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The French language is a woman.
And this woman is so beautiful, so proud, if modest,
so bold so touching, so voluptuous, so chaste,
so noble, so familiar, so crazy, wise,
we love her with all his soul,
and we never tried being unfaithful.
.
Anatole France
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Language, communication instrument par excellence, is fixed by writing.
In our society where writing has been of paramount importance, the history of mankind can be broadly divided into two parts: before and after writing.
Indeed, the invention of writing revolutionized life. It allowed men to communicate with each other at distances greater than that of earshot. She brought permanence to the spoken language - One might even say its eternity.
Initially, there was the image. It was first adapted to the idea and then the sounds of speech.
alphabet we use is a "chance". We took our "system" to the Romans because only Christian texts were translated into Latin and were preserved using the Latin script. The function of writing was to preserve for religious holy texts. Before them, the Greeks relied on the system of the Phoenicians who invented the alphabet, itself born of a remodeling of cuneiform writing. Ideographic systems used in Mesopotamia, Egypt, China (+ / - 3000 BC) are not, either, an original creation. They are the combination of two modes of communication that had preceded them: the word and image.
I call it exploitation by a group of a system of vocal signs whose group is the author. It differs from the communication system in that it allows animals to associate an object or an idea to a combination of sounds. It offers the individual the opportunity to plan ahead and turn around in the past.
Anthropologists agree that the origin of language date of homo erectus, there is more than a million years. They assume, however, that his faculty of speech was very rudimentary.
But it is very difficult to trace the origins of language because there is no material trace of its evolution ...
The visual image is a proposal made to the group. It combines two data: a surface (a wall, a piece of ground, a piece of wood ...) and figures, traces, stains, marks ... whether or not produced by the hand of man.
image, unlike language, is not a system. It does not require the presence of the transmitter and receiver.
writing has appeared when the visual sign system that was supposed to transmit messages from the gods became the medium of men. First pictograms, it has evolved thanks to the scribes who used stylized images to signify concepts.
From the image, the men came to the signs which were grouped in certain ways to describe in words, things, ideas.
Around 2500 BC. AD cuneiform allowed to write literary texts (fables, proverbs ...).
The technique has evolved writing: use of reeds, clay tablets, paper, printing ...
A long walk to reach us, where writing is carried throughout the world in seconds thanks to the vectors of the Internet.
linguistics (the scientific study of human language (language voice), as is done in a language) has become a science in itself. Long confined to grammar, analysis phonetics and historical approach, she studied how to use appropriate language and under what rules. In the early twentieth century, thanks to Ferdinand de Saussure, Geneva (1857-1913), one has instead sought to understand how languages were used to determine their evolution and their mutual relations.
Beside of this science was born another science: graphology. The assumption is that the act of writing is nothing but a hand movement governed by the brain and therefore the particular expression of an individual. Graphology is trying to interpret the personality through writing. Young science, it still inspires distrust of its application areas and potential hasty conclusions.
The handwriting analysis begins with the observation of the document and note the graphic signs most frequently to establish the "definition" of writing. Then comes the psychological interpretation based on many parameters: speed of writing, shape, direction, size, continuity, order, pressure related ...
Semantics is the scientific study of the meaning of linguistic units and their combinations. It focuses on the study of language on the level of meaning: synonymy, changes of meaning of a word structure vocabulary ...
The semantic field is all the different meanings of the same word in different contexts where it is located. In each expression, the same word has a specific meaning different:
Ex: Part
1. Habitable space of a housing defined by walls or partitions. A three-room apartment (or a three-piece).
2. Piece of flat metal, Gener. shaped into a disk, and serving as exchange value of money. A room of one franc.
3. Dramatic work. A play in three acts.
4. Written document used to provide information, to establish a fact, etc.. Documents folder. Receipts ...
The lexicon is the set of words forming the language of a community and considered abstractly as one of the elements constituting the code of the language.
The lexical field is a series of words that have common properties and refer to the same idea or concept.
Where did the French?
The French language like all languages has been built through history. The meeting peoples, wars and alliances, trade singles neighborhood, our ancestors have adapted their language to be understood by their fellows.
Before coming to us, words have undergone many changes either in their form or their meaning.
There are about five thousand years, the people who lived in our region was part of a vast cultural area that stretched into the heart of Bohemia. People were related by language, culture and lifestyle. We now call "the Celtic world." They spoke the Gaulish.
The legions of Julius Caesar conquered Gaul 52 BC. AD and their language is gradually becoming the language of the territory.
From the year 200, the Franks who came from Germany ravaged Roman Gaul. However, they adopt the language of the vanquished by the addition of a few dozen words pott - pot suppa - soup, ...
In the South, the Saracens have also left some 300 Arabic words together algebra and chess. Some words have followed their path to get to us in forms that leave no imagine they also come from Arabic. The words of Arabic origin represent about 5.1% of our language.
The trade has brought new words in Aztecs: tomatl - tomato ayacotl - bean; cacautl - Peanuts in the Dutch: boek - book; ringhband - ribbon of Bulgaria: jaourt, Inuit: anorak and Hindi: pajamas.
German has given about 200 words including accordion, beer, camping, blockades, ramp, scamp, sauerkraut, target, dollar, ersatz, mischievous, kepi, shell, sword, drink, waltz, casement windows ...
The Italian has made about 1,000 words, balcony, bank, fool, compass, brigade, canon, concerto, confetti, parade, courtier, credit, dilettante, squadron, bankruptcy, mural, graffiti, incognito, opera, page, picturesque , scenario, soldier, music theory, tenor ...
English gave some 300 words including: apricot, adjuvant, banana, bizarre, brother, helmet, cedilla, chocolate, cigar, guerrilla, boastful, corn, bully, watchtower, mosquito, romance, nap ...
English has given and still gives currently dozens of new words: knife - knife, bat - boat barma steak, box, budget, because casting committee, football, forecast, grog, hardware, robbery , look, marketing, match, punch, rail rout, record, roast beef sandwich, sketch, software, stock, string, toast, tunnel, zoom ... which does not fail to ask some problems called anglicisms.
Russian boyar brought, Cossack, hut, mammoth, peasant, samovar, steppe ...
Science eager to appropriate terms were coined words based on Latin and Greek roots.
But words do not come only from abroad: there was upon our territories dozens of languages and dialects, and sometimes the words of these regions entered the language: boulend (baker) of Picard; Merk (market ) of Norman; bizou, bijour, gibberish, bagpipes, Breton domendu and a multitude of words from the Provencal with the word "love", shopping, cicada.
Closer to home, slang or rather we bring the new slang words: pitch, shell, pin ...
Latin, that Caesar's soldiers lead in our region (59-51 BC), is sometimes itself borrowed from Greek. It is adopted gradually by the people of Gaul (Low Latin).
past two centuries, Gallo-Roman words evolve and change shape and meaning.
In our daily lives, we still use certain words or expressions of Latin and French many words are built on the Latin prefixes or Latin roots.
Latin is the only official language. The language of the people is not unified nor fixed. In the fifth and during the VI, VII and VIII centuries, they adopt a language formed from Latin and Gallic remains: the Roman, who had a lot of regional differences. A line "La Rochelle - Grenoble" splits the territory in two. North of this line is the langue d'oil, the South, the Langue d'Oc. Constantly, the local language is "rubbing" the language of the Catholic Church. It will take until 1539, when the Ordinance of Villers-Cotterets under Francis I, which elevates the French language as a royal.
The first document is owned by the novel Oath of Strasbourg, given by Louis the German in 842. The French
derived from the Francian - dialect of the Ile de France. The langue d'oil has evolved in different local languages such as Anglo-Norman, Normandy, Picardy in the region of Amiens and the Somme, Champagne, Reims and Troyes around the Walloon and that are spoken in part of the South of Belgium to Liege. The Normans conquered southern Italy and Sicily, the French speak to Hungary and England where he became the second official language. He maintained there for 300 years and a Latin grammar, the French seem even Donat in 1400.
At the end of the eleventh century the first literary works were written Language of Oil: Anglo-Norman or Picard Champagne.
The French is becoming more important. Many Crusaders answered the call of Pope and depart for Palestine: French spreads to Syria, Lebanon, Jerusalem. The kingdoms of Jerusalem and Antioch adopt French as their official language.
Trade promote the French language becomes the language of international transactions. Trade fairs taking place in France are prestigious and attract retailers from across Europe.
In the late Middle Ages, French rayon. It is the language of the country's most populous but also the richest in Europe. Universities in France are famous and attract many foreign students. The
XIV and XV century saw the emergence of the French language itself, which abandoned the use of "cases" Latin.
The modern French settled permanently in the seventeenth century with Malherbe, Descartes, Corneille, Pascal, Racine, Molière, Boileau, La Bruyere, Bossuet ... The fixity of language owes much to the French Academy, founded in 1635 by Cardinal Richelieu. The French then becomes an affair of state.
Towards the end of the sixteenth century that French will see competition from English and Italian (this is the time of D'ante and Petrarch, Machiavelli and the wealth of Florence, Venice and Genoa).
The seventeenth century marks the return of French. Louis XIV is at its peak and the Versailles court enjoys great prestige. France has long feathers: Molière, Racine, La Fontaine. Many foreign scholars living in France. Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685) causes the flight of many French Protestants who settled in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, ...
the eighteenth century, treaties were written in French. It will also diplomatic language until the war 14-18. In the current German and Italian, many chamberlains, officers, painters, ... speak French. The princes write in excellent French and their children are often educated by French tutors.
The nineteenth century marks the apogee of French in the wake of the revolution. Correspondence of the Russian state are in French. European sovereigns are among themselves in French. The Olympic Charter establishes the French as an official language alongside English. The opening and closing are in French and then translated into the language of the host country. French colonization allows the French to establish themselves again around the world.
The twentieth century saw two world wars to shake the colonial empires. Colonized countries gained their independence. The expansion of French seems to stop.
Ph. Egger
