.

Hoodies

Hooded tops and those who wear them are demonised in much the same way in France as here. What is different, language-wise, is that in the UK 'a hoodie' can be the item of clothing or the person who wears it, whereas in French there are two expressions.

a hoodie?

The hooded top is 'un sweat à capuche', most often with the heavily gallicised pronunciation of [swit], which is fun in its own way; sounds like 'un bonbon', looks like 'la sueur'; lovely. By the time modern spoken French has finished with the original American English of 'sweatshirt' it is all but unrecognisable, and a jolly good thing, too; no point in slavish imitation. The word is therefore not universal, even if the 'hoodie' itself is. The youngster who wears one is 'un jeune à capuche'; an international uniform. C'est beau, la mondialisation.  


As for the 'diabolisation' aspect of the 'hoodie', here is a revealing quotation from Le Monde of 17 October last year: 'Un soir, je sortais d'un match de basket avec des copains, se souvient Jonathan M., 17 ans, originaire de Corbeil. Il faisait froid, j'ai couru pour rentrer chez moi. Les flics m'ont contrôlé, je leur ai demandé pourquoi.


Ils m'ont dit : « Un Noir qui sort d'une voiture en courant, c'est suspect ». Surtout, ajoute le lycéen, s'il a le malheur de porter l'uniforme « caillera » - survêtements, baskets de marque, capuche.' Indeed; on housing schemes, whether in France or the UK, the hoodie is seen as part of the chav or young hoodlum (sans jeu de mots...) uniform, and if into the bargain you're running, it's a guaranteed ID-check.
 

 


Bravitude

the great wall

It is no doubt the least of her worries at the moment, but Ségolène Royal's involuntary neologism is at the very least a ten-day wonder, guaranteed a knowing laugh, as on Le Masque et la Plume within days of the gaffe. When in China, on the Great Wall, she came out with the following: 'Comme le disent les Chinois, qui n'est pas venu sur la Grande muraille n'est pas un brave. Qui va sur la Grande muraille conquiert la bravitude.' (Le Monde, 6 January.)


As 'le grand quotidien du soir' put it, she used 'ce néologisme de son cru au lieu du mot « bravoure ».' The online magazine L'Internaute (www.linternaute.com) had a good cartoon on this slip, showing 'Ségo' inventing other even more improbable neologisms, such as 'Ségolènement', 'Présidentialerie' and 'Secondtourable'. 

 


Talking of neologisms... / Vous avez dit neologismes?

A pundit briefly interviewed on the France Culture 10pm news the other day came out with another variation on 'le politiquement correct'; I've noted a few over the years, in past columns, including 'gastronomiquement correct'. Referring to the need of all the candidates to be fashionably green, she came out with 'il y a un climatiquement correct sur l'échiquier politique.' Can you be 'climactically correct'? Well, the French didn't exist until 29 January; it could well be a deranged one-off.
 


Even more neologisms

I heard the admirable Marc Kravetz, on France Culture, thinking on his feet in a piece about the murdered Armenian journalist Hrant Dink. Referring to an English-language text on the question of 'l'identité turque' which used the term 'Turkishness', and receiving audible advice from others in the studio, he came out with the following pair of possibilities: 'Turkicité' and 'Turkitude', and then some wag in the studio yelled out 'Turkicitude' ... which brings us neatly back to Ségolène's 'bravitude'. 'Celtitude' is after all well established in the language as an equivalent of 'Celtishness', and Senghor defiantly invented 'la négritude', so the ending is a perfectly standard one.
 


Re-néologismes, rebelote

If you want to know what officially-sanctioned neologisms have been invented and have appeared in the Journal officiel since 1997, first head for the site of the DGLF, now officially the DGLFLF because of the addition of the very 'linguistiquement correct' tag 'et aux langues de France' to the original 'Délégation générale à la langue française...' Then click on 'vocabulaire et terminologie', and the next page will offer several fascinating possibilities.

eating as posing

Lists, databases, official recommendations of alternatives to mad false anglicisms such as 'le fooding'; hours of fun. 'Le fooding' - basically, eating as posing - is a typical example of the French tendency to think that if it ends in '-ing' it must be an authentic English word. C'est du foutage de gueule, non? The site is very much worth a visit at www.dglflf.culture.gouv.fr.

 

Dougal Campbell, French language tutor at Glasgow University
 
Please contact the author with any comments and similar amuse-gueule snippets of French, at D.Campbell@french.arts.gla.ac.uk

[Copyright Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd 2007]


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