French Assignment On Study Of…

Culture of France

(Masterpiece painting by Eugène Delacroix called Liberty Leading the People portrays the July
Revolution using the stylistic views of Romanticism. Since Liberty is part of the motto «Liberté, égalité,
fraternité», as the French put it, this painting became the primary symbol of the French Republic.)

Submitted By:

MOHAMMAD RAZA KAMAL

Roll No. : 26

MIB: Sem. III (JMI)

Preface

The culture of France and of the French people has been

shaped by its geography, by profound historical events, and

by foreign and internal forces and groups. France, and in

particular Paris, has played an important role as a center of

high culture and of decorative arts since the seventeenth

century, first in Europe, and from the nineteenth century on,

world wide. From the late nineteenth century, France has

also played an important role in modern art, cinema, fashion

and cuisine. The importance of French culture has waned

and waxed over the centuries, depending on its economic,

political and military importance. French culture today is

marked both by great regional and socioeconomic

differences and by strong unifying tendencies.

 C O N T E N T S

1. What is "French" culture?

2. Ethnicity and nationality

3. Language

4. Religion

5. Regional customs and traditions

6. Other specific communities

7. Social class

8. Families and romantic relationships

9. Role of the State

10. Food and lifestyle

11. Media and art

12. Transportation

13. Holidays
 What i s "French" cu l ture?
Culture, whether in France, Europe or in general, consists of beliefs
and values learned through the socialization process as well as
material artifacts.Culture guides the social interactions between
members of society and influences the personal beliefs and values that
shape a person's perception of their environment: "Culture is the
learned set of beliefs, values, norms and material goods shared by
group members... Culture consists of everything we learn in groups
during the life course-from infancy to old age."

The conception of "French" culture however poses certain difficulties

and presupposes a series of assumptions about what precisely the
expression "French" means. Where as American culture posits the
notion of the "melting-pot" and cultural diversity, the expression
"French culture" tends to refer implicitly to a specific geographical
entity (as, say, "metropolitan France", generally excluding its overseas
departments) or to a specific historico-sociological group defined by
ethnicity, language, religion and geography. The realities of
"Frenchness" however, are extremely complicated. Even before the
late nineteenth century, "metropolitan France" was largely a patchwork
of local customs and regional differences that the unifying aims of the
Ancien Régime and the French Revolution had only begun to work
against, and today's France remains a nation of numerous indigenous
and foreign languages, of multiple ethnicities and religions, and of
regional diversity that includes French citizens in Corsica, Guadeloupe,
Martinique and elsewhere around the globe.

The creation of some sort of typical or shared French culture or

"cultural identity", despite this vast heterogeneity, is the result of
powerful internal forces — such as the French educational system,
mandatory military service, state linguistic and cultural policies — and
by profound historic events — such as the Franco-Prussian war and the
two World Wars — which have forged a sense of national identity over
the last 200 years. However, despite these unifying forces, France
today still remains marked by social class and by important regional
differences in culture (cuisine, dialect/accent, local traditions) that
many fear will be unable to withstand contemporary social forces
(depopulation of the countryside, immigration, centralization, market
forces and the world economy).
In recent years, to fight the loss of regional diversity, many in France
have promoted forms of multiculturalism and encouraged cultural
enclaves (communautarisme), including reforms on the preservation of
regional languages and the decentralization of certain government
functions, but French multiculturalism has had a harder time of
accepting, or of integrating into the collective identity, the large non-
Christian and immigrant communities and groups that have come to
France since the 1960s.

The last fifty years has also seen French cultural identity "threatened"
by global market forces and by American "cultural hegemony". Since
its dealings with the 1993 GATT free trade negotiations, France has
fought for what it calls the exception culturelle, meaning the right to
subsidize or treat favorably domestic cultural production and to limit or
control foreign cultural products (as seen in public funding for French
cinema or the lower VAT accorded to books). The notion of an explicit
exception française however has angered many of France's critics

The French are often perceived as taking a great pride in national

identity and the positive achievements of France (the expression
"chauvinism" is of French origin) and cultural issues are more
integrated in the body of the politics than elsewhere (see "The Role of
the State", below). The French Revolution claimed universalism for the
democratic principles of the Republic. Charles de Gaulle actively
promoted a notion of French "grandeur" ("greatness"). Perceived
declines in cultural status are a matter of national concern and have
generated national debates, both from the left (as seen in the anti-
globalism of José Bové) and from the right and far right (as in the
discourses of the National Front).

According to Hofstede's Framework for Assessing Culture, the culture

of France is moderately individualistic and has a relatively high Power
Distance Index.

 Ethnicity and Nationality

Since the beginning of the Third Republic (1871-1940), the state has
not categorized people according to their alleged ethnic origins. Hence,
in contrast to the US census, French people are not asked to define
their ethnic appartenance, whichever it may be. The usage of ethnic
and racial categorization is avoided to prevent any case of
discrimination; the same regulations apply to religious membership
data which cannot be compiled under the French Census. This classic
French republican non-essentialist conception of nationality is
officialized by the French Constitution, according to whom "French" is a
nationality, and not a specific ethnicity. This ideal not withstanding, the
history textbooks (used both in France and its colonies) of the Third
Republic are famous for their opening lines: "Our ancestors the
Gauls...".

In past years, the debate on social discrimination has been more and
more important, sometimes mixing itself with ethnic issues — as by
the Front National 's nationalist discourse of La France aux Français
("France to the French") or Les Français d'abord ("French first"); their
claims of an "ethnic French" group (Français de souche, which literally
translated as "French with roots") have been adamantly refused by
many other groups, which widely considered this party as racist[1] —
in particular concerning the so-called "second-generation immigrants",
who are French citizens born in France to immigrant parents (whom
themselves may either be foreigner or French) France has exhibited a
high rate of immigration from Europe, Africa and Asia throughout the
20th century, explaining that a large minority of the French population
has various ethnic ascendancies. According to Michèle Tribalat,
researcher at INED, it is very difficult to estimate the number of
French immigrants or those born to immigrants, because of the
absence of official statistics. Only three attempts have been made: in
1927, 1942 and 1986. According to this 2004 study, among about 14
million people of foreign ascendancy (immigrants or with at least one
parent or grandparent who is an immigrant), 5.2 million are from
South-European ascendancy (Italy, Spain, Portugal), and 3 million
come from the Maghreb.Henceforth, 23 % of French citizens have at
least one immigrant parent or grandparent. No recognized studies
have been done covering wider timescales since mass immigration
started in the 20th century.

Now, the interracial blending of some native French and newcomers

stands as a vibrant and boasted feature of French culture, from
popular music to movies and literature. Therefore, alongside mixing of
populations, exists also a cultural blending (le métissage culturel) that
is present in France. It may be compared to the traditional US
conception of the melting-pot. The French culture might have been
already blended in from other races and ethnicities, in cases of some
biographical research on the possibility of African ancestry on a small
number of famous French citizens. Author Alexandre Dumas, père
possessed one-fourth black Haitian descent, and Empress Josephine
Napoleon who was born and raised in the French West Indies from a
plantation estate family. We can mention as well, the most famous
French singer Edith Piaf whose grandmother was a North African from
Kabylie

For a long time, the only objection to such outcomes predictably came
from the far-right schools of thought. In the past few years, other
unexpected voices are however beginning to question what they
interpret, as the new philosopher Alain Finkielkraut coined the term, as
an "ideology of miscegenation" (une idéologie du métissage) that may
come from what one other philosopher, Pascal Bruckner, defined as the
"sob of the White man" (le sanglot de l'homme blanc). These critics
have been dismissed by the mainstream and their propagators have
been labelled as new reactionaries (les nouveaux réactionnaires), even
if racist and anti-immigration sentiment has recently been documented
to be increasing in France at least according to one poll. Such critics,
including Nicolas Sarkozy, the current President of France, take
example on the United States' conception of multiculturalism to claim
that France has consistently denied the existence of ethnic groups
within their borders and has refused to grant them specific rights.

 Language
French culture is profoundly allied with the French language. The artful
use of the mother tongue, and its defense against perceived decline or
corruption by foreign terms, is a major preoccupation for some people
and entities.

The Académie française sets an official standard of language purity;

however, this standard, which is not mandatory, is even occasionally
ignored by the government itself: for instance, the left-wing
government of Lionel Jospin pushed for the feminization of the names
of some functions (madame la ministre) while the Académie pushed
for some more traditional madame le ministre.

Some action has been taken by the government in order to promote

French culture and the French language. For instance, there exists a
system of subsidies and preferential loans for supporting French
cinema. The Toubon law, from the name of the conservative culture
minister who promoted it, makes it mandatory to use French in
advertisements directed to the general public. Note that contrary to
some misconception sometimes found in the Anglophone media, the
French government neither regulates the language used by private
parties in non-commercial settings, nor makes it compulsory that
France-based WWW sites should be in French.

France counts many regional languages, some of them being very

different from standard French such as Breton and Alsatian. Some
regional languages are Romance, like French, such as Provençal. The
Basque language is completely unrelated to French and, indeed, to any
other language in the world; its area straddles the border between the
south west of France and the north of Spain. Many of those languages
have enthusiastic advocates; however, the real importance of local
languages remains subject to debate. In April 2001, the Minister of
Education, Jack Lang, admitted formally that for more than two
centuries, the political powers of the French government had repressed
regional languages, and announced that bilingual education would, for
the first time, be recognized, and bilingual teachers recruited in French
public schools.

A revision of the French constitution creating official recognition of

regional languages was implemented by the Parliament in Congress at
Versailles in July 2008.

 Religion
France is a secular country where freedom of thought and of religion is
preserved, by virtue of the 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man and
of the Citizen. The Republic is based on the principle of laïcité, that is
of freedom of religion (including of agnosticism and atheism) enforced
by the Jules Ferry laws and the 1905 law on the separation of the
State and the Church, enacted at the beginning of the Third Republic
(1871-1940). A January 2007 poll found that 51% of the French
population describe themselves as Catholics -- and only half of those
said they believed in God--, 31% as atheists, 4% as Muslims, 3% as
Protestants and 1% as Jews.

Cathol ic ism
The Roman Catholic faith is no longer considered the state religion, as
it was before the 1789 Revolution and throughout the various, non-
republican regimes of the 19th century (the Restauration, the July
Monarchy and the Second Empire). The Official split of Catholic Church
and State ("Séparation de l'Eglise et de l'Etat") took place in 1905, and
this major reform emphazises the Laicist and anti-clericalist mood of
French Radical Republicans in this period.

At the beginning of the 20th century, France was a largely rural

country with conservative Catholic mores, but in the hundred years
since then, the countryside has become depopulated, and the
population has largely become more secular. A December 2006 poll by
Harris Interactive, published in The Financial Times, found that 32% of
the French population described themselves as agnostic, a further 32%
as atheist and only 27% believed in any type of God or supreme being.

I s lam
After Catholicism, Islam is the second largest faith in France today,
and the country has the largest Muslim population (in percentage) of
any Western European country. This is a result of immigration and
permanent family settlement in France, from the 1960s on, of groups
from, principally, North Africa (Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia) and, to a
lesser extent, other areas such as Turkey and West Africa.[14] While it is
prohibited in France for the government census to collect data on
religious beliefs, estimates and polls place the percentage of Muslims
at between 4% and 7%. The Muslim population in France has had to
deal with many difficulties in terms of social and cultural integration
into mainstream French society, stemming both from socioeconomic
issues (unskilled jobs, low incomes, poor neighborhoods, etc.) and
ethnic and religious issues (prejudice, concerns over "radical Islam",
problems of integration into a secular country, etc.) that have been
exemplified in recent years through civil unrest in working-class and
immigrant suburbs (see, for example, 2005 civil unrest in France) and
legal/political issues (such as the "affair of the Islamic headscarf").

Juda ism
The current Jewish community in France numbers around 600,000,
according to the World Jewish Congress and 500,000 according to the
Appel Unifié Juif de France, and is found mainly in the metropolitan
areas of Paris, Marseille and Strasbourg.
The history of the Jews of France dates back over 2,000 years. In the
early Middle Ages, France was a center of Jewish learning, but
persecution increased as the Middle Ages wore on. France was the first
country in Europe to emancipate its Jewish population during the
French Revolution, but, despite legal equality anti-Semitism remained
an issue, as illustrated in the Dreyfus affair of the late 19th century.
Despite the death of a quarter of all French Jews during the Holocaust,
France currently has the largest Jewish population in Europe.

French Jews are mostly Sephardic and span a range of religious

affiliations, from the ultra-Orthodox Haredi communities to the large
segment of Jews who are entirely secular.

Buddhism
Buddhism is widely reported to be the fourth largest religion in France,
after Christianity, Islam, and Judaism. France has over two hundred
Buddhist meditation centers, including about twenty sizable retreat
centers in rural areas. The Buddhist population mainly consists of
Chinese and Vietnamese immigrants, with a substantial minority of
native French converts and “sympathizers.” The rising popularity of
Buddhism in France has been the subject of considerable discussion in
the French media and academy in recent years.

Cults and new religious movements

France created in 2006 the first French parliamentary commission on

cult activities which led to a report registering a number of cults
considered as dangerous. Supporters of such movements have
criticized the report on the grounds of the respect of religious freedom.
Proponents of the measure contend that only dangerous cults have
been listed as such, and state secularism insures religious freedom in
France.

 Regional customs and traditions

Modern France is the result of centuries of nation building and the
acquisition and incorporation of a number of historical provinces and
overseas colonies into its geographical and political structure. These
regions all evolved with their own specific cultural and linguistic
traditions in fashion, religious observance, regional language and
accent, family structure, cuisine, leisure activities, industry, etc.

The evolution of the French state and culture, from the Renaissance to
today, has however promoted a centralization of politics, media, and
cultural production in and around Paris (and, to a lesser extent, around
the other major urban centers), and the industrialization of the country
in the twentieth century has led to a massive move of French people
from the countryside to urban areas. At the end of the nineteenth
century, around 50% of the French depended on the land for a living;
today French farmers only make up 6-7%, while 73% live in cities. [16]
Nineteenth century French literature abounds in scenes of provincial
youth "coming up" to Paris to "make it" in the cultural, political or
social scene of the capital (this scheme is frequent in the novels of
Balzac). Policies enacted by the French Third Republic also encouraged
this displacement through mandatory military service, a centralized
national educational system, and suppression of regional languages.
While government policy and public debate in France in recent years
has returned to a valorization of regional differences and a call for
decentralization of certain aspects of the public sphere (sometimes
with ethnic, racial or reactionary overtones), the history of regional
displacement and the nature of the modern urban environment and of
mass media and culture have made the preservation of a regional
"sense of place or culture" in today's France extremely difficult.

The names of the historical French provinces — such as Brittany,Berry,

Orléanais, Normandy, Languedoc, Lyonnais, Dauphiné, Champagne,
Poitou, Guyenne and Gascony, Burgundy, Picardy, Provence,Berry,
Touraine, Limousin, Auvergne, Béarn, Alsace, Flanders, Lorraine,
Corsica, Savoy... (please see individual articles for specifics about each
regional culture) — are still used to designate natural, historical and
cultural regions, and many of them appear in modern région or
département names. These names are also used by the French in their
self-identification of family origin. Regional identification is most
pronounced today in cultures linked to non-French languages like
Corsu, Català, Occitan, Alsatian, Basque and Brezhoneg (Breton), and
some of these regions have promoted movements calling for some
degree of regional autonomy, and, occasionally, national independence
(see, for example, Breton nationalism and Corsica).

There are huge differences in life style, socioeconomic status and

world view between Paris and the provinces. The French often use the
expression "la France profonde" ("Deep France", similar to "heartland")
to designate the profoundly "French" aspects of provincial towns,
village life and rural agricultural culture, which escape the hegemony
of Paris. The expression can however have a pejorative meaning,
similar to the expression "le désert français" ("the French desert")
used to describe a lack of acculturation of the provinces. Another
expression, "terroir" is a French term originally used for wine and
coffee to denote the special characteristics that geography bestowed
upon these products. It can be very loosely translated as "a sense of
place" which is embodied in certain qualities, and the sum of the
effects that the local environment (especially the "soil") has had on the
growth of the product. The use of the term has since been generalized
to talk about many cultural products.

In addition to its metropolitan territory, France also consists of

overseas departments made up of its former colonies of Guadeloupe,
Martinique and French Guiana in the Caribbean, and Réunion in the
Indian Ocean. (There also exist a number of "overseas collectivities
and "overseas territories". For a full discussion, see administrative
divisions of France. Since 1982, following the French government’s
policy of decentralisation, overseas departments have elected regional
councils with powers similar to those of the regions of metropolitan
France. As a result of a constitutional revision which occurred in 2003,
these regions are now to be called overseas regions.) These overseas
departments have the same political status as metropolitan
departments and are integral parts of France, similar to how Hawaii is
a state and an integral part of the United States, yet they also have
specific cultural and linguistic traditions which set them apart. Certain
elements of overseas culture have also been introduced to
metropolitan culture (as, for example, the musical form the biguine).

Industrialization, immigration and urbanization in the nineteenth and

twentieth centuries have also created new socioeconomic regional
communities in France, both urban (like Paris, Lyon, Villeurbanne, Lille,
Marseille, etc.) and the suburban and working class hinterlands (like
Seine-Saint-Denis) of urban agglomerations (called variously banlieues
("suburbs", sometimes qualified as "chic" or "pauvres") or les cités
("housing projects") which have developed their own "sense of place"
and local culture (much like the various boroughs of New York City or
suburbs of Los Angeles), as well as cultural identity.
 Other specific communities

Romani

France has an estimated 280,000-340,000 Roma, generally known as

Gitans, Tsiganes, Romanichels (slightly pejorative), Bohémiens, or
Gens du voyage ("travellers").

LGBT

There are large gay and lesbian communities in the cities, particularly
in the Paris metropolitan area (such as in Le Marais district of the
capital). Although homosexuality is perhaps not as well tolerated in
France as in Spain, Scandinavia, and the Benelux nations, surveys of
the French public reveal a considerable shift in attitudes comparable to
other Western European nations. As of 2001, 55% of the French
consider homosexuality "an acceptable lifestyle." The current mayor of
Paris, Bertrand Delanoë, is gay.

In 2006, an Ipsos survey shows that 62% support same-sex marriage,

while 37% were opposed. 55% believed gay and lesbian couples
should not have parenting rights, while 44% believe same-sex couples
should be able to adopt.

Other subcultures
Paris has traditionally been associated with alternative, artistic or
intellectual subcultures, many of which involved foreigners. Such
subcultures include the "Bohemians" of the mid-nineteenth century,
the Impressionists, artistic circles of the Belle époque (around such
artists as Picasso and Alfred Jarry), the Dadaists, Surrealists, the "Lost
Generation" (Hemingway, Gertrude Stein) and the post-war
"intellectuals" associated with Montparnasse (Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone
de Beauvoir).

 Social class
Despite the egalitarian aspects of French society, French culture
remains marked by social-economic class and by many class
distinctions.

 Families and Romantic R elationships

Household structure

Growing out of the values of the Catholic church and rural

communities, the basic unit of French society was traditionally held to
be the family .[19] Over the twentieth century, the "traditional" family
structure in France has evolved from extended families to, after World
War II, nuclear families. Since the 1960s, marriages have decreased
and divorces have increased in France, and divorce law and legal
family status have evolved to reflect these social changes.

According to INSEE figures, household and family composition in

metropolitan France continues to evolve. Most significantly, from 1982
to 1999, single parent families have increased from 3.6% to 7.4%;
there have also been increases in the number of unmarried couples,
childless couples, and single men (from 8.5% to 12.5) and women
(from 16.0% to 18.5%). Their analysis indicates that "one in three
dwellings are occupied by a person living alone; one in four dwellings
are occupied by a childless couple."

Voted by the French Parliament in November 1999 following some

controversy, the pacte civil de solidarité ("civil pact of solidarity")
commonly known as a PACS, is a form of civil union between two
adults (same-sex or opposite-sex) for organising their joint life. It
brings rights and responsibilities, but less so than marriage. From a
legal standpoint, a PACS is a "contract" drawn up between the two
individuals, which is stamped and registered by the clerk of the court.
Individuals who have registered a PACS are still considered "single"
with regard to family status for some purposes, while they are
increasingly considered in the same way as married couples are for
other purposes. While it was pushed by the government of Prime
Minister Lionel Jospin in 1998, it was also opposed, mostly by people
on the right-wing who support traditionalist family values and who
argued that PACS and the recognition of homosexual unions would be
disastrous for French society.

Same-sex marriage is however not legal in France.

 Role of the State

The French state has traditionally played a key role in promoting and
supporting culture through the educational, linguistic, cultural and
economic policies of the government and through its promotion of
national identity. Because of the closeness of this relationship, cultural
changes in France are often linked to, or produce, political crisis.[21]

The relationship between the French state and culture is an old one.
Under Louis XIII's minister Richelieu, the independent Académie
française came under state supervision and became an official organ of
control over the French language and seventeenth-century literature.
During Louis XIV's reign, his minister Jean-Baptiste Colbert brought
French luxury industries, like textile and porcelain, under royal control
and the architecture, furniture, fashion and etiquette of the royal court
(particularly at the Château de Versailles) became the preeminent
model of noble culture in France (and, to a great degree, throughout
Europe) during the latter half of the seventeenth century.

At times, French state policies have sought to unify the country around
certain cultural norms, while at other times they have promoted
regional differences within a heterogeneous French identity. The
unifying effect was particularly true of the "radical period"" of the
French Third Republic which fought regionalisms (including regional
languages), supported anti-clericalism and a strict separation of church
from state (including education) and actively promoted national
identity, thus converting (as the historian Eugen Weber has put it) a
"country of peasants into a nation of Frenchmen". The Vichy Regime,
on the other hand, promoted regional "folk" traditions.
The cultural policies of the (current) French Fifth Republic have been
varied, but a consensus seems to exist around the need for
preservation of French regionalisms (such as food and language) as
long as these don't undermine national identity. Meanwhile, the French
state remains ambivalent over the integration into "French" culture of
cultural traditions from recent immigrant groups and from foreign
cultures, particularly American culture (movies, music, fashion, fast
food, language, etc.). There also exists a certain fear over the
perceived loss of French identity and culture in the European system
and under American "cultural hegemony".

Education

The French educational system is highly centralised, organised, and

ramified. It is divided into three different stages:

• Primary education (enseignement primaire);

• Secondary education (enseignement secondaire);
• Higher education (enseignement supérieur").

Primary and secondary education is predominantly public (private

schools also exist, in particular a strong nationwide network of primary
and secondary Catholic education), while higher education has both
public and private elements. At the end of secondary education,
students take the baccalauréat exam, which allows them to pursue
higher education. The baccalauréat pass rate in 1999 was 78.3%.

In 1999–2000, educational spending amounted to 7% of the French

GDP and 37% of the national budget.

Since the Jules Ferry laws of 1881-2, named after the then Minister of
Public Instruction, all state-funded schools, including universities, are
independent from the (roman catholic) church. Education in these
institutions is free. Non-secular institutions are allowed to organize
education as well. The French educational system differs strongly from
Northern-European and American systems in that it stresses the
importance of the development of the individual as an independent
intellectual rather than a productive servant (of the State or the
Company). Secular educational policy has become critical in recent
issues of French multiculturalism, as in the "affair of the Islamic
headscarf".
Minister of Culture

The Minister of Culture is, in the Government of France, the cabinet

member in charge of national museums and monuments; promoting
and protecting the arts (visual, plastic, theatrical, musical, dance,
architectural, literary, televisual and cinematographic) in France and
abroad; and managing the national archives and regional "maisons de
culture" (culture centres). The Ministry of Culture is located on the
Palais Royal in Paris.

The modern post of Minister of Culture was created by Charles de

Gaulle in 1959 and the first Minister was the writer André Malraux.
Malraux was responsible for realizing the goals of the "droit à la
culture" ("the right to culture") -- an idea which had been incorporated
in the French constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights (1948) -- by democratizing access to culture, while also
achieving the Gaullist aim of elevating the "grandeur" ("greatness") of
post-war France. To this end, he created numerous regional cultural
centres throughout France and actively sponsored the arts. Malraux's
artistic tastes included the modern arts and the avant-garde, but on
the whole he remained conservative.

Under president François Mitterrand the Minister of Culture was Jack

Lang who showed himself to be far more open to popular cultural
production, including jazz, rock and roll, rap music, graffiti art
("tagging"), cartoons, comic books, fashion and food. His famous
phrase "économie et culture, même combat" ("economy and culture:
it's the same fight") is representative of his commitment to cultural
democracy and to active national sponsorship and participation in
cultural production. He was also responsible for the massive
architectural program of the Mitterrand years (the so-called "Grands
Travaux" or "Great Works").

The Ministry of Jacques Toubon was notable for a number of laws (the
"Toubon Laws") enacted for the preservation of the French language,
both in advertisements (all ads must include a French translation of
foreign words) and on the radio (40% of songs on French radio
stations must be in French), ostensibly in reaction to the presence of
English.
Académie française

The Académie française, or the French Academy, is the pre-eminent

French learned body on matters pertaining to the French language.
The Académie was officially established in 1635 by Cardinal Richelieu,
the chief minister to King Louis XIII. Suppressed in 1793 during the
French Revolution, it was restored in 1803 by Napoleon Bonaparte (the
Académie considers itself having been suspended, not suppressed,
during the revolution). It is the oldest of the five académies of the
Institut de France.

The Académie consists of forty members, known as immortels

(immortals). New members are elected by the members of the
Académie itself. Académicians hold office for life, but they may be
removed for misconduct. The body has the task of acting as an official
authority on the language; it is charged with publishing an official
dictionary of the language. Its rulings, however, are only advisory; not
binding on either the public or the government.

Military service

Until 1996, France had compulsory military service of young men. This
has been credited by historians for further promoting a unified national
identity and by breaking down regional isolationism.

Labor and employment policy

In France the first labour laws were Waldeck Rousseau's laws passed in
1884. Between 1936 and 1938 the Popular Front enacted a law
mandating 12 days (2 weeks) each year of paid vacation for workers,
and a law limiting the work week to 40 hours, excluding overtime. The
Grenelle accords negotiated on May 25th and 26th in the middle of the
May 1968 crisis, reduced the working week to 44 hours and created
trade union sections in each enterprise. The minimum wage was also
increased by 25%.In 2000 Lionel Jospin's government then enacted
the 35-hour workweek, down from 39 hours. Five years later,
conservative prime minister Dominique de Villepin enacted the New
Employment Contract (CNE). Addressing the demands of employers
asking for more flexibility in French labour laws, the CNE sparked
criticism from trade unions and opponents claiming it was lending
favour to contingent work. In 2006 he then attempted to pass the First
Employment Contract (CPE) through a vote by emergency procedure,
but that it was met by students and unions' protests. President
Jacques Chirac finally had no choice but to repeal it.

Healthcare and social welfare

The French are profoundly committed to the public healthcare system

(called "sécurité sociale") and to their "pay-as-you-go" social welfare
system.

In 1998. 75% of health payments in France were paid through the

public healthcare system. Since 27 July 1999, France has a universal
medical coverage for permanent residents in France (stable residence
for more than three months).

 Food and lifestyle

Food and alcohol

Main articles: French cuisine and French wine

Traditional French culture places a high priority on the enjoyment of

food. French cuisine was codified in the 20th century by Georges
Auguste Escoffier to become the modern version of haute cuisine.
Escoffier's major work, however, left out much of the regional
character to be found in the provinces of France. Gastro-tourism and
the Guide Michelin helped to bring people to the countryside during the
20th century and beyond, to sample this rich bourgeois and peasant
cuisine of France. Basque cuisine has also been a great influence over
the cuisine in the southwest of France.

Ingredients and dishes vary by region (see regional cuisine). There are
many significant regional dishes that have become both national and
regional. Many dishes that were once regional, however, have
proliferated in different variations across the country in the present
day. Cheese (see list of French cheeses) and wine (see French wine)
are also a major part of the cuisine, playing different roles both
regionally and nationally with their many variations and Appellation
d'origine contrôlée (AOC) (regulated appellation) laws (lentils from Le
Puy-en-Velay also have an AOC status). Another French product of
special note is the Charolais cattle.

A sweet crêpe. Crêpes are originally from Brittany

The French typically eat only a simple breakfast ("petit déjeuner") (of,
say, coffee or tea, served traditionally in a large handleless "bol"
(bowl) and bread, breakfast pastries (croissants), or yogurt). Lunch
("déjeuner") and dinner ("dîner") are the main meals of the day.
Formal four course meals consist of a starter course ("entrée"), a main
course ("plat principal") followed by a salad course, and finally a
cheese and/or a dessert course. While French cuisine is often
associated with rich desserts, in most homes dessert consists of only a
fruit or yogurt.

Food shopping in France was formerly done almost daily in small local
shops and markets, but the arrival of the supermarket and the even
larger "hypermarchés" (large-surface distributors) in France have
disrupted this tradition. With depopulation of the countryside, many
towns have been forced to close shops and markets.

Rates of obesity and heart disease in France have traditionally been

lower than in other north-western European countries. This is
sometimes called the "French paradox" (see, for example, Mireille
Guiliano's 2006 book French Women Don't Get Fat). French cuisine
and eating habits have however come under great pressure in recent
years from modern "fast food", American products and the new global
agricultural industry (including genetically modified organisms). While
French youth culture has gravitated toward fast food and American
eating habits (with an attendant rise in obesity), the French in general
have remained committed to preserving certain elements of their food
culture through such activities as including programs of "taste
acquisition" in their public schools, by the use of the "appellation
d'origine contrôlée" laws, and by state and European subsides to the
French agricultural industry. Emblematic of these tensions is the work
of José Bové, who founded, in 1987, the Confédération Paysanne, an
agricultural union that places its highest political values on humans
and the environment, promotes organic farming and opposes
genetically modified organisms; Bové's most famous protest was the
dismantling of a McDonald's franchise in Millau (Aveyron), in 1999.

In France, cutlery is used in the continental manner (with the fork in

the left hand, prongs facing down and the knife in the right hand).
French etiquette prohibits the placing of hands below the table.

The legal drinking age is officially 18 for strong liquors (21% vol.
alcohol), and 16 for most alcohol drinks (beer, wine...) (see Legal
drinking age).

France is one of the oldest wine-producing regions of Europe. France

now produces the most wine by value in the world (although Italy
rivals it by volume and Spain has more land under cultivation for wine
grapes). Bordeaux wine, Bourgogne wine and Champagne are
important agricultural products.

Tobacco and drugs

While cigarette age of smoking:12 years of age smoking has long been
part of French culture — figures indicate that in France, 39% of male
adults and 27% of female adults smoke (1998), and that more than
40% of young adults (between 18 and 24) smoke —, France, from 1st
February, 2007, tightened the existing ban on smoking in public places
found in the 1991 Évin law: Law n°91-32 of 10th January, 1991,
containing a variety of measures against alcoholism and tobacco
consumption.

Smoking is now banned in all public places (stations, museums, etc.);

an exception exists for special smoking rooms fulfilling drastic
conditions, see below. A special exemption was made for cafés and
restaurants, clubs, casinos, bars, etc. which ended, 1st January, 2008.
Opinion polls suggest 70% of people support the ban.Previously, under
the former implementation rules of the 1991 Évin law, restaurants,
cafés etc. just had to provide smoking and non-smoking sections,
which in practice were often not well separated.

Under the new regulations, smoking rooms are allowed, but are
subjected to very strict conditions: they may occupy at most 20% of
the total floor space of the establishment and their size may not be
more than 35 m²; they need to be equipped with separate ventilation
which replaces the full volume of air ten times per hour; the air
pressure of the smoking room must constantly be lower than the
pressure in the contiguous rooms; they have doors that close
automatically; no service can be provided in the smoking rooms;
cleaning and maintenance personnel may enter the room only one
hour after it was last used for smoking.

Popular French cigarette brands include Gauloises and Gitanes.

The possession, sale and use of cannabis (predominantly Moroccan

hashish) is illegal in France. Since 1 March 1994, the penalties for
cannabis use are from two months to a year and/or a fine, while
possession, cultivation or trafficking of the drug can be punished much
more severely, up to ten years. According to a 1992 survey by
SOFRES, 4.7 million French people ages 12-44 have at one time
smoked cannabis.

Sports and hobbies

Main article: Sport in France

The French "national" sport is football (soccer), colloquially called 'le

foot' (see Football in France). The most-watched sports in France are
football (soccer), rugby union, basketball, cycling, sailing and tennis.
France is notable for holding the football World Cup in 1998, for
holding the annual cycling race Tour de France, and the tennis Grand
Slam tournament Roland Garros, or the French Open. Sport is
encouraged in school, and local sports clubs receive financial support
from the local governments. While football (soccer) is definitely the
most popular, rugby union and rugby league takes dominance in the
southwest, especially around the city of Toulouse (see Rugby union in
France and Rugby league in France).

The modern Olympics were invented in France, in 1894.

Professional sailing in France is centred on singlehanded/shorthanded
ocean racing with the pinnacle of this branch of the sport being the
Vendee Globe singlehanded around the world race which starts every 4
years from the French Atlantic coast. Other significant events include
the Solitaire du Figaro, Mini Transat 6.50, Tour de France a Voile and
Route de Rhum transatlantic race. France has been a regular
competitor in the Americas Cup since the 1970s.

Other important sports include:

People playing Pétanque next to the beach at Nice, France

• Grand Prix Racing (Formula 1) - invented in France in 1946

• Pétanque - the international federation is recognized by the IOC.
[6] [7].
• Fencing - fencing leads the list of sports for which gold medals
were won for France at summer Olympics (see France at the
Olympics).
• Parkour - developed in France, parkour ("art du déplacement") is
a physical activity that resembles self-defense or martial arts.
• Babyfoot (table football) - a very popular pastime in bars and in
homes in France, and the French are the predominant winners of
worldwide table football competitions.

Like other cultural areas in France, sport is overseen by a government

ministry, the Minister of Youth Affairs and Sports (France) which is in
charge of national and public sport associations, youth affairs, public
sports centers and national stadia (like the Stade de France).

Fashion

Along with Milan and New York, Paris is sometimes called the "fashion
capital of the world". The association of France with fashion (French: la
mode) dates largely to the reign of Louis XIV [26] when the luxury
goods industries in France came increasingly under royal control and
the French royal court became, arguably, the arbiter of taste and style
in Europe.

France renewed its dominance of the high fashion (French: couture or

haute couture) industry in the years 1860–1960 through the
establishing of the great couturier houses, the fashion press (Vogue
was founded in 1892; Elle was founded in 1945) and fashion shows.
The first modern Parisian couturier house is generally considered the
work of the Englishman Charles Frederick Worth who dominated the
industry from 1858-1895.[27] In the early twentieth century, the
industry expanded through such Parisian fashion houses as the house
of Chanel (which first came to prominence in 1925) and Balenciaga
(founded by a Spaniard in 1937). In the post war year, fashion
returned to prominence through Christian Dior's famous "new look" in
1947, and through the houses of Pierre Balmain and Hubert de
Givenchy (opened in 1952).

In the 1960s, "high fashion" came under criticism from France's youth
culture while designers like Yves Saint Laurent broke with established
high fashion norms by launching prêt-à-porter ("ready to wear") lines
and expanding French fashion into mass manufacturing and
marketing.[28] Further innovations were carried out by Paco Rabanne
and Pierre Cardin. With a greater focus on marketing and
manufacturing, new trends were established in the 70s and 80s by
Sonia Rykiel, Thierry Mugler, Claude Montana, Jean-Paul Gaultier and
Christian Lacroix. The 1990s saw a conglomeration of many French
couture houses under luxury giants and multinationals such as LVMH.

Since the 1960s, France's fashion industry has come under increasing
competition from London, New York, Milan and Tokyo, and the French
have increasingly adopted foreign (particularly American) fashions
(such as jeans, tennis shoes). Nevertheless, many foreign designers
still seek to make their careers in France.
Pets

In 2006, 52% of French households had at least one pet [29]: 9.7
million cats, 8.8 million dogs, 2.3 million rodents, 8 million birds, and
28 million fish.

 Media and art

Art and museums

The first paintings of France are those that are from prehistoric times,
painted in the caves of Lascaux well over 10,000 years ago. The arts
flourished already 1,200 years ago, at the time of Charlemagne, as
can be seen in many hand made and hand illustrated books of that
time.

Classic painters of the 17th century in France are Nicolas Poussin and
Claude Lorrain. During the 18th century the Rococo style emerged as a
frivolous continuation of the Baroque style. The most famous painters
of the era were Antoine Watteau, François Boucher and Jean-Honoré
Fragonard. At the end of the century, Jacques-Louis David was the
most influential painter of the Neoclassicism.

Géricault and Delacroix were the most important painters of the

Romanticism. Afterwards, the painters were more realistic, describing
nature (Barbizon school). The realistic movement was led by Courbet
and Honoré Daumier. Impressionism was developed in France by
artists such as Claude Monet, Edgar Degas, Pierre-Auguste Renoir and
Camille Pissarro. At the turn of the century, France had become more
than ever the center of innovative art. The Spaniard Pablo Picasso
came to France, like many other foreign artists, to deploy his talents
there for decades to come. Toulouse-Lautrec, Gauguin and Cézanne
were painting then. Cubism is an avant-garde movement born in Paris
at the beginning of the 20th century.

The Louvre in Paris is one of the most famous and the largest art
museums in the world, created by the new revolutionary regime in
1793 in the former royal palace. It holds a vast amount of art of
French and other artists, e.g. the Mona Lisa, by Leonardo da Vinci, and
classical Greek Venus de Milo and ancient works of culture and art
from Egypt and the Middle East.

Music, cinema & television

France boasts a wide variety of indigenous folk music, as well as styles

played by immigrants from Africa, Latin America and Asia. In the field
of classical music, France has produced a number of legendary
composers, like Frederic Chopin, while modern pop music has seen the
rise of popular French hip hop, French rock, techno/funk, and
turntablists/djs.

France created the Fête de la Musique (first held in 1982), a music

festival, which has since become worldwide. It takes place every June
21, on summer's day.

Books, newspapers and magazines

France has the reputation of being a "literary culture"[30], and this

image is reinforced by such things as the importance of French
literature in the French educational system, the attention paid by the
French media to French book fairs and book prizes (like the Prix
Goncourt, Prix Renaudot or Prix Femina) and by the popular success of
the (former) literary television show "Apostrophes" (hosted by Bernard
Pivot). This image not withstanding, 1980s figures showed that the
French spent 50% less on books and used lending libraries 1/12 as
often as the British.

Although the official literacy rate of France is 99%, some estimates

have placed functional illiteracy at between 10% and 20% of the adult
population (and higher in the prison population).

While reading remains a favorite pastime of French youth today,

surveys show that it has decreased in importance compared to music,
television, sports and other activities. The crisis of academic publishing
has also hit France (see, for example, the financial difficulties of the
Presses universitaires de France (PUF), France's premier academic
publishing house, in the 1990s)

Literary taste in France remains centered on the novel (26.4% of book

sales in 1997), although the French read more non-fiction essays and
books on current affairs than the British or Americans.Contemporary
novels, including French translations of foreign novels, lead the list
(13% of total books sold), followed by sentimental novels (4.1%),
detective and spy fiction (3.7%), "classic" literature (3.5%), science
fiction and horror (1.3%) and erotic fiction (0.2%). About 30% of all
fiction sold in France today is translated from English (authors such as
William Boyd, John le Carré, Ian McEwan, Paul Auster and Douglas
Kennedy are well received)

An important subset of book sales is comic books (typically Franco-

Belgian comics like Tintin and Astérix) which are published in a large
hardback format; comic books represented 4% of total book sales in
1997. French artists have made the country a leader in the graphic
novel genre and France hosts the Angoulême International Comics
Festival, Europe's preeminent comics festival.

Like other areas of French culture, book culture is influenced, in part,

by the state, in particular by the "Direction du livre et de la lecture" of
the Ministry of Culture, which oversees the "Centre national du livre"
(National Book Center). The French Ministry of Industry also plays a
role in price control. Finally, the VAT for books and other cultural
products in France is at the reduced rate of 5.5%, which is also that of
food and other necessities.

In terms of journalism in France, the regional press (see list of

newspapers in France) has become more important than national
dailies (such as Le Monde and Le Figaro) over the past century: in
1939, national dailies were 2/3 of the dailies market, while today they
are less than 1/4. The magazine market is currently dominated by TV
listings magazines followed by news magazines such as Le Nouvel
Observateur, L'Express and Le Point.

 Transportat ion
There are significant differences in lifestyles with respect to
transportation between very urbanized regions such as Paris, and
smaller towns and rural areas. In Paris, and to a lesser extent in other
major cities, many households do not own an automobile and simply
use efficient mass transportation. The cliché about the parisien is rush
hour in the Métro subway. However, outside of such areas, ownership
of one or more cars is standard, especially for households with
children.
The TGV high speed rail network, train à grande vitesse is a fast rail
transport which serves several areas of the country and is self
financing. There are plans to reach most parts of France and many
other destinations in Europe in coming years. Rail services to major
destinations are punctual and frequent.

 Hol idays
Despite the principles of laïcité and the separation of church from
state, public and school holidays in France generally follow the Roman
Catholic religious calendar (including Easter, Christmas, Ascension
Day, Pentecost, Assumption of Mary, All Saints Day, etc.). Labor Day
and the National Holiday are the only business holidays determined by
government statute; the other holidays are granted by convention
collective (agreement between employers' and employees' unions) or
by agreement of the employer.

The five holiday periods of the public school year are:

• the vacances de la Toussaint (All Saints Day) - one and a half

weeks starting near the end of October.
• the vacances de Noël (Christmas) - two weeks, ending after New
Years.
• the vacances d'hiver (winter) - two weeks in February and
March.
• the vacances de Pâques (Easter) - two weeks around Easter
weekend.
• the grandes vacances - summer vacation.

On May 1, Labour Day (La Fête du Travail) the French give flowers of
Lily of the Valley to one another.

The National holiday (called Bastille Day in English) in on 14 July.

Military parades, called Défilés du 14 juillet, are held, the largest on
the Champs-Élysées avenue in Paris in front of the President of the
Republic.

On November 2, All Souls Day (La Fête des morts), the French
traditionally bring chrysanthemums to the tombs of departed family
members.
On November 11, Remembrance Day (Le Jour du Souvenir) is an
official holiday.

Christmas is generally celebrated in France on Christmas eve by a

traditional meal (typical dishes include oysters, boudin blanc and the
bûche de Noël), by opening presents and by attending the midnight
mass (even among Catholics who do not attend church at other times
of the year).

Candlemas (La Chandeleur) is celebrated with crêpes, which must be

eaten only after eight p.m. If the cook can flip a crêpe while holding a
coin in the other hand, the family is assured of prosperity throughout
the coming year.

In recent years, the Anglo-Saxon and American holiday, Halloween has

grown in popularity to some extent.
------ ----- ----- ----- ----- -----