Language of love cares little for other tongues;ANALYSIS Is it religious prejudice, the oppression of freedom or fervent natio nalism? Trevor Royle unearths the roots of France`s long-standi ng war on the outside world
France is desperately proud of its individual cultural identity and no other European country, with the possible
exception of Russia, has done so much to protect ''l'exception Francaise'' from unwelcome
external influences.
Take the national tongue. France is one of the few countries in the world where the language of the street bears
little relationship to the language of officialdom. Thanks to the power and influence of the French Academy, the final
arbiter on matters linguistic, foreign words are barred from virtually all business and government communications,
public announcements and advertisements if a ''suitable local equivalent'' exists in French. This
means that in official papers ''courriel'' is preferred to e-mail, ''coussin gonfable de
protection'' has to be used in place of air-bag and fast food becomes ''restauration
rapide''.
History has played a great part in developing the country's cultural protectionism in that the official state
language slowly spread out from Paris into regions such as Alsace, Brittany and Le Midi, where French was not the native
tongue. A centrist policy was in place by the 16th century and 200 years later the revolution made it de riguer to stamp
out non-French idioms which might also be considered counter-revolutionary or even treasonable. Traditionalists and
patriots regard the policy as admirable, being part of a national outlook which embraces the three-hour lunch, extended
holidays, striking as a means of industrial expression, an emphasis on individualism, a refusal to be upset by notices
bearing the message ''en panne'' (broken down) and a reluctance to criticise an older man for having
a younger mistress. As Mark Twain observed of the latter difference: ''A Frenchman's house is where
another man's wife is.''
Cultural protectionism allowed a minister of culture, Jack Lang, to more or less declare war on films made by
Hollywood and it brought a large measure of public approbation for the environmentalist Jose Bove when he tried to
destroy a McDonald's restauration rapide. Bove's beef was not so much with the food on offer or that
hamburgers were being served ''bien cuit'' (well done) - he objected that the chain might one day
destroy French culinary culture.
In both cases there was something heroic, if doomed, about the actions. Lang led the European charge to introduce
quotas or barriers to prevent the mass importation of what he described as cheapjack US movies and television programmes
in the 1990s. His argument was supported by the distinguished director Bertrand Tavernier, who likened Hollywood's
hegemony to the treatment of native Americans a century earlier, but the upholders of the tradition were swimming
against the tide. McDonald's survived and the rapid spread of satellite channels made quotas and barriers tricky to
impose.
Seen from another angle, though, many younger French people find the strict emphasis claustrophobic and increasingly
unworkable. In an age of cultural diversity they want to be part of the revolution, not on the outside looking in
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