CSI: Quebec -- Crack French police unit still pursues English-speaking lawbreakers

[Wilson Gray]

Do you remember a french language law that decreed something to the
effect that a public performance in another language had to be
accompanied by a simultaneous translation into French? The law was
lampooned in a cartoon (published in Le Canard  enchaine?) featuring a
rock concert. The band's singer is belting out, "Shake, baby! Shake!
Shake! Shake!" At a microphone stage left, the French interpreter is
simultaneously singing, "Cheque, bebe! Cheque! Cheque! Cheque!" With
the appropriate diacritics, of course. I would put them in, but they
would show up in the post as garbles.

-Wilson

On 5/24/07, James Harbeck <jharbeck at sympatico.ca> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       James Harbeck <jharbeck at SYMPATICO.CA>
> Subject:      Re: CSI: Quebec -- Crack French police unit still pursues
>               English-speaking lawbreakers
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> >to see if French lettering is at least twice the =20=
> >
> >size of everything else.
>
> I remember an amusing editorial cartoon of a guy with a french fry
> stand, and his sign said
>
> FRENCH
> FRIES
>
> but with the word "French" twice as large as the word "fries."
>
> Which reminds me of one of the greatest evidences of the superiority
> of Quebecois culture: poutine (fries with cheese curds and gravy).
> It's popular throughout Canada now. Gravy has always been popular on
> fries in English Canada, but the cheese curds to make it poutine
> really caught on outside of Quebec maybe 20 years ago.
>
> Meanwhile, in the US, if I ask for gravy with my fries, I get a look
> like the one I get from a pharmacist (in the US, not in Canada) if I
> ask about pain relievers with codeine: like they want to put me in
> rehab.
>
> James Harbeck.
>
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