Almost 10 years ago I left my homeland and moved to the other side of my country, Venezuela, for work reasons. Months after arriving in Barinas, I discovered that a few blocks from my office there was a branch of the Alliance Française: the largest network for the diffusion of French language and culture in the world. After more than a decade of mastering the English language, I decided to move on to a third language.
In a few months I learned a lot about the similarities between Spanish (my native language) and French, which is logical since both are descendants of Latin. However, I was surprised to learn that there are also many similarities between English and French, due to their extensive geographical and historical relationship.
Here are some curious and interesting facts about one of the most studied, important and influential languages in the world today: French.
Besides English, this is the only language which is spoken on five continents. As you read it: French is not only spoken in France. It is also the official language of Madagascar, Belgium, Canada, Ivory Coast or Switzerland, and so on up to a total of 32 countries around the world.
A living language
French is a language in constant growth. From 2014 to 2019, the number of French speakers has increased by 9.6%. The biggest advance is in Africa, with 17%, something logical knowing that 59% of French speakers live on the African continent.
In French there is no such thing as ¨cheap¨.
The word "cheap", which is used in English to refer to a reduced price, does not exist in French. Instead, equivalents such as "pas cher" (not expensive) or "bon marché" (good price) are used. This phenomenon is very frequent when literal translations are made. Therefore, languages should often not be translated, but interpreted.
There are words that do not rhyme with anything
The words "quatorze", "quinze" and "monstre" ("fourteen", "fifteen" and "monster") do not rhyme with any other word in French. This, being the language of many artists of letters, such as poets and writers, it is a very useful curiosity.
Irregular plurals
The word "eye" in French ("oeil") is the only word that begins with a different letter in its singular ("oeil") and plural ("yeux") forms.
Official language of England...
French was the official language of the English country during the 300 years in which the Normans conquered the English-speaking territory. In fact, it is currently estimated that one third of the lexicon of the English language has a French root.
Studying French
There are more than 132 million people studying French in the world. More than 80 million people study French and more than 50 million people in all countries study it as a foreign language. It is the second most studied language after English.
It is necessary to invest about 600 hours to begin to get by in the language. French uses five diacritics (acute, circumflex, grave, cedilla and diaeresis), which makes pronunciation one of the greatest challenges for foreigners learning the language.
As you can see, mastering a language does not only imply knowing its grammatical rules, knowing how to use its lexicon or getting a good pronunciation. But learning a language also means knowing its history, its transformations and its particularities... And you, have you had any knowledge or contact with the French language?
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I'm glad you are studying French. I like that language.