Language ideologies in 19th and 21st century language commentary on French

What is it about?

This book explores how people think and talk about language. It examines language discussions from two different time periods, the 19th and 21st centuries, to show how these have evolved. Each of the sources examined gives us access to two perspectives: that of the 'expert' and their 'audience', e.g. the 19th century resource is a language advice publication where the 'audience' send in questions about language to the 'expert' who publishes them with his response in a biweekly pamphlet. This is compared to an online question and answer service run by the Service du Dictionnaire, a group of language professionals linked to the Académie française.

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Photo by Salah Ait Mokhtar on Unsplash

Photo by Salah Ait Mokhtar on Unsplash

Why is it important?

Lots of research has examined the 'expert' perspective in language commentary, but much less has considered that of the 'audience'. This is, in part, because the 'audience' perspective has historically been harder to access. Examining both the 'expert' and 'audience' perspective allows us to understand how language is thought about and talked about by a much broader spectrum of people. This book intends to show the merits of 'dialogic' commentary (texts where there is conversation between two or more parties) and reveals some striking similarities in the ways in which 'experts' and their 'audiences' discuss language. There is a large and significant body of research on French language culture, but thus far the 19th and 21st centuries have received little attention. This book highlights the importance of both periods as times of change for the French language and reveals how the genre of language commentary has evolved over time.

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