French: From Dialect to Standard

by R. Anthony Lodge

Written as a text, this book looks at the external history of French from its Latin origins to the present day through some of the analytical frameworks developed by contemporary sociolinguistics. French is one of the most highly standardized of the world's languages and the author invites us to see the language as heterogenous, rather than a monolithic entity, using the model proposed by E. Haugen as a useful comparative grid to plot the development of standardization. After an introductory section which examines the dialectalization of Latin in Gaul, the four central chapters of the book are constructed around the basic processes invoved in standardization as identified by the selection of norms, the elaboration of function, codification and acceptance. The concluding chapter deals with language variability and the wide gulf that has now developed between French used for formal purposes and that used in everyday speech, with particular reference to Occitan speaking regions. Emphasizing the ordinary speakers of the language, rather than the statesmen or great authors as agents of change, the book combines a traditional history of the language' approach with a sociolinguistic framework to provide a broad and comparative overview of the problem of language standardization.

Genres: France

296 pages, Kindle Edition

First published March 4, 1993

Reviews

[Mikhael Hayes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Honestly, a solid book that confirms much of what I learned a class on the history of Romance. I know Lodge straight up said he would be "gallocentric" and just focus on France, but the book feels incomplete with so much discussion of dialectal diversification and almost zero discussion of the rest of Francophonie. Nevertheless, the full circle thing of starting from many dialects of Romance, exterminating and unifying, and then finally branching again is a good way to format the book.

[Robert Stevens · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a Francophile, I enjoyed reading about the journey from Latin to Modern French and the sociocultural and political factors that created what we now have today. If interested in the evolution of Latin into French is something that interests you, this is a good book to choose.

[Christopher · Rating 3 out of 5]

R. Anthony Lodge's book here aims to overturn conventional myths about the rise of standard French as the gradual “refinement” of the language, the creation of something objectively wonderful. Using the framework of sociolinguistics, he shows how the language has evolved under shifting social and political pressures, and French today is simply the outcome of the French monarchy's gradual expansion over the whole of the country as we know it today, and the subsequent institutionalized linguistic prejudices of the French Revolution (“la langue doit être une comme la
République”).

Based on the work of Haugen and (to a somewhat lesser degree) Labov, Lodge's historical sociolinguistic survey is certainly wide-ranging. He takes us from the Latinization of Gaul under the Roman Empire to the resistance of anglicisms in the 20th century. Through the centuries, he quotes documentation (letters, grammatical treatises) that reflect what those in power thought about acceptable speech, and there are some nice maps showing the shifting populations of French and "patois" speakers over time.

While informative (at least in offering citations to follow up on), I found Lodge's book somewhat repetitive and longwinded. A major downside is that, except for the chapters on the last 200 years or 2000, the author does not present much non-standard French, helping to show what varieties exactly were ousted by the prestige language. Furthermore, the book was first published in 1993 and a second edition would be welcome, as France's Arab and Sub-Saharan African immigrant populations are no longer hidden away, but today have come to influence the general discourse.