Reponse economique et eduquee a l'accusation d'inutilite de Monsieur Paxman envers le francais

Apparemment, le Francais est une langue inutile parce qu'elle est moins utilisee que l'anglais economiquement parlant. Ce qui rend l'art inutile, puisque sa proportion dans les echanges internationaux de biens est inferieure a celle de la viande. La livre sterling vient egalement d'etre rendue inutile, etant moins traitees que le yen chinois.

Je parle francais et je vis dans un pays anglophone. Si je ne considerais que le potentiel de seduction apporte par mon parle francais, la langue francaise me serait deja utile.

Mais en lisant regulierement la “merveilleuse” description sensuelle des saveurs de vins et d'autres aliments ou boissons fin(e)s dont sont capables nos amis amglophones, je realise que sans le francais, il n'existerait pas de vocabulaire pour decrire un vin boise, pour comparer la volupte du chocolat a celle d'un baiser, la note de fond fievreuse et latente d'un parfum... Aucun anglais n'a su "invent[er] la couleur des voyelles" comme Rimbaud ni redessiner la femme moderne comme Saint-Laurent. Aucun anglophone n'a le premier mis par ecrit les droits de l'homme dans une salle de jeu de paume. Aucun anglophone n'a le premier decrit les premisces du socialisme qui naissait dans le ventre de Paris fin 18eme ni invente le roman philosophique et historique comme Hugo. Aucun Anglophone n’a inspire la ville moderne comme l’ont fait Napoleon III et son fidele Baron Hausmann en transformant Paris en la capitale de lumieres que l’on connait aujourd’hui. Aucun dirigeant anglophone n'a organise la resistance a l'invasion nazi et aucun anglophone n'a jamais pose ses deux fesses sur la meme chaise a la table de l'Union Europeenne.

Les gens s'eteignent, Monsieur Paxman, mais les idees demeurent. Votre systeme de vote est francais et vous en remercierez Condorcet. Vos quelques connaissances en science politique sont francaises. La strategie militaire de vos dirigeants est encore francaise. Les miettes de philosophie qui parsement votre vie sont d'origines francaises. Sans le Baron Thiry Holbach et son auditoire francais, votre Adam Smith et sa main invisible n'aurait eu de premieres critiques ou auditoire. Sans les Lumieres, Rousseau, Voltaire, Diderot, l'Etat et l'Eglise feraient peut-etre encore un et les sciences naturelles n'auraient jamais eu d'Encyclopedie.

Les idees, Monsieur Paxman, demeurent et les plus promptes a se repandre s'inscrivent pour des millenaires. Pour ces idees-la, la langue n'est pas une barriere. Croire le contraire ne fait de vous qu'un ignare faineant sans potentiel. Les idees, Monsieur Paxman, sont le fondement meme de notre civilisation et de l'economie qu'elle soit nationale, mondiale ou regionale. Vous remercierez d'ailleurs Victor Hugo d'avoir ete l'un des premiers a mentionner ce concept. Plus tard redecouvert par Keynes, Mills, Hayek, puis North, McCloskey, Ostrom et, dernierement, Leighton et Lopez.

Monsieur Paxman, si l'anglais a l'hegemonie sur l'economie, mais que l'economie est fondee sur des idees francaises, grecques, latines (italiennes), viennoises, arabes et, beaucoup plus tardivement, anglaises dites-moi Monsieur Paxman, qu'est-ce que cela fait de l'anglais? Un outil? Aucune langue n'est inutile sur le pretexte de sa frequence dans les echanges commerciaux. Le francais est la langue du melange des sens: couleurs, vin, odeurs, beaute, textures et formes - rien de tout cela n'a de meilleur langage que le francais. La langue de Moliere a invente la facon dont on melange les cinq sens dans le langage descriptive d’aujourd’hui – et ce procede est probablement l’un des plus usite en mercatique. Et que serait le commerce sans la mercatique de nos jours? L'anglais est le parle du “business” et l’arabe celui des mathematiques. Je sais que le drehu, une langue melanesienne, est le parle des metaphores. Je n’ai jamais connu d’autre langue inutile que la langue de vipere et j’ai bien peur que cette description ne s’applique a la votre.

Je m’appelle Chloë Violette Tiennot, je parle francais et anglais, baragouine espagnole et sais imiter quelque accents. Je suis doctorante en economie, ai etudie les mathematiques et la philosophie après mon lycee, la comptabilite et le commerce international, le droit, l’ingenierie et meme l’ingenierie financiere. Chacune de ces disciplines a son proper langage et je vous defie de les accuser d’inutiles.

Considering your implacable lack of knowledge, mister Paxman, I decided to level down for you and translate my thoughts in your language. Apparently, French is useless because it is less frequent in economic exchanges. I speak French, am doing my PhD in economic in Australia – in English. Hereafter I demonstrate that English is first – merely a tool for economic and second – not less important than any other languages in the world.

If I was to extend your reasoning, Monsieur Paxman, then art would be useless in the world because it is less traded than meat. The Pound sterling becomes useless because less traded than the Yen.

If I was just to consider the seductive potential that French gives me in an English country – which is useful for the economy because sex and babies are excellent for global consumption - my mother’s tongue would already be useful. Actually, all Latin tongues can argue the same. You know what I mean.

As soon as I read the ‘fabulous’ description of wines, cheese, and other fine foods I realise that without French I could not describe a ‘woody’ wine nor compare the voluptuosity of chocolate to that of a kiss, nor say how the third note of a fragrance is full of latent fever… No English speaker has ever invented the colour of vowels as Rimbaud did, nor reinvented the shape of a woman as did Saint-Laurent. No English speaker has ever described the birth, the sketched of the very first socialist ideas in Paris 18th nor created the philosophico-historico-novel genre as did Hugo. No English speaker has ever designed the first modern city that would inspire for centuries the transformation and design of every city – but Napoleon III and Baron Hausmann did it with Paris. No English speaker has ever lead the resistance against the nazi and I know no English leaders who has ever fully sat their bottom on one chair only at the European Union table.

People do die, Monsieur Paxman, but ideas spread and remain.

Without French, Breakfast at Tiffany’s would not be so chic, the little black dress would not have become a cliché that every woman wants to wear on a rendez-vous. Without French, the voting system would have never been improved – and yet we all thank Condorcet for his research. With him started all the field on political science and, later, political economics. Yes, all the modern economic knowledge of government based on a French man. All strategic leaders in the world still study the ideas of Napoleon. Modern philosophy is based on the French Enlightenment and without Baron Holbach Adam Smith’s ideas and the invisible hand may have never been given any credit. If Diderot had not experienced the French religious schools, natural science would not have had any Encyclopedia. Without him, or Voltaire, or Rousseau the Church and the State may still be one and the morality could still be dictated by religion today.

Ideas remain, Monsieur Paxman, and the most prompt that spread will endure for thousand years and more. For these ideas, language is no obstacle. Believing the contrary makes you nothing but a lazy arrogant ignorant with no potential.Victor Hugo in The Miserables was one of the first to ever describe the economic and legal importance of ideas. Later on it was rediscovered by Keynes, Mills, Hayek then North, Ostrom, McCloskey and, lately, Leighton and Lopez. Would anyone prefer to read Shakespeare or a description and retranscription of his ideas? Would anyone choose to learn from a secondary source rather than the primary? That’s exactly what English is to French in art, in economics, in philosophy, in design.

Ideas make the economy globally, regionally, nationally. There even is an economy of ideas and ideas of economics and economic ideas and ideal economies. If English is predominant in economy, but the economy is based on French, Greek, Latin, Arab, German ideas then what does it make of English? A tool, basically? No language is useless based on its frequency in economic exchange. French is the language of wine, of colour, of beauty, of shapes and textures – French invented the way we mix all senses in language today, and this is still used in marketing. And what would be trade today without marketing? English is the language of business, and Arabic the original language of mathematics. I know that Drehu, a Melanesian language, is described as the allegoric tongue.

I know no other useless tongue than the viperine one – and it seems to me that yours can be qualified as one.

My name is Chloë Violette Tiennot, I speak Francais, English, a few words of español and can pick up a few accents. I am studying economics, have studied mathematics and philosophy, law, accountability, marketing, engineering, international business and corporate and market finance. Each of these academic disciplines has its own language and I dare you to qualify it as ‘useless’.