up vote 20 down vote favorite
1

Une décision que nous devons prendre dans les prochains jours est la langue principale du site. Il y a des choses qui peuvent être bilingues (en particulier on peut avoir des questions en anglais et des questions en français — c'est ce qui était prévu sur Area 51). Mais l'environnement dominant sera quand même dans une langue.

  • Un participant doit-il forcement comprendre l'anglais ? (Pour l'instant oui, l'interface et la FAQ sont en anglais, mais c'est un obstacle facile à surmonter.)
  • Un participant doit-il forcément comprendre le français ?
  • Les étiquettes (tags), notamment, seront-elles en anglais ou en français ?
  • Le site meta est-il anglophone ou bilingue ? (Pour l'instant, il ne peut pas être que francophone, lorsqu'il s'agit de communiquer avec les développeurs.)

A decision that we need to take in the next few days is the principal language of the site. Some things can be bilingual, in particular we can allow both English-language and French-language questions (this was the plan on Area 51). But there will inevitably be a dominant language.

  • Must every participant understand English? (For the time being, yes, because the interface and the FAQ are in English, but this can be remedied easily.)
  • Must every participant understand French?
  • In particular, should the tags be in English or in French?
  • Is the Meta site English-speaking or bilingual? (It cannot be French-only at the moment, because we need to communicate with the developers in English.)
share
Apparement c'est bien parti pour rester en Francais. Une telle decision venant de personnes naturellement francophones semble un peu egoiste cependant... C'est dommage, ce site aurait pu aider des amis qui cherchent a apprendre le francais et ont souvent des questions, je ne vais probablement pas leur recommander ce site car leur Francais n'est pas encore assez bon... Certes l'anglais reste accepte mais ca limite l'utilisation dans le temps, c'est pas rentable de passer son temps ici quand on voit que 90% des questions/reponses sont en Francais: mettez completement le site en francais... – Aki Feb 9 '12 at 6:10
@Aki The proportion is more like 50%, and askers who use English are not made to feel unwelcome. – Gilles♦ Feb 9 '12 at 9:30
Oh really? Well I admit I didn't really check, it just felt like 90%. My other point is that people want to learn from others' questions, which is not possible if they can't understand the question being asked. So this site mainly targets readers who can already understand French, which is not the majority IMHO. – Aki Feb 9 '12 at 12:48
@Aki The people who would most benefit from this site are people who already have some level of French proficiency. If you're just beginning to learn French, you need closer tutoring than a Q&A site can provide. A majority of the regulars on the site are native French speakers. Posts in English exclude the people who know the subject matter (French) but don't speak your proposed metalanguage (English). – Gilles♦ Feb 9 '12 at 13:00

5 Answers

up vote 17 down vote

La langue principale du site devrait être le français, et la plupart des questions et des réponses sur le site devraient être en français, puisque les experts sur le thème du site (qui est, rappelons-le, le français) maîtrisent par définition le français mais ne sont pas forcément capables de comprendre ou de s'exprimer en anglais. Il vaut mieux que les débutants posent leurs questions en français (quitte à ce qu'un passant les corrige), plutôt que de poser des questions en anglais qui risquent de ne pas être comprises. De plus une trop large proportion de questions dans une langue autre que le français ferait fuire de nombreux francophones. Encore une fois, il ne faut pas repousser les experts.

Il y a quelques types de questions pour lesquelles l'anglais se défend :

  • Des questions qui demandent spéciquement des explications sur une nuance du français que n'a pas l'anglais. Exemple : Connaître and savoir ; si cette question est intéressante et pas si élémentaire, c'est parce qu'elle demande plus qu'une simple lecture des articles connaître et savoir dans un dictionnaire — le fait que les deux mots sont en général traduits par le même (know) en anglais est pertinent.
  • Des questions de traduction entre l'anglais et le français.

(Méta est une autre histoire. Vous pouvez constater que pour le moment j'essaire d'y poster systématiquement dans les deux langues, afin d'être compris à la fois des francophones et du personnel de Stack Exchange.)

The primary language of the site should be French, and most questions and answers on the site should be in French, since the experts on the topic of the site (the French language) are by definition fluent in French and may not be able to understand or write in English. It is better for learners to post in halting but comprehensible French (and have their question improved) than to post in English only to have their question misunderstood. Furthermore a large proportion of questions that are not in French would drive away many native French speakers. Again, we don't want to drive the experts away.

There are a few questions that might fare better in English:

  • Questions that are specifically aimed at explaining nuances of French with respect to English. Example: Connaître and savoir; part of the reason why this question is not so easy (and why I don't think it's a general reference question) is that there's more to it than the dictionary definitions — the fact that connaître and savoir are usually translated as the same word (“know”) in English is relevant.
  • Questions asking for translations to and from English.

(Meta is a different matter. As you can see, so far I'm trying to keep my posts on Meta bilingual, so that they can be understood by both the Francophone denizens of the site and Stack Exchange personnel.)

share
Alors, pas encore corrigé le Français de Ninefingers? :) – Benjol Aug 18 '11 at 5:46
@Benjol Je comprends bien le système "stackexchange" alors si quelqu'un a amélioré mon français, je sais comment trouver la différence et alors je peux apprendre, mais ce n'est pas vrai pour tous nos membres, dont les nouveaux utilisateurs bénéficierait plus peut-être par un commentaire. À moi, c'est autant. – Antony Vennard Sep 5 '11 at 20:56
2  
@Ninefingers On other sites, improving the English in a post is considered routine, so improving the French should be routine here anyway. – Gilles♦ Sep 5 '11 at 20:58
La langue principale du site devrait être le français : c'est vrai, mais le reste du site est en anglais (liens, profils, administration, architecture générale). Est-il techniquement possible de le traduire ? – Stamm Dec 7 '11 at 14:48
1  
@Stamm Il y a une traduction non officielle et incomplète de l'interface pour les gens qui sont près à installer un userscript : meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/105169/… Les bêta-testeurs sont bienvenus. Traduire la FAQ (qui est plutôt un guide d'utilisation) est sur ma liste de choses à faire (mais si quelqu'un d'autre est volontaire, très bien). – Gilles♦ Dec 7 '11 at 15:37
up vote 10 down vote

Good question.

For the record (and no offence, but,) I'm totally against asking questions in both languages at once.

I think the dominant language will happen naturally and depend on user-base. Any attempt to work against that is futile, I'd say.

Tags however, is a VERY good question, and I don't have any answer. I think they should definitely be monolingual, and I'd be tempted to say that they should be in French (this is FL&U after all!).

Brainwave: using synonyms to translate from English into French!

We will always need to communicate with developers, but I think there are enough of us here to translate for them if need be.

UPDATE: my take on this is refining slightly: I would say that the only reason for asking questions in English (on main) is because the asker isn't comfortable writing it in French. Autrement dit: I'm think I'm against francophones asking questions in English.

share
1  
On German Language & Usage, tags are in English. I don't think we should do this, because the proportion of native French speakers who also know enough English to keep up with and be interested in an English-speaking site is far smaller. – Gilles♦ Aug 17 '11 at 20:46
5  
OK, so we're agreeing. I think using tag synonyms to translate English tags directly into their French equivalents is an elegant solution which would avoid tripping up English users. – Benjol Aug 17 '11 at 20:49
I don't understand what you mean by 'tag synonyms'; do you mean just adding 2 tags (one in each language) instead of 1? – Jez Aug 17 '11 at 20:53
@Jez Yes: you type the English name, and it's silently translated to the French name. The software already has that feature, all we'd need to do is enter the list of names we want to translate. – Gilles♦ Aug 17 '11 at 20:58
1  
@Jez SE sites allow us to make one tag essentially redirect to another. So any time someone tags a question grammar it would automatically change that to la grammaire, etc. – keithjgrant Aug 17 '11 at 20:59
1  
... hmmm. Whether or not to use the article in tag names is an interesting question. French is a lot more particular about article usage than English. – keithjgrant Aug 17 '11 at 21:00
@keithjgrant, that deserves it's own question! :) – Benjol Aug 18 '11 at 18:49
up vote 3 down vote

Je suis en accord avec @Gilles - la langue du site doit etre francais; facilement car c'est fou du demanderais en anglais quand les meilleurs (quantite et qualite) du renseignements sont les francais qui ne peut pas etre bilingue.

Je suggère que nous permettons à des questions pour être affichées en français ou en anglais et en français, avec la partie anglaise étant facultative et seulement pour clarifier les corrections pour eux avec mauvais français

I agree with Gilles - the site language must be French - simply because it's madness to ask in English when the best quantity and quality of answers will be posted by those who can read French as well or better than they can read English.

I would also suggest that we allow questions to be posted in French, or in French (and underneath) in English - to clarify the meaning for those of us with not very good french skills.

share
up vote 2 down vote

To answer this question, we have to address a deeper question: who is this site's audience? There are a few possible answers to that question:

  1. Francophones looking to better their French.
  2. Anglophones learning French.
  3. Anglophones learning French and francophones learning English.

If the answer is #1, then we should go with French. If the answer is #2, then we should go with English. Finally, if the answer is #3, then we can go either way or declare both of equal value.

If the site was meant for francophones, then English wouldn't even be allowed. After all, it would be for people with an already decent grasp of French. The fact that we allow another language other than French clearly implies that those people are also part of the audience. Since option #1 doesn't account for why we allow English in here, that can't be the answer.

That leaves option #2 and #3. Which of the two is it?

The truth is, that question has already been implicitly answered in an other meta question:

 Do not allow questions asking for translations from French into English as such; however, it is fine to ask for an explanation in English of what a difficult French sentence means.

Unless we decide to revise that policy (it's fairly new, after all), the answer is #2. The fact that we do not allow French to English translation makes it clear that it is a site about French, not French and English - which is to be expect of French.SE. As a result, the answer cannot be #3 and thus it is #2.

Therefore, the primary language of this site should be English.

If the community doesn't like the answer to this question, then perhaps that suggests there is something wrong with the original intent/design of the site. But I don't see how, given the current policies, French should be this site's primary language. It wouldn't be consistent with the design.

share
3  
I disagree with this policy. The site should be for anyone to better their French. I'm not keen on allowing English, but I'm prepared to deal with a moderate amount of it. If the site is primarily for Anglophones learning English, it won't interest me (or many other francophones) much. – Gilles♦ Aug 18 '11 at 7:16
@Gilles: I'm not keen on it either, but it's the logical conclusion to the other policies that have been adopted so far. As I said, if the community has a problem with English being the primary language, then it's sign of a deeper problem. – Borror0 Aug 18 '11 at 7:20
We have a deeper problem already? where? – Gilles♦ Aug 18 '11 at 7:30
@Gilles: I have not said that. I said that our current policies cater to anglophones learning French, so English should be our primary language. If the community does not want English to be our primary language, then that suggests there is something wrong with our other policies too. – Borror0 Aug 18 '11 at 14:38
3  
@Borror0 How about 4. Anglophones learning French and francophones looking to improve their French and discuss the language? – Jez Aug 19 '11 at 14:18
@Jez: We can only dialogue in one language: either in French, which excludes anglophones whose French isn't that great yet, or in English, which excludes all the francophones whose English isn't that great. That's why option #4 is a lie. It doesn't really exist. – Borror0 Aug 19 '11 at 16:48
I don't agree. Some people can dialogue in one language, others in another. – Jez Aug 19 '11 at 16:50
As Gilles knows, I disagree with the French policy. My argument is concerning one other language website: japanese stack exchange. There should be some kind of uniformity and logic within stackexchange. Moreover, people learning one language may not master it at a sufficient level to learn from all questions/answers if they are in French. I often find my self digging through questions in the japanese site and without English it would be hopeless and I wouldn't learn or contribute at all. Please consider that most people in the world who study french aren't french, help them learn. – Aki Feb 9 '12 at 6:05
up vote 2 down vote

Je suis Britannique. Quand j'étais à l'école, tous les professeurs faisaient cours en anglais, en dépit de ce que la plupart parlaient français couramment, s'ils n'étaient pas bilingues voire de langue maternelle française. Comment peut-on s’améliorer si l'on n'a pas la chance de pouvoir utiliser la langue ? S'il y a un choix à faire, je soutiens le français.

However:

  1. As Benjol says, it's a community decision.
  2. Having another language to compare/contrast with is useful. For English learners of French, comparing our own language helps sometimes. So I don't support a total exclusion of other languages.
  3. However, this is about French. Allowing a majority contribution in English unfairly disadvantages say German students of French, for example. So half of this answer may be unintelligible to some of our visitors.
  4. Obviously the UI is in English. I did start an effort to fix this (you need GreaseMonkey) but unfortunately becoming employed put paid to my efforts at the time. Please don't laugh at my bad French - has been a while. Anyone wishing to help me continue/improve this work - please do. Clearly, a better solution would be UI translation for sites like this.

A hard question, I feel, but overall, I am in favour of being in French.

share
4  
Despite what I said here, anybody who dares to laugh at anybody else's 'bad' French or English here will be summarily executed. A guillotine would be fitting. – Benjol Aug 18 '11 at 5:48
1  
Thanks a lot for your UI translation effort! I'm going to have a look (when I have time… not always easy, in spite of what you may think from my SE activity). Warning: I don't know computer vocabulary in French. – Gilles♦ Sep 5 '11 at 20:40
@Gilles It might be slightly broken - it depends what SE Inc do with their markup on each page as I'm using jQuery to identify the elements and change their contents. Last time I tried it it broke the user pages, but translated the home page ok. Likewise; my free time is fairly restricted, but if we can put together a working template, that's less work for Jeff and team to do when it comes to working on the actual translation effort. – Antony Vennard Sep 5 '11 at 20:46
@Ninefingers I know nothing about web programming. I was proposing to look at the translations, I'll leave the programmy bits to others. BTW, have you marketed this to other languages, e.g. German Language & Usage? – Gilles♦ Sep 5 '11 at 20:50
@Gilles not yet - I don't speak German (my French is rusty enough, as I have discovered in the past two weeks!) but I was thinking if we could get help from Pekka we might really get something going. Start a chat room is perhaps the best way? – Antony Vennard Sep 5 '11 at 21:07

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged