By Filip Noubel
France, with over 20 regional languages, has always been a multilingual country, but its central government remains reluctant to recognize and fully embrace such diversity. In an interview with Global Voices, language expert and activist Michel Feltin-Palas explains the reasons behind this hesitancy.
Feltin-Palas is a journalist at the French weekly L’Express, where he publishes a newsletter dedicated to France’s linguistic diversity. He is also the author of several books dedicated to the topic, including his latest, “Sauvons les langues régionales” (“Let’s save regional languages”), published in 2022, in which he analyzes the historical and political reasons put forward by the French government for limiting the recognition of what are officially called “langues régionales” (“regional languages”). The book makes reference to 20 languages that have been historically spoken in what is today metropolitan France.
Feltin-Palas unpacked the origins of this fear of language diversity on the part of France’s state institutions, particularly in the field of legislation and education:
Many of these 20 languages have a rich literary tradition, both oral and written—yet that heritage remains largely absent from the educational and even the cultural landscape. Feltin-Palas explained that:
Many of the “regional languages” contain different dialects, and in some cases, different orthography, as is the case in Occitan. Feltin-Palas gave his views on this often heated debate:
Given the importance of naming, what do you think are the most respectful and appropriate terms to apply to what the French state calls “regional languages”?
How do you explain the success of Euskara, or the Basque language, in comparison to other regional languages of France?
Do you think “immersive education”, where children are taught all subjects in their regional language for the first few years, is finally being recognized by the state as the only way to effectively promote those languages?