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From banlieue to bestseller
The Guardian and The Times examine Le Lexik des cités, a new book on French street slang sweeping the bestseller list in France, and discover the large influences of immigration, poetry, and music on the new French lexicon.
Paris suburban slang has spread to all playgrounds in France, whatever their social and ethnic backgrounds, leading many parents to buy the book in order to, at last, understand their children's "tchatche" (or what they're chatting about). Others, lovers of the French language, have bought it to follow the evolution of the language. "It is fascinating to see how a language evolves with time. Words are incredible world travellers, they come and go, and when they come back home, they are forever changed from their adventures abroad. There is no such thing as a ministry of Immigration for words," says Alain Rey, referring to the new Ministry of Immigration set up by Nicolas Sarkozy.
November 8, 2007
