News

• What do Americans Know About Bastille Day?

  Inspired by President Trump’s visit to Paris, Fox News went to the Jersey Shore and asked beach-goers questions about Bastille Day and French culture. The answers are, hum, interesting. Watch the video below to hear the answer to questions like "Who was Napoleon?", "What is your favorite French food?", and "Trump is in France commemorating the 100th anniversary of which war?"...

• Paris Rematch for Donald Trump

  L’avion présidentiel Air Force One s’est posé à l’aéroport d’Orly, au sud de Paris, ce jeudi matin (heure locale). Donald Trump entend profiter de ce second voyage européen pour faire diversion de la polémique russe et laver l’affront de la « poignée de main ». Aussitôt à Paris, Donald Trump s’est rendu à l’ambassade américaine où il a salué « les liens entre nos deux pays »,...

• Remembering the “Freedom Fries” Episode in Washington

  Nathalie Loiseau, former director of the French administration school and Minister of European Affairs in the recently-formed Macron government, spent five years in the United States working as the spokesperson for the French Embassy in Washington D.C. It was a trying time for relations between France and America. From 2002 to 2007, when American officials in Washington needed a French...

• Where to Eat French Cuisine During Chicago’s Restaurant Week?

  July 10 to 23, 12 French restaurants in Chicago will be offering special prix fixe menus so that the public can sample their best dishes at affordable prices. The third edition of the city’s French Restaurant Week coincides with Bastille Day celebrations and meals will be offered for $17.89, $38, and 178.90 to echo France’s revolutionary year. Below is a...

Opinion

• Trump Makes Merry in Paris

  Donald Trump was Emmanuel Macron’s guest of honor at the July 14 celebrations in Paris, and seems to have forgotten the advice of his friend “Jim.” The American president has fallen back in love with France. Advantage: Macron. Macron hooked a big fish — Donald Trump — by using the bait that works best on the U.S. president: Flattery and...

• Revolution as Play in France

  On July 14, Americans celebrate Bastille Day. On this day, the French celebrate more than their National Day or the anniversary of the Storming of the Bastille: They celebrate the everlasting spirit of the 1789 Revolution. “The French are better at fighting revolutions than making reforms”, wrote Alexis de Tocqueville in his notes in 1848. As a Deputy of the Manche...

• Scott Pruitt’s Crusade Against Ecology

  The United States’ withdrawal from the Paris Agreement on climate change is the only tangible decision made by the Trump government in its five months of existence. The American president himself hesitated at length, before leaving it up to a militant, committed member of his staff: A certain Scott Pruitt, the ecologists’ enemy number one. In this baroque, incompetent administration,...

• The Jeff Koons Affair

  American sculptor Jeff Koons gifted one of his creations to the city of Paris last November. But the gaudy work inspired by the Statue of Liberty is still a point of contention. The artist’s large-scale sculpture representing a bouquet of tulips is supposed to be pay homage to the victims of the Paris Attacks in 2015. The project is supported...

Culture

• Urban Revolts, from Detroit to Clichy-sous-Bois

  Caroline Rolland-Diamond is a historian at Nanterre University near Paris, and is specialized in American social movements. She is currently drawing parallels between the Detroit riots of 1967 (whose 50th anniversary will be commemorated this summer) and civil disturbance in the French suburbs. On July 24, she will be taking part in a conference held at Wayne State University in...

• “The Midwife”: The Down-Trodden and the Diva

  Starring Catherine Deneuve and Catherine Frot, the latest film by Martin Provost tells the story of an unlikely friendship between two totally opposed women. Claire (Catherine Frot) works as a midwife in a small maternity clinic threatened with closure in the Paris region. Her professional attitude and altruism have led her to sacrifice everything and devote herself entirely to her...

• Female Boxer Anissa Meksen Comes Out Swinging

  French boxer Anissa Meksen will be celebrating Bastille Day in New York. Weighing in at 53 kilos (117 pounds), the athlete will be taking part in a gala match in Madison Square Garden this Friday. The event marks the first American fight in her professional boxing career. Anissa Meksen exudes determination and self-confidence, even as she answers our questions on...

• Anne Morgan, an American Heart

  Anne Morgan, daughter of U.S. banking tycoon J.P. Morgan, was certainly from a “good family,” but was anything but faint-hearted. From 1917 to 1924, she led major private fundraising campaigns and recruited an army of 350 U.S. women volunteers to help civilians in war-ravaged France less than 30 miles from the front. A touring exhibition on the life of the...

Business

• The Rosé Revolution

  Rosé wine has been rising fast in popularity among wine lovers, carving out a place for itself as an equal to white and red wines. The United States, the second largest rosé drinker next to France, has seen an exponential rise in imports of the drink from its birthplace, the region of Provence. Rosé sales have surpassed white wine in...

• The French Number: The App that Lets you Connect with French Locals

  [Partner Article] The French Number, the crowdsourced hotline for France, now has users in 167 countries — a veritable telephone social network. Cocorico! Connect with a targeted French person based on location, interests or gender. For instance, for Chelsea from New York, who is preparing for a trip to Nice, getting in touch directly with a local will enable her to get...

• Craft Beer’s Triumphant Return to France and the United States

  American brewers have been rediscovering and remixing long-forgotten traditional French beer recipes since the 1980s. Some of these American beer artisans have even moved to France, and today are playing a role in the “craft beer revolution.” A sign of this evolution, the Mondial de la Bière international craft beer festival — which was created in Montreal in 1994 — will take place...

• Provence in the Mail with Good Morning South

  Whether you’re after embroidered bags, tapenade, scented candles or almond-based body care products, Good Morning South delivers Provence to your door. The French website was launched on June 5, 2017, and aims to introduce the American public to the Provence region and the expertise of its artisans. We met with Marseille-born Lucille Pinero, 31, who co-founded the website. France-Amérique: How was this project born?...

Education

• The Alliance of French and American Universities

  The Alliance Program, a partnership between Columbia University in New York and three French institutions — Ecole Polytechnique, Sciences Po and Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University — has awarded 700 dual-degrees in the past ten years. Each one of these graduates spent half of their schooling in Paris and the other half in New York, making their education an equal product of...

• A Public Immersion Program for Pasadena

  Two French-English bilingual classes will open next August at the Pasadena, California, school district. In a state where public schools are rare, this free program is quick to seduce parents. Gary Prézeau is from Sherbrooke in the Quebec province. His wife, Kerry, is Australian. Based in Pasadena, California, since 2001, the couple endeavor to raise their son “in a bilingual environment.” Their five-year-...

• Bilingualism Becomes a Government Affair in Salt Lake City

  Public schools in Utah are focusing on dual language immersion to create a generation of cosmopolitan citizens and attract international investors. With a total of 3,900 children involved in the Francophone part of the program, Utah is the second American state — just behind Louisiana — with the highest number of pupils learning French. Room 216 is an ordinary classroom, with a whiteboard, 30...

• Are Online Classes the Way Forward for French Departments?

  French departments threatened with closure in the United States are finding a solution online. Four universities in Georgia recently joined forces to create the first online bachelor’s degree in French Dorothée Mertz-Weigel meets her French students for an advanced conversation class every Monday at 9pm. The discussions takes place online via Skype. The students include office workers, soldiers and homemakers,...

Gastronomy

• A Touch of France in a Chicago Mexican Kitchen

  Years after his humble beginning in the United States, Mexican chef Carlos Gaytan still calls on his classical French training to help him reimagine Mexican gastronomy. His restaurant will be participating in Chicago’s French Restaurant Week through July 23. From a dishwasher to the first Mexican chef to be awarded a Michelin star, Carlos Gaytan’s journey to success does not mean...

• La Ripaille Keeps the French Bistro Alive in New York

  While its candlelit tables and jazzy French music may seem similar to the many other French bistros in New York, La Ripaille is unique in its longstanding history of 37 years. The interior, largely unaltered since its opening in 1980, stands proudly as a grandfather example for the many new French bistros that have opened recently during the re-emergence of...

• Bringing Couscous from Algeria to Brooklyn via Paris

  When studying journalism at Columbia University, Aaron Lee never imagined he would become, in his wife’s words, “a Southwest Georgia boy who’s now the king of couscous in New York.” However, just a few years later, he owns and operates Bar Omar in Williamsburg, a dimly-lit restaurant in Brooklyn with a menu famous for its French-Algerian couscous and tagines. The...

• Thierry Rautureau: Out of the Kitchen and onto our Small Screens

  Thierry Rautureau is perhaps best known to Americans by his nickname, “the Chef in the Hat”. Having been a Seattleite for 30 years, the chef from the Vendée region hosts a weekly radio show and regularly appears on cooking programs on The Food Network, PBS and Bravo. His small screen appearances act as a second storefront for his café, Luc, which will be...