French want English out of offices, ASAP
ENGLISH is increasingly being heard in French offices, including jargon such as “workshop”, “ASAP” and “brainstorming”, a new dictionary suggests.
The Académie Française — custodian of the language that comes up with alternatives to Anglicisms — has kept English terms at bay in the bureaucracy, but its linguistic sway over the private sector has been less effective.
Already the bane of English offices, French firms are seeing more terms such as “benchmarking”, “bullet points”, and “burnout”.
The Dictionnaire du Nouveau Français lists 400 neologisms that have entered the French language but not yet been picked up by official dictionaries — and about half of them come from English.
In many cases, this simply means stealing the English term, such as drawing up a to-do list rather than a liste de choses à faire, or meeting a deadline rather than respecting a délai.
The practice has infuriated purists, with Alain Rey, a French linguist, saying: “When there is a possible French translation, I admit that I find it completely ridiculous. This supposedly universal managementspeak made up of French stuffed full of English or very bad and poorly mastered English does not guarantee clear thought.”
Jean-François Amadieu, a sociologist, said the trend “is tending to accelerate” as companies imitate each other or pick up the terms through conferences or business magazines.
Often, the French clumsily customise the English term, morphing it into Franglais, such as “switcher” (to switch) or “forwarder” (to forward).
Alexandre des Isnards, author of the dictionary, said Anglicisms in the workplace were often about efficiency. “When people are under pressure at work, they say the first word that comes into their mind. They don’t stop and analyse it and think what word they should use,” he told The Local news website.
“Sometimes English is used simply because it’s more efficient. For example, it’s quicker to say “ASAP” rather than “le plus rapidement que possible.” But the phenomenon clearly grates on many French ears, with Le Figaro calling it a “veritable scourge” and asking readers to send in pet hates. Among these were “conference call” and “drinker”— meaning to have drinks in the office. — © The Daily Telegraph, London