Exorcising the English

Press, 12 March 1985, Page 19

Exorcising the English

From

ROBIN SMYTH

in Paris

A popualr French cigarette sold in a blue packet and called “Blue Way” could be driven off the market in France if its producers refuse to give it a new name. The heaviest attack on Frangiais yet mounted in France is being planned by Georges Sarre, a leftwing Socialist deputy. Sarre is preparing a draft law to put before the National Assembly which would forbid the use of foreign — which means AngloAmerican — words in names of companies and brand names of products. It would root out Frangiais from commercial publicity whether on street hoardings, on radio and TV, or in newspapers. Present legislation against the inroads of Anglo-Saxon words has

not, according to Georges Sarre, dampened the passion of French advertisers for Frangiais. He complains that a brand of cigarettes calls itself “News”, the Renault company is promoting a model call “Macadam Star”, hire car firms suggest that their customers “rent-a-car”, and French teenagers buy “shrink-to-fit” jeans at “Sportswear”, “Mad Engine”, or “Star Way”. The new law, which aims to “protect the genius of the French language,” is inspired by Quebec’s legislation to roll back the invasion of the English language in the French Canadian province. There

will be a mounting scale of penalties for producers and advertisers, including the seizure of goods which are not rechristened with a French name. Proof that it is no easy task to exorcise English from France was given by Sarre himself when he launched into an attack on the word “jogging” in the presence of a reporter from the French daily, “Liberation". Sarre found himself extolling the virtues of the alternative “le cross” until it was pointed out to him that this shortened form of cross-country was not exactly home-grown either. Copyright London Observer Service.