La Langue Française: Losing Numerous Speakers?

[Catfish]

I hope it works out great for them. FSI French, Assimil, and French in Action are good courses that they could use when they get a little older.
You are far too kind. Thanks again.

P.S. My youngest daughter has a French first name and many
people look at us like they have either never have heard of it
before or think it's a boys name.

[ilv2]

what's her name?

Personally (and this is a view of an academic), I would strongly recommend getting professional help, either through classes or contact with native francophone people in your area - the alliance française is great for this as they reunite some of the french community (events etc.) and also provide classes and a good learning environment for interested americans. they are also great people too, so there's a chance you can forge friendships beyond the organization. (sorry if this sounded like a plug, but it's the truth! :D)

given that you're located in Ohio, there are a couple branches that you can check out : Cincinnati, Kent, Columbus, Toledo.
http://www.alliance-us.org//en/Directory.aspx

[Catfish]

what's her name?

Personally (and this is a view of an academic), I would strongly recommend getting professional help, either through classes or contact with native francophone people in your area - the alliance française is great for this as they reunite some of the french community (events etc.) and also provide classes and a good learning environment for interested americans. they are also great people too, so there's a chance you can forge friendships beyond the organization. (sorry if this sounded like a plug, but it's the truth! :D)

given that you're located in Ohio, there are a couple branches that you can check out : Cincinnati, Kent, Columbus, Toledo.
http://www.alliance-us.org//en/Directory.aspx
WOW! I'm so flattered. Thanks for the info.
We are moving back to Chicago. I used your link and found 4 groups in
the Chicago land area. Sounds fascinating. I'm a very curious person
and a historian who loves these kind of cultural exchange opportunities.

[Douai]

Catfish, its really up to you how you want your children to learn the language, but several polyglots agree that it is actually better to self-study. Some classes can be like learning a language in school with very few hours, few oral drills, and other things. I have done clases at Alliance française before. It was okay. They gave me a textbook, and tapes. Each session was once a week for 2 hours, and for several weeks. Honestly, by the end of the course I don't think it helped people get very far in the beginner level. The tapes didn't have that much material, and each session really didn't teach much. However, my local Alliance française may just be poor. I am not entirely dismissing language classes. My dad learned English from an immersion class in the United States. So you do have some that can be useful. This quote from a language website lists some problems with certain language classes. If you are no more of schoolage, you can still choose to take language classes. My advice is : avoid group classes at any cost. They are a waste of time, unless you are at a very advanced level. You'd better save some money to buy good tapes and private lessons when you are more advanced. To tell you that there are three word genres in russian, or that you put s at the end of words in spanish to denote plurality, you don't need a teacher. With a good book, you'll be able to learn at your own pace, re-read what is difficult for you, browse through the easy parts, etc... All this at midnight or on Sunday if you want. Which classes are that convenient?

Some people say that they would not study if they were to do it on their own, that the regularity of the class helps them win over their laziness or lack of will. This is NOT sufficient. Unmotivated or lazy people will never master their target language, classes or not.
-François Micheloud

[Catfish]

Catfish, its really up to you how you want your children to learn the language, but several polyglots agree that it is actually better to self-study. Some classes can be like learning a language in school with very few hours, few oral drills, and other things. I have done clases at Alliance française before. It was okay. They gave me a textbook, and tapes. Each session was once a week for 2 hours, and for several weeks. Honestly, by the end of the course I don't think it helped people get very far in the beginner level. The tapes didn't have that much material, and each session really didn't teach much. However, my local Alliance française may just be poor. I am not entirely dismissing language classes. My dad learned English from an immersion class in the United States. So you do have some that can be useful. This quote from a language website lists some problems with certain language classes.
-François Micheloud
Thanks for your thoughts. I agree that the best method is total
immersion. It forces you to learn the new language and you hear
it over and over again from native speakers.

[ilv2]

Motivation and immersion are the key words. IMO the greatest strength of the af is their ability to bring together francophone speakers and french people, which is really damn hard to do in any other setting. What you get out of how much you invest at your time (motivation and immersion) has a higher amount of potential at the af than with self-instruction and private tutors, clearly, as there is no other concentration of people more available and eager to help others learn the language. One just needs to put in the effort and realize that merely classes is not going to turn you into a french champion, ever. For example, there are an extraordinary amount of people in my french major who have difficulties identifying indirect objects, direct objects, using different verb tenses, or even conjugating them - beginning material! And these people love learning french too as much as they love those wonderful views from montmartre and crepe stands :rolleyes:. Yet, no amount of self-inspiration is going to overcome the simple fact that learning a language is pure tedium and narrowly focused. Involving yourself with native speakers and partaking in those cultural exchanges give you not only actives examples and a source of assistance, but a goal to which you can aspire to.

I agree, however, that learning at your own pace is nice. But again, professional help either through tutoring or small classes is the most effective way to help you master the intricacies of grammar (the french love their grammar). Otherwise, who's going to catch your mistakes made in conversation or in writing? Yourself? The desire to "do it yourself" is admirable, but good quality instruction and an eagerness to make the most of it will carry oneself both farther and faster. However, as Douai mentioned, there's always a possibility that the help is bad. Fortunately, Chicago has a significant concentration of french expats and immigrants who have settled in the area, so whatever organizations exist there should be quite excellent.

[Ballon d'or Identity]

Just watched the french news which I TIVO every evening... had a reportage on francophonie worldwide (they said 200 million people are francophone in the world making it the 9th most spoken language in the world) and they specifically spoke about vietnam, interesting because i mentioned it in my post yesterday... go to the link below and you'll find on the right one of the report called Vietnam: la france se perd
http://jt.france2.fr/20h/

enjoy

200 million ???
i think it's too much, i heard 125 million and that would be a better figure.
Can someone with the knowledge fill the blanks ?

64 million in France
million in Belgium
thousands or million in Luxembourg
million in Swizterland
million in Canada
million in Africa

I'm sure that if you add up all those figures, you can't reach 200 million people.

My point of view is pretty pessimistic regarding the french language influence unfortunaly.
If you were a non-french speaker would you chose to learn french ?
What for ? International business is in english. If you want to be understood from south america to China english is the ticket. No other anguage does that.
Plus the french language depends a lot on France itself. If France loses power and its influence then other francophone countries won't be able to resist since they do not have influence or economic power nor are large enough either to compete against english, spanish and why not someday chinese.

A lot of english speaking countries do not have that problem.
Spanish is becoming a force to reckon with since so many hispanic are making it in the US and export their language with them.
Plus the whole of south america is behind too (except for Brasil). We don't have that luxury.

French might be nice to foreign ears, but it's not enough and it's it's easy to learn and by today's standards (where everything has to be done fast) it's not good.
People are willing to learn if they see a reward. Learning a tough language knowing it won't be of any use, what's the point ?
I think eventually french will be like Italian someday.

[Catfish]

A lot of english speaking countries do not have that problem.
Spanish is becoming a force to reckon with since so many hispanic are making it in the US and export their language with them.
Plus the whole of south america is behind too (except for Brasil). We don't have that luxury.
I already know Spanish...took 5 yrs of it. I'm not fluent, but I can get
by; I can read it and understand the spoken word. I'm slow on speaking and writing. I'm sure with more practice that could be improved.

[Douai]

200 million ???
i think it's too much, i heard 125 million and that would be a better figure.
Can someone with the knowledge fill the blanks ?



La Francophonie dans le monde 2006-2007 gives these figures:
* 128 million Francophones - Speak French (as a native or adopted language) fluently and use it on a regular basis.
* 72 million "partiel" Francophones - Live in a francophone country but do not speak French regularly, due to limited knowledge.
* 100-110 million students of all ages - Do not live in a francophone country, but have learned/are learning French in order to communicate with Francophones.

http://french.about.com/library/bl-whatisfrench.htm

I think eventually french will be like Italian someday.

I find that statement very sad :( , especially since that isn't unlikely. Supposely, more and more Americans are learning Spanish instead of French. Some French speaking African countries are getting closer to China than France since China is providing economic aid. I also heard that most riders in the peloton in Le Tour de France mostly speak in English now. They used to speak mostly French. Some teams stress that their cyclists learn English. I don't think that Chinese will ever be the international language like English. It is too hard for people, and most Chinese people learn English anyway.

[guignol]

If you were a non-french speaker would you chose to learn french ? What for ?to be able to read les cahiers du football of course!;)

and also proust, celine... there are more good reasons than simply practical ones to do something!

lastly, giving youself over to english means giving yourself over to CNN, directly or indirectly. speaking another language, and particularly french in today's context, is like going through the looking glass.

[Ballon d'or Identity]

I find that statement very sad :( , especially since that isn't unlikely...

Well sorry, but i don't see much alternative to that. Unless you deal with french speaking countries economically you won't use it (and even they use english sometimes), culturally we're not much of a force either. We have culture yes plenty of it, but we live on our past, we attract thanks to our history, but by today's standards we're not world beaters in terms of cinema (yes we are n°1 in Europe but we can't say our films are passionaly anticipated even in France), pop culture (we don't make trends, we have become followers), our artists don't export.
Those are today's tools of influence and we're playing too little a part to impose our language. And as we don't have massive populations speaking french influencing a country like the US, like spanish does, i can't really see how things could improve for the french language.