27.363, Review: Historical Ling; Lang Acq; Socioling: Argent, Rjéoutski, Offord (2014)

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Subject: 27.363, Review: Historical Ling; Lang Acq; Socioling: Argent, Rjéoutski, Offord (2014)

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Date: Tue, 19 Jan 2016 16:08:43
From: Judith Bridges [jcbridges at mail.usf.edu]
Subject: European Francophonie

 
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Book announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/25/25-3512.html

AUTHOR: Vladislav  Rjéoutski
AUTHOR: Gesine  Argent
EDITOR: Derek  Offord
TITLE: European Francophonie
SUBTITLE: The Social, Political and Cultural History of an International Prestige Language
SERIES TITLE: Historical Sociolinguistics - Band 1
PUBLISHER: Peter Lang AG
YEAR: 2014

REVIEWER: Judith Bridges, University of South Florida

Reviews Editor: Helen Aristar-Dry

SUMMARY

“European Francophonie: The Social, Political, and Cultural History of an
International Language”, edited by Vladislav Rjéoutski, Gesine Argent, and
Derek Offord, surveys the usage of French beyond France mostly between the
mid-seventeenth century and the nineteenth, but at times as broadly as the
Middle Ages and the twentieth century. The volume arose from a series of
seminars and commissioned papers from various scholars on francophonie in
Europe; it comprises twelve chapters, each examining a different language
community. Accompanied by two introductory chapters and a conclusion chapter,
this volume provides a robust depiction of the topic of French in European
language communities outside of France. The volume also provides notes on
contributing authors and an index. 

As the title conveys, the volume explores the history of social, political and
cultural issues of French as an internationally prestigious language. Some of
the sociolinguistic matters covered include the multilingualism of European
communities, French as a language of prestige and as a lingua franca, the
usage of French and its connection with speakers’ class, gender, language
ideologies and level of education, and the choice of French among the
nobility, in the courts, and as a method of cultural transmission. French
usage in these dimensions is investigated amongst twelve linguistic
communities: medieval English, Piedmontese, Italian, Dutch, German (Prussian),
Bohemian, Spanish, Swedish, Polish, Romanian, Imperial Russian, and Ottoman
Turkish. 

The first of two introductory chapters is authored by the co-editors Gesine
Argent, Vladislav Rjéoutski and Derek Offord. I dwell on this chapter at some
length because it is fundamental. First the reader is afforded with a useful
overview of the term ‘francophonie,’ plus how and why this term can be
problematic depending on the time frame. The authors then establish an
impression of the attitudes towards the French language in the seventeenth
century as an idealized notion of a universal syntax and pure, polite, and
unambiguous expression. These ideologies often impacted some previous
sociolinguistic studies of francophonie. The chapter summarizes some past
attempts to paint an all-inclusive picture of French and its influence in
Europe, many of which fell short of explaining why French and its reputation
developed in the matter that it did, other than ‘by its own virtue’. 

This chapter additionally explains that while there is an abundance of
literature on the spread of English and other languages, as well as modern
language spread and multilingualism, there is a dearth of works examining
historical francophonie across Europe from a sociological point of view. It
proceeds to define the dimensions, paradigms, and relevant questions explored
by scholars of historical sociolinguistics, and precisely how the volume –
despite the limitations of having no access to reliable spoken data – was able
to examine the history of French as a language of civilization, while dealing
with the fact that languages do not simply become prestigious on their own. In
sum, this chapter provides a marvelous introduction to historical
sociolinguistics and orients the reader for the rest of the volume. 

The second chapter by Peter Burke continues as a very useful overview of the
concept of diglossia. Like the first chapter, this chapter prepares the reader
for the following chapters. Burke concisely describes the extensive subject of
diglossia, taking into account the complexity of diglossia’s geopolitics and
sociology. In this chapter, the reader learns that French is a very famous
example of a High form language used on a multinational level in early modern
Europe. 

In Chapter Three, the volume begins its focus on individual linguistic
regions. “The French of Medieval England”, by Marianne Ailes and Ad Putter,
focus on the centuries immediately after the Norman Conquest. This chapter
examines why French became a major language in medieval England, who used
French and why, what impact did francophonie in England have on francophone
literature elsewhere, and why English increased as a written language while
French ceased to be a mother tongue by the mid-thirteenth century. Finally,
despite the ascendancy of English, the authors show that the French language
continued to thrive as a useful language, spoken and written, all the way
through the fifteenth century. This chapter thoroughly portrays the duration
of francophonie in England with each claim illustrated by specific examples of
letters, literature, chansons, instruction manuals, and various chronicles. 

Chapter Four, “Knowledge of French in Piedmont” by Alda Rossebastiano
documents the manifestation of francophonie in this uniquely situated region
that bridges the Italo-Romance and the Gallo-Romance territories.
Rossebastiano begins the treatment of French in Piedmont by summarizing the
decline of French as a common tongue especially in higher society, to
eventually yielding to Italian as Italy became unified in 1860. The chapter
continues on to describe the earlier periods when French was more present in
Piedmont, such as the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, when French was
used in the court system, in official documents, or for scientific,
historical, military, or administrative subjects. The author argues for the
strong interference of the French and culture with numerous examples of loan
words, quantitative information such as the percentage of French books in
circulation during the sixteenth century, and a table that shows the
prevalence of French in onomastics. 

The fifth chapter is Nadia Minerva’s “The Two Latin Sisters: Representations
of the French and the French Language in Italy,” in which Minerva shows the
influence of ‘Gallomania’ and ‘Gallophobia’ in Italy. Specifically, the
chapter covers the history between Italy and France from the seventeenth
century to the early nineteenth century, when resistance movements increased
during the era of Napoleonic invasions. Minerva demonstrates the prestigious
status of French, how it evolved and came to impose on national identity, and
how the obsession with French gradually dissipated. The information in this
chapter is supported with a synthesis of some previous research on the topic,
and plenty of examples that aid in illustrating each step of the evolution of
the French language’s prestige and usage in Italy.

In the following chapter, Madeleine van Strien-Chardonneau offers an overview
on how French was used among the Dutch elites in the eighteenth century. The
chapter begins its treatment of French in Holland with a portrayal of the more
overarching historical and linguistic background, explaining how French spread
and by whom. French acquired certain features as a language for international
connections, in literary societies, and in the private dimension of letters
and personal journals. The Dutch elite were mostly bilingual, and, similar to
elsewhere in Europe, by the end of the Napoleonic era French as a symbol of
cosmopolitanism began to fade, and French became primarily a foreign language
learned in school. 

In Chapter Seven, “The Domains of Francophonie and Language Ideology in
Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Prussia,” Manuela Böhm sketches the usage
and the role of the French language, as well as the traces that francophonie
left behind, in four different domains: the nobility, the sciences and
scholarship, higher education, and Berlin (where French usage trickled down
even to the informal language of the lower social classes). For each domain,
Böhm outlines how French usage in Prussia was linked to both the speaker’s
being part of a particular social group, and the speaker’s being in a certain
location, consolidating each point with various examples. 

The eighth chapter explores “Aristocratic Francophone Literature in Bohemia,”
in which Ivo Cerman refers frequently to French as the “aristocratic
sociolect” of eighteenth-century Bohemia (p. 209). In other words, French was
a language which was used to demarcate the separation between the aristocracy
and the general public. This chapter outlines the two contradictory functions
of French: first, as a language of the private sphere, such as performative
literature of aristocratic women; and secondly, a scholarly language used in
the literary public sphere. Cerman addresses the roles of francophonie in
Bohemia all the while retaining the cultural multilingualism and diversity of
the Bohemian Lands as other languages, namely German, Latin, and Czech, were
used for essentially all other spoken and written functions of the public
sphere, even among the aristocracy. 

In Chapter Nine, “Francophonies in Spain,” the authors Amelia Sanz-Cabrerizo,
Begoña Regueiro-Salgado, Luis Pablo-Núñez and Silvano Carrasco trace the
importation of the French language and culture into Spain. This chapter
discusses first how French was used and played a role as a second language of
culture in Spain and separately treats each period from the sixteenth through
the twentieth century. While considering the political and geographical
factors, the authors outline the flux of linguistic and imperial hegemony in
Europe from Spain to France during the seventeenth century, and the role of
the Bourbon dynasty that has been on the Spanish throne since 1700. Next is a
discussion on immigrant groups from France before the French Revolution, the
subsequent transculturation of French culture into Spain, and how the French
culture far outspread the reach of the French language in Spain,
differentiating Spain from other European countries. 

Margareta Östman addresses the structure of seventeenth-, eighteenth-, and
nineteenth-century Swedish francophonie in the next chapter, or more
specifically, in which ranks of Swedish society the most French was used, and
for what motives. First Östman provides some historical background of Sweden
in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, during which francophonie enjoyed
its glory days in Sweden. Östman provides a variety of stances on Swedish
francophonie. First, the instruction of French was undertaken by people from a
range of social positions. Östman evidences Swedish francophonie with tables
and charts based on a compilation of over 450 texts, showing the francophone
population in Sweden from a sociological perspective. The linguistic and
orthographic quality of French writing by Swedes is examined, and the chapter
concludes with an analysis of how Swedes perceived the influence of French in
their country. 

In Chapter 11, Maciej Serwański and Katarzyna Napierała contribute to the
volume with “The Presence of Francophonie in Poland from the Sixteenth Century
to the Eighteenth.” Serwański and Napierała begin by describing early modern
Poland and its political, social, and cultural characteristics, followed by
the relations between the Nobles’ Republic of Poland and France during the
time period at hand. The authors set up the background context of French in
Poland with the courts of two French queens of Polish kings during the era.
Various perspectives of the manifestation of French in Poland is examined,
including the way it was learned, how well it was acquired, and the cultural
role it played such as in literature, theatre, and the press.

The twelfth chapter, “The Beginnings of the Golden Age of Francophonie among
the Romanians” by Ileana Mihaila examines the spread and influence of French
in Romania, and the development of a tradition of francophone writing in
Romania from the seventeenth to the nineteenth century. Like other chapters,
this one begins with a historical sketch. Against the background of the Age of
Enlightenment, the French Revolution, the Napoleonic Wars, and the 1848
revolutions across Europe, the author offers a historical review of
francophonie in the Romanian Lands, its reception and the ideologies towards
it, and its usage there. The chapter also describes the public instruction and
private tutoring of French across Romania and its cultural impact. Finally,
Mihaila explains the impact of a high demand for the works of French authors
which subsequently, through translation efforts, had a positive linguistic
impact on Romanian literary language. 

The next chapter, by Derek Offord, is “Francophonie in Imperial Russia.”
Offord begins the account of French in Russian courts and among the Russian
nobility by describing its development, its maintenance, and then its decline.
This historical context focuses mainly on the period from the mid-eighteenth
century to the mid-nineteenth, during which French went from being widely used
among the social elite to being restricted in usage, as a result of major
sociocultural changes. The reader is presented numerous examples of the impact
of French on the Russian lexicon and various social elements of French usage
in Russia. Lastly Offord discusses francophonie in Russian literature,
specifically some major works, such as Tolstoy’s War and Peace. The works were
written after Russia’s defeat in the Crimean War, which led to deep reflection
on national identity. The result was a shift away from a culture dictated by
the social elite and towards linguistic unity. 

The fourteenth chapter focuses on the volume’s last of twelve linguistic
communities. “French in Ottoman Turkey: ‘The Language of the Afflicted
Peoples’?” by Laurent Mignon outlines a story of francophonie that is
different from the others previously described. Unlike other regions whose
accounts necessarily center largely on the social elite and cultural authority
of French, the context of Turkish francophonie was mostly that of ambivalence
regarding cultural hegemony spread via French. After an introduction of the
multilingual history of the Ottoman Empire and where French fit therein,
Mignon documents the Ottoman Turkish literary domain who engaged in
translating works from French to promote a contemporary progression in Turkish
literature away from Ottoman mystical literary traditions, arguably to
stimulate enlightenment and democratization. The chapter next turns to the
Ottoman Jewish intellectuals and their undecided attitudes towards French, and
its usage in schools over Hebrew, Turkish, or Judeo-Spanish. Mignon lastly
discusses some Ottoman writers who wrote in French, specifically İzzet Melih
and Abdullah Cevdet. 

The three editors, Argent, Offord, and Rjéoutski, return to conclude the
volume in the fifteenth chapter. Cautious not to take away from the
distinctive circumstances of each linguistic case examined in the volume, this
chapter aims at some generalizations about the spread of French. First,
European francophonie existed in particular domains and served similar
functions. Francophonie was widely associated with nobility, courts, and other
higher echelons of society, which subsequently lead to French’s profound value
in cultural capital. French ventured from prestige and the haut monde to being
a resented, and at times, stigmatized language. French was useful as a lingua
franca and for making countries known in Europe; however, Europe began to
realize that using French did not embrace plurilingualism and diversity.
Disproportionate use of French and its numerous words streaming into home
languages and cultural influence in numerous domains – these factors all
provoked a negative perception of French. Alongside a movement of cultural
nationalism, the mid-nineteenth century saw an increase of English as the
choice foreign language and lingua franca. In sum, this volume portrays the
complex factors that allowed French to enjoy a status of prestige from the
seventeenth to the nineteenth century in Europe. 

EVALUATION

This book provides a valuable overview to linguists who wish to understand the
complexities of how French arose as a lingua franca and a language of
cultural, political and social prestige in early modern Europe. This book
could be useful to readers with a variety of interests including historical
linguistics, sociolinguistics, multilingualism, language choice, language
variations, language ideologies and the role of language in social, national,
and international identity. 

The volume states it aims to explore issues concerning the role and outcome of
French in schools, in international scholarship, as a lingua franca, and as a
prestige language. It aims to treat francophonie not as a monolithic entity.
It also aims to avoid the idea that linguistic prestige is related to
intrinsic qualities of language, but instead to focus on how people use
language and how their discourse customs spread. Indeed this book succeeds in
providing a tour d’horizon of French usage, examining francophonie across
European linguistic communities in an appropriately multidimensional nature.
Each chapter is careful to discuss francophonie as a construction of
linguistic diversity, regarding a delocalized notion of intertwining cultural
groups that exist within and beyond national boundaries. 

One good aspect of the book is that each chapter sets up the historical
context. Some chapters’ background is densely filled with names of historical
figures and family trees, showing the diligence and expertise of the authors
and achieving a thorough and irrefutably factual account; for some readers not
so erudite in history, these areas may be slightly heavy. Another positive
attribute is that many chapters begin with an anecdote that sets up the
context of francophonie in their particular region, which offers insight into
the complexity or importance of French and its role in the region’s history.
Lastly, some chapters also provide a good deal of quantitative data, namely
the chapters on Sweden and Bohemia. 

Overall, the book is exactly what it claims to be: a volume of European
francophonie from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries and from social,
cultural, and political perspectives. The volume discusses who spoke French,
under what circumstances, and to whom  they spoke it, as well as what the
sociocultural impact was. The contributors all succeed in answering these
questions, each describing their particular linguistic case in a unique way,
always providing numerous illustrative examples and supportive evidence from a
wide range of sources.


ABOUT THE REVIEWER

Judith Bridges is a doctoral student of Second Language Acquisition and
Instructional Technology at the University of South Florida. Her interests
include sociolinguistics, language ideologies, language teacher identity, and
French as a foreign language.





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