For
our French class this week we read an interesting article. It was an interview with the author of the
book, “The Incredible History of French Words in English.”
The
article was interesting for a couple of reasons. The first was just learning about how many
English words come from French – something like 30-40%! I had no idea there were so many. It’s more than either Latin or German, the
other two big sources.
Apparently
it all began with the Norman Conquest of 1066, when William the Conqueror
brought his language along with his soldiers and his system of governance. But it has continued through the centuries,
helped by the English language’s well-known tendency to absorb words from many
sources.
The
other interesting thing about the article was the author’s attitude. While he is bilingual, with an English mother
and a French father, he is clearly his father’s son.
So
when he talked about words going from French to English, he used neutral
expressions like “the arrival” or “the movement” of new words into
English. But when he talked about the
reverse, with words going from English to French, he used a verb phrase we
hadn’t seen before – s’immiscer dans”.
And
what does that mean? “To interfere
with.” Oh, those French!
KVS
http://www.france-amerique.com/articles/2015/03/26/l_influence_du_francais_sur_la_langue_anglaise_est_considerable_et_insoupconnee.html
LOL Another option to translate "s'immiscer" is "to infiltrate".... Wars have started this way!
ReplyDeleteEnglish is just a thick layer of French laid on top of a Germanic structural base. Prior to 1066, English, or "Angle-lish", was just another German dialect, from the northwest corner ("angle") of Germany. Even the spelling of Old English was fairly regular, in the German manner. With the arrival of William of Normandy in 1066, the government and the upper classes of English society were quickly taken over by the French, and French became the official language of Parliament and the legal system for the next 300+ years. Thus began the melding of French from the top and German from the bottom that produced what we now know as the English language, complete with its ridiculous spelling!
ReplyDeleteMy favorite book on the history of the English language is Our Language, by Simeon Potter. https://books.google.fr/books/about/Our_Language.html?id=53w0AAAAMAAJ&hl=en
ReplyDelete