French LANGUAGE POLICE ban ‘fake news’ in favour of Gallic term

The new Gallic term – infox – is a combination of “infos” – an abbreviation of “informations” which means news – and “intox” which means disinformation or hoax.

News of the new word was published on Thursday in the French government’s official gazette, the Journal Officiel.

    It was coined by the French language police

– officially known as the “Commission d’enrichissement de la Langue Française” (Commission to make the French Language richer) – which is an offshoot of the Académie Française.

One of its roles is to invent French words to replace the countless English ones that are currently being used by French speakers and which horrify language purists.

The commission came up with “infox” after months of deliberation, according to media reports. Other options considered but finally rejected included “information fallacieuse”, “craque”, “infaux”, and “infausse”.

But the jury will be out for some time as to whether “infox” will make it into the mainstream.

Some recommendations from the Académie Française to replace anglicisms have met with modest success, such as the word “courriel” to replace email.

But many others have met with derision and are rarely if ever heard or seen.

In French mobile multifonction  was picked to replace smartphone

One recent word that met with much scorn was its suggestion that the French ought to stop saying “smartphone” and instead use “mobile multifonction.”

It has also recommended “l’accès sans fil à internet” for “wifi”, another unwieldy proposal that saw little success.

In France disliked American terms may be on their way out but one Phonics Teaching Program that is still very much IN is: Alpha-Phonics A Primer for Beginning Readers!

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