Last Wednesday, the French Academy unveiled the ninth edition of its dictionary, after thirty-eight years of work. Delivered the next day to Emmanuel Macron, it was described by the President of the Republic as a “reference” work and its authors as “guardians of our language”. Just that.
However, as soon as the dictionary was officially published, many voices were raised to criticize its content. In a column published in Liberationthe collective of Dismayed Linguists noted that words that had become commonplace such as “coronavirus”, “daron” or “feminicide” were missing. But the dictionary also has obsolete definitions, such as that of “mail” which is only a “big hammer”. “It’s grotesque for a dictionary which appears in 2024 and which was started in 1986,” comments Médéric Gasquet-Cyrus, linguist at the University of Aix-Marseille and member of the collective.
More seriously, there are among these 59,000 terms “more than questionable” definitions, such as “heterosexual”, which is, according to the French Academy, “relating to natural sexuality between people of different sexes”.
A political speech, not a definition
“Implicitly, this definition of ‘heterosexual’ says that homosexuality is not natural, analyzes the specialist, co-author of the book Go check in the dictionary if I’m there. This is more than problematic: it is scandalous. And factually and scientifically false. It has long been proven that, in animal or human species, homosexuality was natural and has always existed. » He adds: “I understand that it is hard to make a dictionary but you have to be serious. Here, the speech is not only conservative, it is outrageous in terms of the values it conveys. It’s very shocking. And it is validated by the President of the Republic. »
Aurore Vincenti, linguist of the body and sexuality, goes further. For her, saying that heterosexuality is “natural” is political speech. “The argument from ‘nature’ is an argument from authority,” she explains. It is a way of closing the debate and excluding those who would not be part of this standard. And in the context of sexuality, it is used all the time, wrongly and abusively – as a political tool, to anchor conceptions that will reinforce an order of things. Saying that heterosexuality is natural sexuality allows us to maintain a discourse of male superiority and complementarity of the sexes. »
The linguist also recalls that homosexuality was considered a crime in France and still is in certain countries around the world. “It is still perceived as a perversion, a deviance by a reactionary part of the population and it is on this political sensitivity that the Academy plays. We are not far from the arguments of Family for All: “one dad, one mom”…”, she points out.
“Woman” reduced to a reproductive function in the dictionary of the French Academy
The problem is therefore not the fact that the Academy wishes to create a dictionary, but rather the “discourse with which the institution adorns itself”. “It cannot be qualified as a reference when its dictionary does not describe the language spoken or written by the French population,” assures Médéric Gasquet-Cyrus. How does she explain that among the 59,000 words, “daron”, an old slang word that is resurfacing, does not appear. Or ”kiss”. In the name of what? Why is there ”wokiste” but not ”Web”, ”fellatio” but not ”cunnilingus”? ! Explain to us! There is no consistency. »
Another astonishing observation is the first meaning of the definition of “woman”. In this 9th edition, the first meaning of the word is: “human being defined by his sexual characteristics, which allow him to conceive and give birth to children. » “It’s serious, women are still, in 2024, reduced to a reproductive function,” insists the linguist. For him, the French Academy only “slows down the movements of development of the language”. Same observation for Aurore Vincenti who even thinks that with regard to the French language, “the Academy is very resistant to its evolution”. She adds: “it’s a community of people from the same background, having more or less the same values and ensuring order. »
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Médéric Gasquet-Cyrus also believes that these Academicians have “no idea of the French language, its uses and have made no observation of society to design this dictionary”. He recommends referring to other editions such as Larousse, Hachette or Le Robert which revise their dictionaries every year. “In reality, no one really looks at the Academy dictionary. It only has a symbolic function. And fortunately! », concludes the linguist.
Contacted, the French Academy had not responded to our requests at the time of publication of this article.
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