Alliance Française Library
Titre :
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The story of French
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Auteurs :
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Jean-Benoît Nadeau ;
Julie Barlow
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Type de document :
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texte imprimé
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Editeur :
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Knopf, 2006
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ISBN/ISSN/EAN :
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978-0-676-97734-9
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Format :
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483 p.
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Langues:
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Français
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Catégories :
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Culture
France
Francophonie / French-speaking communities
Langue française / French language
Linguistique / Linguistic
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Résumé :
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That major historical moments affect a language's development seems to be self-evident. But in the case of French, as Canadian authors Nadeau and Barlow ("Sixty Million Frenchmen Can't Be Wrong") exhaustively illustrate, this notion shouldn't be taken for granted, since an insistence on linguistic purity influences how French is taught, spoken and written. What began as a loose confederation of local dialects became mired in a particularly French obsession with linguistic propriety. Despite the natural development of French over time, "[in] the back of any francophone's mind is the idea that an ideal, pure French exists somewhere." Nadeau and Barlow traveled the world to research what they call "the mental universe of French speakers" from its center in France to such places as Canada, Senegal and Israel. "French carries with it a vision of the State and of political values, a particular set of cultural standards," the authors write. They have managed to corral what could be an ungainly subjectboth the history and the present dayin a clearly written, well-organized approach to the lingua franca of millions of people. Francophiles will be well-served by the care and detail with which the authors handle their subject, while English speakers will find an illuminating portrait of Gallic sensibility. (from Publishers Weekly)
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Genre :
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Documentaire / Non Fiction
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Exemplaires (1)
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010471 | 440 NAD | Livre | Books, audiobooks, movies, music, magazines | Documentaires / non-fiction | Disponible |