This is not really going to be an interesting post. I felt like writing and didn't want to tackle some of the other stuff I could be blogging about. So, here is how my language learning is going, including French, Spanish and a long section on the linguistic state of Norway which might interest you if you like collecting pieces of irrelevant and useless knowledge.

French

I became kind of worried a couple of weeks ago at the prospect of going to live in France soon. I can read very well, but my speaking and listening are still not that great. To remedy this, I decided to watch some films in French without subtitles, something I'd never done before but knew I'd have to do before long. I started with Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King because I already knew the plot, making it a bit easier. I understood about 90% of what was said. Then I watched La Planete Sauvage (Fantastic Planet), which I hadn't seen before - comprehension was worse, perhaps 75%, but I still managed to understand what was going on. Encouraging. Incidentally, I received confirmation of a teaching assistant position in France next year, but will not be told where I'm assigned to until May.

Spanish
Spanish is going well. I find it hard to believe how easy it is... perhaps I have spoken too soon?

The Linguistic State of Norway
I've finished my 10 lessons of Norwegian now, so anything else I learn from now on is down to myself. I therefore decided to research Norwegian a bit more.

Before I started learning Norwegian, I knew there were two languages, not one, in the country. The majority use Bokmål [bukmɔl], meaning 'book language', while about 10-15% use Nynorsk [nynɔʃk], meaning 'New Norwegian'. To understand why this is, some historical context is required.

For most of its history, Norway has been a subject nation, only gaining independence in 1905. Until then it had variously been ruled by Denmark and Sweden. This meant that the written language, Bokmål, was basically a slightly Norwegianised form of Danish. In the 1800s, a man called Ivar Aasen therefore invented Nynorsk, a 'New Norwegian' based on indigenous dialects and Old Norwegian. Thus the existence of two languages; in the image to the right you can see where Bokmål is prevalent (red) and where Nynorsk is prevalent (blue).

To complicate matters further, the Norwegian government had a policy of slowly merging Bokmål and Nynorsk into a single unified language, which they only abandoned in 2002. Therefore, there are various types of each of the two languages based on how much they have been changed from the original. The older, more conservative type of Bokmål is called Riksmål (language of the country), while the older, more conservative type of Nynorsk is called Høgnorsk (High Norwegian). Joy.

To complicate matters even further, I recently discovered that all the above are written languages, not necessarily spoken languages. In Norway, there is no standard spoken language - each area has its own dialect with its own peculiar pronunciation, grammar and whatnot. While you might write in Bokmål or Nynorsk, you would speak something fairly different.

As an example, my Norwegian friend lives in Trøndheim in central Norway. The dialect spoken there is Trøndersk. I'll highlight the differences (based on what I understand from Wikipedia). In Bokmål (which is what I'm learning) one might say:

Jeg vil ikke ha noe å spise og drikke. Pronounced:
[jæi ʋil ikə ha nuə ɔ spisə o drikə] Meaning:
I want not to-have something to eat or drink. i.e. I don't want anything to eat or drink.

In Trøndersk, as I understand it, this would be pronounced:

[æ ʋil itj ha nu ɔ spis o drik]

This is just one random sentence I have chosen in one dialect because I can handle it, but you can see there are significant differences.To make it even worse, there is of course social variation in dialects. So my friend, who goes to Oxford and is therefore rather well-spoken, claims to speak "Fin-Trøndersk" which is half-way between Trøndersk and Bokmål. But more or less everybody's speech will vary depending not only on social position, but also on circumstances - in a more formal setting, people will be more likely to speak in a less dialectical, more Bokmål way, and vice versa.

The overall impression I get is of a linguistic diversity which is difficult to impress on an English speaker. If I do ever make it to Norway, I'm sure I'll be rather hopeless.

In any case, I'm finding Norwegian, or the version I'm learning (Standard Østnorsk, Standard East Norwegian) an interesting language to learn. The pronunciation is hard and I am slightly terrible at it, but the rest of it seems alright. There are only two genders (except in the dialects with three, which is most of them actually), which is manageable, and only two cases (except in the dialects with three...), which is also fine. There is no conjugation of verbs for person, which is like heaven for a linguist! Additionally there aren't too many tenses. The language also does some interesting stuff which is new to me, such as tones(!), of which there are thankfully only two and which don't seem to be that important anyway, and marking definiteness as a morphological suffix, which is kinda cool. All in all it does seem an interesting and not overly challenging language to learn - my main worry is dialects, but I'm sure this will never be a problem as 1) everyone speaks Bokmål anyway and 2) everyone speaks English anyway. :D

Book recycling scheme: http://www.greenmetropolis.com Sell any book for £3, buy any book for £3.75, free delivery unless it's a hardback or weird size!

There aren't any books I desperately want at the moment, so I'm happy to wait and see if the ones I vaguely want will turn up for cheaper in a charity shop somewhere. However, they have a huge range of stuff, so if you are after something I would check it out. If you don't mind second-hand books, you should save some money AND help the planet.

I've just finished a couple of books by Voltaire for my course, Candide and Lettres philosophiques / anglaises. After studying realism for so long, I'd forgotten French could be so easy to read, so well-written and witty.

Candide is a classic of Western literature; I'm not sure how good it is in translation but it was one of the first books I read in French and I couldn't put it down. Fast paced, hilarious, pessimistic... one of my favourite books.

It was the first time I read Lettres philosophiques, but it was very interesting doing so. The basic premise of the book is that the UK is the best country in the world. Voltaire goes on about liberalism, tolerance, parliament and how advanced we were in the sciences. So that was weird. I suppose he'd be a bit depressed to see it now.

I'm looking forward to reading more Voltaire. Witty, well-written and banned by the Pope - what's not to like?

I was doing a translation into French today, and trying to figure out how to say "way of life." I figured I'd go on French google and type in various likely options, then see which one had the most hits and use it. So I typed in "facon de" which translates as "how to..." or "ways to..."

Google predictive search kicked in at this point. The first option it gave me was "facon de se suicider" - ways to commit suicide! Right under that was "how to roll a joint." Eighth was "ways of making love" and tenth was "ways to say goodbye" which I thought were quite amusing in near juxtaposition!

Just to test, I typed similar stuff into English google. Nothing interesting for "how to..," although eighth, ninth and tenth for "ways of" were "suicide," "abortion" and "getting pregnant" which were a worrying combination. For "ways to", commit suicide came fourth.

I think I prefer French google!

I went through two town centres hunting for a job today. Considering Luton had a population of 230 000 people, that is a very large town centre.

How many suitable vacancies did I find?

Yes. One. I have handed my CV in... let's just see what happens now.


In other news, my statistics exam today went well - I'm predicting myself anything from a very high B to a high A, which means I can afford to lose some marks in mechanics, which is very difficult!


In yet other news... er... French politics. Yes. I'm shamelessly sneaking it in now that you've already started reading. The right-wing party has kept its majority in parliament with 311 of the 577 seats, but it lost 58 seats compared to last year, compared to the Socialist gaining 70 seats! Which is an unexpected and wonderful swing to the left, but unfortunately not enough to stop Mr Sarkozy turning France into another UK.

Vague thoughts here. I am slightly ill (phenomenal amounts of phlegm have emigrated from my nose) so I blame that for the disjointedness of this. And also for the fact that I'm not revising.

Firstly, is there any way to delete memories on LJ? I have a random post by Sarah as a memory because it showed me how to cut, but I no longer need it.

 In other news, I really wish I was more musical. I'm surrounded by such talented musicians in RL - people with their own bands, writing their own songs, which are actually very good; people in jazz bands who sound amazing when put together; people who play several instruments - and on LJ - Sarah's amazing on the piano, Fea is one of those multiple-instument people and I'm not even going to mention Encai.

As Nogrod recently posted, music has this amazing ability to touch people. I don't think poetry has quite the same effect and is, in any case, not the most popular medium. I suppose I'd be content with getting some rhythm into my poetry à la Baudelaire, and I think I'm getting there, but there's a long way to go, especially considering how infrequently I write.

Speaking of poetic French people, here's a bit more Camus for the Camus-hungry:

Il est bon que l'homme se juge quelquefois. Il est seul à pouvoir le faire.
It's good for man to judge himself sometimes. He is alone in being able to do so.

"Tout est permis" s'écrie Ivan Karamazov. Cela aussi sent son absurde. Mais à condition de ne pas l'entendre vulgairement. Je ne sais si on l'a bien remarqué: il ne s'agit pas d'un cri de délivrance et de joie, mais d'une consatation amère. La certitude d'un dieu qui donnerait son sens à la vie surpasse de beaucoup en attrait le pouvoir impuni de mal faire.Le choix ne serait pas difficile. Mais il n'y a pas de choix et l'amertume commence alors. L'absurde ne délivre pas, il lie. Il n'autorise pas tous les actes. Tout est permis ne signifie pas que rien n'est défendu.
"Everything is permitted," writes Ivan Karamazov. He also feels the absurd, but only on the condition that one does not interpret him vulgarly. I don't know if you remarked: this is not a cry of deliverance or joy, but a bitter statement. The certainty of a God who would give His meaning  to life far surpasses in attraction the ability to do evil unpunished. The choice would not be difficult to make. But there is no choice, and so the bitterness commences. The absurd does not deliver, it binds. It does not authorise all acts. "Everything is permitted" dos not mean that nothing is defended.

I thought I'd do a bit of self-analysis. This has just been on my mind.

There are two sides to me. The first is the existentialist, searching for some deep meaning in life that doesn't exist. Because life is so meaningless, this side of me is very apathetic. Back when I created the Red Book, somebody asked why I even needed a reminder of why I should be a communist. The existentialist within is the answer.

In response to the existentialist, the other side of me is the fervent socialist/communist. I think I'd prefer to call myself a socialist to distance myself from Marx, Lenin and Stalin. Anyway, this side of me responds that yeah, maybe there is no point to life, but it exists anyway. Suffering exists. And while it exists, it's unfair to be apathetic; it should be every person's duty to reduce that suffering. In this way, I suppose I give meaning to life: the ease of suffering. Even though I haven't done anything noble or altruistic on a grand scale, so it feels a lot like I'm talking the talk but not walking the walk... I aim to correct that at Uni.

There you have my two polar opposites as I see them. I'm biased of course, being myself, so who knows how accurate this is. Who cares really?


Talking of existentialism, I've finished Jean de Florette by Pagnol, which was quite depressing, so I'm starting up Le Mythe de Sisyphe by Camus again. I really love this guy. Here are some of my favourite quotes thus far, in French for those lucky enough to understand it, and with my shoddy translations beneath for those who speak only English.


Il arrive que les décors s'écroulent. Lever, tramway, quatre heures de bureau ou d'usine, repas, tramway, quatre heures de travail, repas, sommeil et lundi mardi mercredi jeudi vendredi et samedi sur le même rythme, cette route se suit aisément la plupart du temps. Un jour seulement, le « pourquoi » s'élève et tout commence dans cette lassitude teintée d'étonnement.

One day, the settings collapse. Wake up, tram, four hours of the office or the factory, meal, tram, four hours of work, meal, sleep, and Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday to the same rhythm; most of the time we follow this route with ease. Yet one day, the question "why?" awakens and everything begins to be seen with weariness tinted with astonishment.


Dans certaines heures de lucidité, l'aspect mécanique de [les] gestes [des hommes], leur pantomine privée de sens rend stupide tout ce qui les entoure.

In certain hours of lucidity, the mechanical aspect of [men's] gestures, their pantomimes lacking sense render everything surrounding them foolish.

Si... nous affirmons... la réalité de l'Un (quel qu'il soit), nous tombons dans la ridicule contradiction d'un esprit qui affirme l'unité totale et prouve par son affirmation même sa propre différence et la diversité qu'il prétendait résoudre.

If we affirm the reality of the One (whatever it is), we fall into the ridiculous contradiction of a being who affirms the total unity and proves by this same affirmation his own difference and the diversity which he claimed to resolve.

That's a bit of a complex one. What Camus is saying is that God provides meaning to life, He gives it reason by uniting all the irrational things we see. However, in doing this, he also proves his own separation from the Unity of the world, because he's outside it. The meaning and unity God gives to the world cannot be applied to Himself so this results in the same problem of a non-united, diverse universe without meaning.


I love Camus. So much of this book goes over my head, either because it's in complex French or because I don't understand the philosophical arguments (he spends quite some time attacking other philosophers whose works I haven't read), but what I understand really speaks to me.

Sarkozy - 53%
Royal - 47%

This is a disappointment to me on two levels.

Firstly, I'm disappointed that Sarkozy, the man, is president. He's an aggressive bully and not a little racist and classist, as I've said. He also has too many friends in the media. I don't want that brute in charge of France.

Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, I'm disappointed that his policies will be put into place. He's going to liberalise France, more or less ban striking, and force people to work unhealthy, American/British hours. Socialism is one thing that attracts me to France, and Sarkozy aims to kill it. He is the Thatcher of French politics. Who knows, people may look back on 6th May 2007 as the date the old France died.

Oh well. The French people have spoken and chosen a man who cannot enter poor areas for fear of his safety. We'll see how it goes... To make his Americophilic dreams a reality, his party will have to win the legislative elections (for the lower house of parliament) in June. Until then there is hope.

Jean-Marie Le Pen, the Far Right candidate who got 10% of the vote in the first round, has urged his supported to abstain from voting in the second round. We've yet to see how many will listen to him, but this should be a blow to Sarkozy and a boost to Royal. Meanwhile, relations between Royal and Bayrou, the centrist, seem much stronger than Bayrou-Sarkozy. Looks promising.

or Why I Hate Sarkozy.

This will be heated. But it's an interesting read, seeing how much more exciting French politics is than British or US politics.


My dislike of Sarkozy isn't just because I'm left wing and he's right wing. That would be stupid. I respect some of the things Blair has done, so I can hardly claim to hate him. I also respect Angela Merkel as a person, for example.

But Sarkozy is so much worse then them. On the one hand, there's his personality. He is a horrible, aggressive, insulting man. More on that later, but here is a short video which makes me laugh, 1:35 minutes long. It's in French, but you can get the meaning from the way they speak:



The bit to the left says "A debate in 1993, Sarkozy uses the same dialectic of victimization and the same method of trying to steamroller his opponents. Royal puts him in his place."

In addition to that, there is his racism and classism. He's been courting the extreme-right for a long time. I mentioned before how he said he wanted to "clean out" the surburbs - wherein live mostly the poor children of Arab immigrants - of "scum." They disgust me.

If that wasn't enough, his policies, frankly, scare me. He is unlike any right-wing leader in the past because he's left the traditional seat of French politics. He "admires" Blair & the Anglo-Saxon economic models. His policies include making striking as difficult as it is in Britain, for example. Striking is part of France! Socialism is part of France. The best health care system in the world, a brilliant education system, that emphasis on society is part of France. He wants to do away with it, to make France yet another state in the American model. This is why I think this election is a matter of life and death for France; if Royal wins, she will let France continue to be France. Sarkozy wants to kill it.


In actual politics, you may remember Bayrou, the centrist third man, whose votes Royal and Sarkozy are now battling for to win the second round. I predicted that he would support Royal, but he's stayed neutral, because openly declaring a side would split his party. Several senior members of his party have already said they will vote for Sarkozy.

However, Bayrou himself accepted an offer from Royal to have a televised debate together. It took them two days to find a TV station, and Bayrou has attacked Sarkozy because he believes Sarkozy used his power and his friends in the media (another reason to distrust the man) to stop a TV chain showing the debate. He talked about the "intimidation and menace" of Sarkozy in preventing their debate being aired. He said "There are great financial and media powers around Sarkozy, and direct interventions to the television channels have been made" to prevent the debate being aired. "Sarkozy isn't even president yet. Think of how bad it will be when he is."

This seems to me as good as an endorsement for Royal. And Sarkozy, in his typical arrogant and aggressive manner, responded my attacking Bayrou and Royal with all he's got. "I see the temptation for those for whom the first round of elections did not go as well as hoped to take their revenge by creating a fog in the media. Those who are tempted by this strategy of removing democratic debate should know that I will oppose them." "There are people today who cannot accept that the French people did not choose them, who are convinced their defeat can only be the result of an odious manipulation."

He attacked the "lies" and "slander" of Royal & Bayrou, their "rancour and deceptions." "When I see people in whom one would have great difficulty to find any superiority of heart, of character or of intelligence, giving lessons, I say to myself, 'What have they done in their lives that is so admirable that it allows them to talk about me with such violence, intolerance and contempt?'"

While I am disgusted with the man, and don't doubt that he did intervene with the media, I am glad of this violent attack on Bayrou. Unable to resist the urge to insult and belittle his opponents, Sarkozy has forgotten that he needs Bayrou's supporters to vote for him to become president. Hopefully seeing his true pathetic nature will put Bayrou's supporters off.

In the words of Arlette Laguiller, head of the Workers' Struggle Party, "Sarkozy is a dangerous man." I hope the French see this and defeat the repulsive man. I cannot bear to think of him being in charge of that wonderful republic.

Well, I had a night of vivid dreaming, followed by a poem popping into my head almost entirely by itself. Dreaming and creativity do seem to be linked. Unfortunately I couldn't write it down straight away because I had to wait til I was on the train, forgetting part of it... I pity painters. The space of time between inspiration and conclusion must be so great.

This is my first bilingual poem... I've had lots of fun analysing it after writing it.

L'anglais / The Frenchmen

Votre orgueil sera votre mort.
Laissez la voie de la tort;
Venez avec nous, apprenez à vivre,
On étouffe ici parmi vos livres.

What can I say? I am an Englishman.
And indeed, what can I do?
My home is here, I cannot leave;
I will not go with you.

Votre orgueil sera votre mort.
Let me show you to the door.

Votre orgueil sera votre mort.
Goodbye. Farewell for evermore.

Son orgueil anglais sera son mort.

If you have no interest in French elections, do look away now...

Firstly, and most importantly, Ségolène Royal made it to the second round!

Sarkozy (Right) - 31.18%
Royal (Left) - 25.87%

The next two candidates were François Bayrou, the centrist who astonishingly managed to make it to third place with 18.57%, followed by Le Pen, the far-right fascist, with only 10.44%

Here's a table I made myself, showing the results according to ideology:

Affiliation	2002		2007
	votes	%	votes	%
Far Right	5,471739	19.2%	4,653733	12.67%
Moderate Right	7,209656	25.3%	11,871077	32.33%
Centre	3,598491	12.63%	6,820914	18.57%
Moderate Left	6,789088	23.83%	9,501295	25.87%
Far Left	5,429497	19.09%	3,877826	10.57%

So, I am glad Royal made it and wasn't knocked out. This was partly due to high turnout - 84% - to prevent Le Pen getting into second place again. It was partly due to smaller left-wing parties joining Royal's Socialist Party. But it was also because Royal exploited the fear of Le Pen getting to the second round again, launching an appeal to the anti-liberal left (communists, trotskyists, greens and altermondialists) to cast a "useful vote," i.e. one for her. 1.5 million of the anti-liberal left did indeed vote for her. The far-left's share of the vote fell from 19% in 2002 to 10.6%. However, I'm sure they won't regret it - she has promised the traditional left-wing policies of raising minimum wages and all that.

The Far-right also suffered this time, with their share of votes falling from 19% ro 12.7%. This was due slightly to the high turnout this time, but 800 000 of them - 15% - also chose to cast a "useful vote" this time round - for Sarkozy. Sarkozy has been courting the far right for a while now, so it's not surprising.

The centre has gained a huge number of votes. Infact, you can see some symmetry in the 2002 vote - 20-25-10-25-20. This time, though the right (moderate and extreme) keeps its 45% share of the vote, the left is down to 35%. The other 10% have defected to the centre. This is exactly why I resented Bayrou becoming a serious contender - he leans more to the left than to the right, and he split the left vote. Especially because polls showed that in the second round he could win against Sarkozy, whereas Royal would probably lose to Sarkozy.

This does, however, mean that a lot of the Bayrou vote will be anti-Sarkozy. It's the tradition in France for the unsuccessful candidates to declare who they will vote for in the second round, wich influences their followers of course. I feel confident that Bayrou will choose to support Royal, as will most of his party.

Opinion polls at the moment show that Sarkozy will get 54% in the second round, Royal 46%. I'm not worried though. I know the extreme left will support Royal (some already have pledged allegiance) but Le Pen hates Sarkozy! A French commentator said that most of the far-right would vote blank. Sarkozy is actually the son of an immigrant, so I think he'll only attract half of them at most.

On top of this, I'm confident that Bayrou will declare his allegiance to Royal rather than Sarkozy. What his party does remains to be seen, but a lot of them are leftists-in-exile.

I also think the ghettoes in France will activate themselves against Sarkozy. Sarkozy called them scum, which they didn't take too well. I feel that the traditionally apathetic poor will take to the polling booths to vote not for Royal, but against Sarkozy.

This time in 2 weeks, I think (and hope) that it will be la présidente instead of le président for the first time in French history.



A few ending things. I know I'm overexcited, but this does only happen every 5 years! Also, I don't get this excited about elections in the UK or US - France is just more interesting for a multitude of reasons.

Finally, a few interesting figures about French citizens living abroad who voted in the elections. In the US, Sarkozy got 55%! Typical. Meanwhile, liberal Canada gave Royal a 7 point lead with 38%. Most of Europe - Germany, Austria, Denmark for example - chose Royal over Sarkozy. I can't find figures for Britain.

Hooray! I remembered one of the things.

The French elections have made me think once again about the inadequacy of democracy. I won't go into all the obvious stuff - tyranny of the majority, the average person being too stupid to be able to run a country, etc.

On the news, I saw a young French woman deliberating whom to vote for. "I want to case a useful vote, which would mean Ségolène Royal and the Socialist Party. But my heart is with the Revolutionary Communist League."

This highlights the flaw in almost any democracy, which is that people have to vote tactically for who they think will get the most votes. I have no doubt that the communist parties would be quite a bit stronger if people actually thought they had a chance of winning.

The best idea I've seen to combat this is multiple rounds of voting. Whoever gets the least votes is struck off, and everybody votes again. Then, again, the candidate with the least votes is struck off and everybody votes for the remainder. This continues until there is only one left, ensuring that this one candidate has the greatest possible following in the country.

Yes, it would be horribly long and horribly expensive, but that would be proper democracy. If democracy is your kinda thing that is... Can't say it's mine, except on a local level.

French elections are very different to Britain or the USA. For one thing, they have about 10 parties.

April 22nd, in 4 days, is the first round of the presidential elections (presidential elections take place separately from elections for the Assemblé Nationale, their equivalent of the House of Commons, the lower house).

I say first round because the two candidates who gain the most votes go on to a second round, where everybody votes for one of the two. Whoever wins is president.

Now, usually, these two candidates are from the moderate left and moderate right. However, in 2002, for the first time ever, the far-right candidate made it into the second round, knocking the moderate left party, the Socialists, to third place. He beat them by just 0.5%. This shocked the world, and of course, the moderate right candidate won the second round by a huge margin.

Everybody is waiting to see if this will happen again. This time, even the moderate right candidate has shown himself to be racist. And, completely shockingly, a fourth candidate has emerged from the centre.

At the moment, polls show Sarkozy, the moderate-but-racist right in the lead with 27%, followed by Ségolène Royal from the Socialist party with 25%, the centist Bayrou with 19% and finally Le Pen, the fascist, with 15.5%.

What's notable, as I predicted, is that support has drained away from the various communist parties as the left are desperate to prevent another run off between two right wing candidates. This would usually mean the socialists would get to the second round, but Bayrou becoming a credible candidate has ruined this, as he's attracted a lot of left-leaning votes.

It's notable that in 2002, the polls said Le Pen only had about 14% support, and he still managed to get into the second round. Anything could still happen in the second round... lots of people probably lie to the pollsters because they're ashamed of voting for him.

I am of course supporting Ségolène Royal, though I wouldn't mind Bayrou. "Anything but Sarkozy" is my feeling, mirrored by much of the French left. I heard Royal admired Blair, which made me wary at first, but looking up her policies, I still support her. She only admires the sensible things Blair has done.

The Socialist Pary's logo is almost the same as that of the Second International, whose logo you see here as my userpic.