News
Coronavirus: The French Banned from Entering the United StatesDonald Trump made a shock announcement yesterday evening, declaring that Europeans would be forbidden from travelling to the U.S. from Friday, March 13, due to the corona virus pandemic. The French are now preparing for an organizational nightmare and are worried about the economic consequences, particularly in the tourism sector. This measure applies to anyone who has been to the...
Explaining the French Pension Reform Strikes to AmericansThe French pension reform is hardly a long, tranquil river. Our Paris-based columnist took a crack at explaining what pushed thousands of French railway and public-transit workers, pensioners, medical staff, and teachers to take to the streets. France has been paralyzed recently by mass strikes and demonstrations over the government’s plans to reform the pension system. At present, there are...
Franco-American Esther Duflo Wins the Nobel Prize in EconomicsFrench-born American citizen and MIT professor Esther Duflo is one of three economists awarded the 2019 Nobel Prize in Economics for her research into the fight against poverty. Finding local solutions to the global problem of poverty is the calling of Esther Duflo, one of the most prominent economists of her generations. While studying at the Ecole Normale Supérieure during...
Map: Where to Celebrate Bastille Day in the United States?On July 14, the French commemorate the storming of the Bastille of 1789 and the Fête de la Fédération of 1790. In the U.S., the event is know as Bastille Day, a celebration of France through wine, accordion, and pétanque! Over 200 Bastille Day events will take place in the United States this year. In New York, the French Institute...
Opinion
The Virus of DeglobalizationThe Covid-19 pandemic will transform the economic map of the world, writes Guy Sorman. "We will see a reindustrialization of the West, a retreat by China, and a certain degree of economic deglobalization." History may not repeat itself, but it sometimes stutters. Exactly nine years ago, a tsunami in Japan destroyed Fukushima’s nuclear plant and disabled the core of Japanese...
Anti-Semitism, Here and ThereAccording to a report on anti-semitism in Europe ordered by Ronald S. Lauder, former U.S. ambassador to Austria and president of the World Jewish Congress, France is the most dangerous place to be Jewish today. In fact, responds Guy Sorman, there is in this regard a strange back-and-forth between France and the United States. The oldest recorded antisemitic slurs date from Ancient...
The French Don’t Understand ImpeachmentThe U.S. Senate has acquitted Donald Trump on Wednesday after a long impeachment trial, a little-known process in France. For the third time in about fifty years, the French are discovering the American procedure of the impeachment of the president of the United States: Richard Nixon in 1974, Bill Clinton in 1998, and now Donald Trump. One Democrat, two Republicans. As...
#MeToo Catches Up With Roman PolanskiFrance has taken longer than North America to address the sexual misconduct of its artists. Revered in France but boycotted and subjected to legal attacks in the United States for the 1977 rape of an underage girl, Roman Polanski had never had cause for concern in the country where he fled. However, this is no longer the case. While his latest...
Culture
This Week on TV5 Monde USA (April 6-12)This is your new reality: You are confined at home for the foreseeable future. Take advantage of this time to watch TV5 Monde USA, the first French-language television channel in the United States. Every week, France-Amérique will compile a list of 5 films, series, documentaries, cooking shows, and children's shows you don't want to miss! 1. AntiVirus Monday, April 6,...
Notre-Dame de Paris: Eight Centuries of HistoryFrom the birth of the project to the finishing touches, the documentary Notre-Dame de Paris, The Secrets of the Builders looks back at the life of this architectural gem on Ile de la Cité in Paris, using animated images in a blend of historical facts and fictional anecdotes. We talked with director Emmanuel Blanchard to find out more. France-Amérique: You condensed...
Three French Series That Have the Americans HookedAfter enduring years of indifference and even scorn, the quality of French television fiction is now widely accepted in the United States. Series such as The Returned, Spiral and Braquo paved the way for French series to find audiences abroad. Inspired by the well-crafted screenplays, hard-hitting dialogues and credible fictional worlds, other productions quickly followed suite. The result is a...
Simone de Beauvoir in AmericaBorn in 1908, the philosopher, novelist, and essayist was 39 when she arrived in New York. She had not yet published her renowned feminist work The Second Sex (1949), but had written three novels, including She Came to Stay, and two essays. Invited by the French cultural services to give a series of conferences at American universities, she spent four...
Business
Coronavirus: Industry Goes to War!Heavy industry and individual workers have arrived as backup to accelerate the production of masks and ventilators desperately needed by medical professionals. Both in France and the United States, a wartime economy has developed to fight against the coronavirus pandemic. On the banks of the East River opposite Manhattan, the Brooklyn Navy Yard is back to work. The former naval...
Emmanuel Macron Dreams of UnicornsAmbitious French president Emmanuel Macron wants to see a fivefold increase in the number of billion-dollar start-ups, or “unicorns,” in France over the next few years. His goal is to replicate the American model. Emmanuel Macron has a dream. He wants unicorns to flourish in France, and hopes that their number will rise from five to twenty, or even twenty-five,...
Ode à la Rose: Flower Delivery à la FrançaiseThe business model of Ode à la Rose, a flower delivery company founded by two French entrepreneurs in New York City in 2012, is based on the dual concept of French elegance and speed. Available across the northeast of the United States and in the Chicago area, the service will soon be expanded to and Florida. Monday is the most...
Pop! The Rise of American Sparkling WineThe consumption of sparkling wine in the United States has doubled since the 1970s. Thanks to champagnes imported from France, "American champagnes," and sparkling wines produced by French companies established on the U.S. West Coast, the American market is bubbling over! Since the first cases of champagne were delivered to the Thirteen Colonies in 1750, French bubbly has enjoyed a...
Education
Teachers 2.0: An Online French-American High SchoolThe first online French-American high school, OFALycée, will be opening its virtual doors in September 2020. Its goal is to prepare students within the U.S. education system for the French Baccalaureate exams. Every year, some 400 high school students in the United States take the Baccalaureate exam, which enables them to continue on to higher education in France. Fourteen schools,...
The Success of French Dual-Language Programs in the U.S.Dual-language classes are flourishing in the United States. With more than 160 bilingual programs across 34 states, French is now America’s second most popular foreign language. In New York, one in ten public schools offers a bilingual education. In Utah, one in five schools is bilingual. And in August, Alaska inaugurated its first two dual-language French-English classes. These bilingual programs...
French Immersion Classes Arrive in Alaska!The first two dual-language French-English classes in Alaska will be launched next August at O’Malley Elementary School, a public school in Anchorage. Despite being isolated, this American state is attracting an increasingly large international population. Alaska is no stranger to bilingualism. After all, the state’s first dual-language program is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year! Japan was one of Alaska’s...
Are French Classes Under Threat at American Universities?According to the latest report from the Modern Language Association, which conducts an annual survey on the status of language learning in higher education in America, 129 French programs were discontinued between 2013 and 2016. Karl Cogard, education attaché at the embassy of France in Washington D.C., offers his take on this worrying situation. France-Amérique: The Modern Language Association’s report...
Gastronomy
The Jean-Georges EmpireJean-Georges Vongerichten has lived in New York since 1986, and made the city the capital of his culinary empire. The French restaurant owner reigns over 39 establishments, including 25 in the United States. He guarantees the same quality of service from Las Vegas to Singapore, and still finds time to cook for his friends! The clock strikes 5:30 pm in...
La Chandeleur: The Day to Flip CrêpesWhile Americans watch expectantly for the groundhog to emerge on February 2, the French will be flipping crêpes with their families. Known as Chandeleur in French and "Candlemas" in English, this event mixes pagan, Celtic, and catholic influences, and is named after the candles used for a pagan ritual celebrating the arrival of the harvest. In 472, Pope Gelasius I...
King Cake: A French Tradition Little Known in the U.S.This golden, frangipane-filled cake appears in boulangeries and patisseries at the end of December. King cake or la galette des rois, is traditionally eaten with the family on the first Sunday after New Year’s Day, but many enjoy it from December 31 and throughout the whole month of January! Along with Yule logs and Easter eggs, this is another unmissable...
Dinner Is Served: The Art of Hosting à la FrançaiseWith the end-of-year celebrations almost upon us, what is the best way to host a dinner à la française without committing a faux pas? Here are a few invaluable tips for putting on a meal fit for the finest French tables. In the olden days in France, young women from well-to-do families all had a bible of good manners, Usages...