{"id":129649,"date":"2016-02-05T23:48:08","date_gmt":"2016-02-06T06:48:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/02\/05\/when-you-have-official-language-police-things-can-get-ugly.html"},"modified":"2016-02-08T15:05:59","modified_gmt":"2016-02-08T22:05:59","slug":"when-you-have-official-language-police-things-can-get-ugly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/02\/05\/when-you-have-official-language-police-things-can-get-ugly.html","title":{"rendered":"When you have Official Language Police, things can get ugly"},"content":{"rendered":"

The French are known for being … um … determined to intentionally maintain the purity of their tongue, to officially deprecate word imports in favor of their own native words, etc.<\/p>\n

But that sort of sentiment can draw flak when the government officially makes changes to the language.<\/p>\n

'French linguistic purists have voiced online anger at the removal from many words of one of their favourite accents – the pointy little circumflex hat (ˆ) that sits on top of certain vowels. Changes to around 2,400 French words to simplify them for schoolchildren, such as allowing the word for onion to be spelled<\/i> ognon as well as the traditional<\/i> oignon, have brought accusations the country’s Socialist government is dumbing down the language.'<\/i><\/p>\n

But it's not those zany Socialists this time. These changes were all proposed and approved by the language police, the Académie Française, decades ago. <\/p>\n

Language always changes. For all that people here get irked when that change is messy and pop-culture-driven, that may be a less objectionable way than to have the government pass on the dictates of the language police.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\n
\n
\n<\/a>
\nNot the oignon: fury as France changes 2,000 spellings and drops some accents<\/a><\/span>
\n#JeSuisCirconflexe campaigners fight back against decision by the Académie Française to ‘fix anomalies’ – although decision was originally made in 1990\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

View on Google+<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The French are known for being … um … determined to intentionally maintain the purity of their tongue, to officially deprecate word imports in favor of their own native words, etc. But that sort of sentiment can draw flak when the government officially makes changes to the language. 'French linguistic purists have voiced online anger … Continue reading “When you have Official Language Police, things can get ugly”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[106,24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-129649","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-plusposts","category-writing-and-language"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":42465,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/06\/09\/our-livingish-language.html","url_meta":{"origin":129649,"position":0},"title":"Our living(ish) language","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 9-Jun-14 10:34pm","format":false,"excerpt":"I find, as I grow older, that rather than being more curmudgeonly about the changes (temporary or long-term) in English, I become more fascinated. It's not just a matter of slang, but of actual, lasting tweaks to how we use words (and the words involved) that are so intensely interesting.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":128453,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/10\/28\/words-mean-things-civil-war-edition.html","url_meta":{"origin":129649,"position":1},"title":"Words Mean Things (Civil War Edition)","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 28-Oct-15 5:02am","format":false,"excerpt":"Language evolves and changes. Words get worn down over time, or drift and find new meanings. Old word stop meaning what they used to. Or sometimes our understanding of words changes, and what was acceptable becomes fraught, for reasons serious or silly.That said, I'm always a bit leery of intentional\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6603,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/08\/13\/too_many_ss.html","url_meta":{"origin":129649,"position":2},"title":"Too … many … S’s …","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 13-Aug-04 7:29am","format":false,"excerpt":"Germany seems to be in unofficial revolt against efforts by the central government to simplify language and spelling. It is the language of Goethe, the Brothers Grimm and Bertolt Brecht....","rel":"","context":"In "Politics & Law"","block_context":{"text":"Politics & Law","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4693,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/07\/18\/what_next_freed.html","url_meta":{"origin":129649,"position":3},"title":"What next, “Freedom Fries”?","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 18-Jul-03 1:10pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Ever-sensitive to non-French terms slipping into French, the government in Paris is banning e-mail. No, not banning electronic communication, banning the English word \"e-mail.\" Goodbye \"e-mail\", the French government says,...","rel":"","context":"In "Geopolitical Brouhaha"","block_context":{"text":"Geopolitical Brouhaha","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/geopolitical-brouhaha"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8600,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2005\/09\/30\/embarrassed.html","url_meta":{"origin":129649,"position":4},"title":"Embarrassed","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 30-Sep-05 8:52am","format":false,"excerpt":"So I've been noticing this bus stop bench ad which asks, \"PREGNANT? EMBARAZADA?\" Which set me to thinking ... does the Spanish word for \"pregnant\" really fundamentally mean \"embarrassed\" (as...","rel":"","context":"In "Writing and Language"","block_context":{"text":"Writing and Language","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/writing-and-language"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3991,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/03\/03\/words_mean_thin.html","url_meta":{"origin":129649,"position":5},"title":"Words mean things","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 3-Mar-03 11:11am","format":false,"excerpt":"To a certain degree, English can never be completely bound by rules and vocabulary lists. It's a living language, evolving with time, bringing in new terms, seeing old terms, old...","rel":"","context":"In "Hi-Tech"","block_context":{"text":"Hi-Tech","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/hi-tech"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129649","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=129649"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129649\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":129702,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129649\/revisions\/129702"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=129649"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=129649"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=129649"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}