The Wordsmith

Sobriety: The Party’s Over

How can we reduce carbon emissions and preserve the planet’s natural resources? By tightening our belts and consuming less but better. After all, sobriety […]

By Dominique Mataillet
| February 21, 2023

The Wordsmith

American or United-Statesian?

Some people are indignant that a single country like the United States seems to have monopolized the demonym of a whole continent! […]

By Dominique Mataillet
| February 8, 2023

The Wordsmith

Francocide, from Fantasy to Reality

Based on the terms “femicide” and “genocide,” this word is used by the far right to condemn the murder of French people supposedly killed […]

By Dominique Mataillet
| January 18, 2023

The Wordsmith

Liberalism, Warts and All

Regularly decried as the source of all evils, liberalism (like democracy) seems to be the worst system – except for all the others that […]

By Dominique Mataillet
| November 21, 2022

The Wordsmith

Hubris Syndrome, a Sickness of Heads of State

From Trump to Putin to Erdogan, many political leaders are suffering from a pathology whose symptoms include the feeling of being omnipotent. […]

By Dominique Mataillet
| September 8, 2022

The Wordsmith

Balderdash, Twaddle, and Other Macronisms

Despite speaking a very refined French, President Emmanuel Macron allows himself the occasional semantic indulgence. […]

By Dominique Mataillet
| August 11, 2022

The Wordsmith

Ultracrepidarians, Think You Know Better?

Behind this strange term lurks a plague of our modern times: the omnipresence of people in the public arena who hold forth on subjects […]

By Dominique Mataillet
| May 18, 2022

The Wordsmith

What Makes a Francophone?

March is Francophonie Month, and March 20, International Francophonie Day. This term is used to describe both a sociolinguistic reality and a geopolitical concept. […]

By Dominique Mataillet
| March 1, 2022

Geography

The Astonishing French Names of the United States

Many American states, counties, cities and towns, a multitude of streets, forests, mountains, lakes, and rivers have French names. These toponyms are a testament […]

By Anthony Lacoudre
| October 5, 2021

Book

Translating Trump: Mission Impossible?

With his incoherent, repetitive style, coarse expressions, and dubious syntax, the American president has made life difficult for French translators and journalists. In Trumpspeak, […]

By Claire Levenson
| November 4, 2020

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