Thursday 8 January 2015

LA LANGUE DANS LA JOUE

There is an hypothesis popularly referred to as the  "Sapir–Whorf hypothesis", which purports the concept of linguistic relativity, which holds that the structure of a language affects the ways in which a speaker of that language sees her world.  The proposition is that it is not the way we think that affects the way we speak, but rather the way we speak affects our way of thinking. It should follow then, that the more languages we speak, the broader our thinking. Anyone involved in translation, or the teaching and learning of languages, will be affected by the process.

There are a number of figures of speech in English which, when translated into another language, loose their meaning yet provide amusement for the speakers of both languages. e.g. "She has ideas above her station" becomes in French, "Elle a des idées au-dessus de sa gare.". A famous line from Terence Rattigan’s French Without Tears.

Say to a Frenchmen “J’ai la langue dans la joue” and he’ll not have the slightest idea what you’re on about, unless he has a knowledge of English, in which case he might smile. On the other hand, should you refer to ‘taking French leave’ he might take offence and correct that figure of speech as ‘filer a l’Anglaise’. Indeed there is a curious notion across Europe that to slip away without notice is either a French exercise or an English one:

    Czech: zmizet po anglicku ("to leave English style")
 German: "sich (auf) französisch empfehlen" or literally 'französischen Abschied nehmen ("to take a French leave")
    Italian: andarsene all'inglese ("to leave English style")
    Polish: wyjść po angielsku ("to leave English style")
    Portuguese: saída à francesa ("to leave French style")
    Russian: уйти по-английски (ujti po-anglijski) ("to leave English style")
   Spanish: despedida a la francesa ("goodbye in the French way", "French farewell")
    Walloon: spiter a l' inglesse ("to leave English style")
    Hungarian: angolosan távozik ("to leave English style")

It would appear by a factor of 2 to 1 that most of Europe attributes this trait to the English. The phrase is clearly the result of the historical associations between the countries concerned, indicating that the two most influential, or perhaps dominant, of European States are France and England.

Apparently the phrase first appears in the English language in 1771, whilst the opposite French phrase appears around the turn of the 19th/20th centuries. Presumably the phrase rises out of the Seven Years War, which is claimed to have been a critical moment in the history of Anglo-French relations and which laid the foundations for the dominance of the Anglosphere during the next two and a half centuries, and arguably the spread of English common law. The United Kingdom was pretty widespread from that time on through to the First World War. Indeed, the English language can be regarded the lingua franca just about everywhere.

As to the French view, it may be the phrase was developed in retaliation to the English idiom as the result of what is referred to as the Scramble For Africa between the 1870s and 1880s. The Suez Canal project, begun by Frenchman Ferdinand de Lesseps and later taken over by the English. is an instance in point; as well as the strained relationship between the United Kingdom and France leading up to the First World War, even although allies.

However it came about, do these figures of speech seriously affect the way different speakers think? ‘Flash in the pan’ is an English expression originating from the use of firearms and referring to a brief, intense effort that produces no really significant result. The French equivalent  idiom is “un feu de paille” or literally, ‘a fire of straw’.

Both expressions involve a short-lived fire, although the one emanates from the use of firearms and the other from merely trying to start a fire which could be for any number of reasons, most likely cooking, it being a French phrase. But I project. In any event both figures of speech indicate a very different process of thinking. Does this have any profound significance? I do not know that it does, save that the knowledge of it, I believe, is worth having.

I leave you with this English phrase (told to me by Charles Carne, allegedly spoken by Nelson at Trafalgar) and translation in French, which should be spoken quickly:


“To the water, it is the hour”    =     “À l'eau, c’est l'heure”


2 comments:

  1. I'm reminded of the various euphemisms for venereal disease. The Spanish call it the Italian disease, the Italians call it the French disease, the French call it the English disease, etc. (or something like this). Anyway, nobody is prepared to take responsibility for it.

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    1. According to Wikipedia debate on the origins of syphilis has been raging for centuries. New genetic evidence supports the theory that Christopher Columbus brought syphilis to Europe from the New World. According to the study, genetic analysis of the syphilis family tree reveals that its closest relative was a South American disease that causes yaws, an infection caused by a sub-species of the same bacterium. So it's down to a Sailor, as one might have suspected. To the water, it is the hour!

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