Academie Francaise

One of the topics I've heard much about since my time in France has been "l'Academie Francaise", an official state-sponsored group of 40 important literary and political figures whose charge is to safeguard the French language. l'Academie has been in existence since 1635 (courtesy of Cardinal Richilieu), was briefly abolished during the French Revolution, and currently resides in a magnificent building on the Seine. They routinely discuss the state of the French language and make formal recommendations as to things such as the spelling of a given word, specific minutiae of grammar, whether or not to formally adopt English words into the language, etc. I guess I've always thought that this is a little funny because I don't think the U.S., or any other English-speaking nation, has a similar governing body to "protect the purity of the English language." However, it's also kind of cool to have a definitive reference as to what the specific rule is. Sure, in the U.S. we have things like "Webster's Dictionary" and "White's Elements of Style," but neither of these is associated with the official government nor is their word considered an official edict.

An example of one of the "success stories" of l'Academie Francaise, according to one of my neighbors who is a professor of French society at Wellesley, is the "Walkman", which as we all know is the line of products developed by Sony that became the standard for portable music. The Walkman line was so successful of course that we often refer to any portable cassette or radio as a "Walkman", even if it's not a Sony brand. Evidently, the same thing began to happen in France, but when l'Academie weighed in with its opinion, it felt the need to "frenchify" the word, which they recommended be "baladeur" ("balader" is the verb for "to walk" or "to take a stroll"). Several years later, "baladeur" is the preferred word in the French language.