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Islamic Salvation Front

Islamic Salvation Front

The Islamic Salvation Front (Arabic: الجبهة الإسلامية للإنقاذ, al-Jabhah al-Islāmiyah lil-Inqādh) (French: Front Islamique du Salut) is an outlawed Islamist political party in Algeria.

History

On November 3, 1988, the Algerian Constitution was amended to allow parties other than the ruling FLN. The FIS was founded shortly afterwards in Algiers on February 18, 1989, led by an elderly sheikh, Abbassi Madani, and a charismatic young mosque preacher, Ali Belhadj. Its views ranged across a wide spectrum of Islamist opinion, exemplified by its two leaders. Abbassi Madani, a professor at University of Algiers and ex-independence fighter, represented a relatively moderate religious conservatism and symbolically connected the party to the Algerian War of Independence, the traditionally emphasized source of the ruling FLN's legitimacy. Ali Belhadj a high school teacher appealing to a younger and less educated class, made aggressively radical speeches that attracted dissatisfied lower-class youth and alarmed non-Islamists and feminists. He purportedly represents a salafi branch. Madani sometimes expressed support for multiparty democracy, whereas Belhadj denounced it as a potential threat to sharia. Their support of free market trading and opposition to the ruling elite also attracted middle class traders who felt left out of the economy. free market Their support base rapidly increased, with the help of activists preaching in friendly mosques, and on June 12, 1990, they swept the local elections with 54% of votes cast, taking 46% of town assemblies and 55% of wilaya assemblies[http://www.algeria-interface.com/new/article.php?article_id=545&lng=e]. Its supporters were especially concentrated in urban areas: it secured 93% of towns/cities of over 50,000. Its rapid rise alarmed the government, which moved to curtail the powers of local government. The Gulf War further energized the party. Although FIS had condemned Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait, public opinion shifted in Iraq's favor once it was apparent that Western intervention was inevitable, and FIS made political capital out of outdoing the government in gestures opposing Desert Storm, including massive demonstrations, blood donation drives, and even calls for volunteers to fight in Iraq. In May 1991, the FIS called for a general strike to protest the government's redrawing of electoral districts, which it saw as gerrymandering directed against it. The strike itself was a failure, but the demonstrations FIS organized in Algiers were huge, and succeeded in pressuring the government; it was persuaded in June to call the strike off by the promise of fair parliamentary elections. However, disagreements on the strike provoked open dissension among the FIS leadership (the Madjliss ech-Choura), and the prolonged demonstrations alarmed the military. Shortly afterwards the government arrested Madani and Belhadj on June 30, 1991, having already arrested a number of lower-ranking members. The party, however, remained legal, and passed to the effective leadership of Abdelkader Hachani after four days of contested leadership by Mohamed Said (who was then arrested). The rise of the party continued despite the arrests, though its activists were angered as its demands for the leaders' release went unheeded. After some deliberation, it agreed to participate in the next elections, after expelling dissenters such as Said Mekhloufi and Kamareddine Kherbane, who advocated direct action against the government. On December 26, 1991, the FIS handily won the first round of parliamentary elections; with 48% of the overall popular vote, they won 188 of the 231 seats contested in that round, putting them far ahead of rivals. The army saw the seeming certainty of resulting FIS rule as unacceptable. On January 11, 1992, it cancelled the electoral process, forcing President Chadli Bendjedid to resign and bringing in the exiled independence fighter Mohammed Boudiaf to serve as a new president. Many FIS members were arrested, including FIS number three leader Abdelkader Hachani on January 22. A state of emergency was declared, and the government officially dissolved FIS on March 4. On July 12, Abbassi Madani and Ali Belhadj were sentenced to 12 years in prison. Such activists as remained at large took this as a declaration of war, though FIS would not officially call for armed resistance until 1993, attempting to steer a nuanced course of expressing sympathy for the guerrillas without endorsing their actions. Many took to the hills and joined guerrilla groups. The country inexorably slid into a civil war which would claim more than 100,000 lives, from which it only began to emerge at the end of the 1990s. Initially, the guerrillas were led by members of non-FIS groups, such as Mustafa Bouyali's supporters and people who had fought in Afghanistan, although FIS itself established an underground network, led by Mohamed Said and Abderrezak Redjam, setting up clandestine newspapers and even a radio station with close links to the MIA. From late 1992, they also began issuing official statements from abroad, led by Rabah Kebir and Anwar Haddam. Soon after taking office in 1994, Zeroual began negotiations with the imprisoned FIS leadership, releasing some prisoners (including such figures as Ali Djeddi and Abdelkader Boukhamkham) by way of encouragement. These first negotiations collapsed in March, as each accused the other of reneging on agreements; but further, initially secret, negotiations would take place over the following months. As the radical Armed Islamic Group, hostile to FIS as well as to the government, rose to the forefront, FIS-loyalist guerrillas, threatened with marginalization, attempted to unite their forces. In July 1994, the MIA, together with the remainder of the MEI and a variety of smaller groups, united as the Islamic Salvation Army (a term that had previously sometimes been used as a general label for pro-FIS guerrillas), declaring their allegiance to FIS and thus strengthening FIS' hand for the negotiations. It was initially headed by MIA's Abdelkader Chebouti, who was superseded in November 1994 by MEI's Madani Mezrag. By the end of 1994, they controlled over half the guerrillas of the east and west, but barely 20% in the center, near the capital, where the GIA were mainly based. Their main leadership was based in the Beni Khettab mountains near Jijel. It issued communiqués condemning the GIA's indiscriminate targeting of women, journalists, and other civilians "not involved in the repression", and attacking its school arson campaign. Meanwhile, following letters from Madani and Belhadj expressing a commitment to pluralistic democracy and proposing possible solutions to the crisis, the governnment released both from jail to house arrest on September 13. However, no let up was observed in the fighting, and the government was unwilling to allow them to consult with FIS figures that remained in prison; the negotiations soon foundered, and at the end of October the government announced the failure of the second round of negotiations, and published incriminating letters from Belhadj that were allegedly found on the body of GIA leader Cherif Gousmi, who had been killed on September 26. A few FIS leaders, notably Rabah Kebir, had escaped into exile abroad. During 1994, they carried out negotiations in Italy with other political parties, notably the FLN and FFS, and came out with a mutual agreement on January 14, 1995: the Sant'Egidio platform. This set forth a set of principles: respect for human rights and multiparty democracy, rejection of army rule and dictatorship, recognition of Islam, Arabness, and Berberness as essential aspects of Algerianness, demand for the release of FIS leaders, and an end to extrajudicial killing and torture on all sides. To the surprise of many, even Ali Belhadj endorsed the agreement. However, a crucial signatory was missing: the government itself. As a result, the platform had little if any effect. Despite the government's extremely hostile reaction to the Rome Platform, though, a third attempt at negotiations took place, starting in April with a letter from Madani condemning acts of violence, and hopes were raised. However, the FIS did not offer enough concessions to satisfy the government, demanding, as usual, that FIS leaders should be released before FIS could call for a ceasefire. In July Zeroual announced that the talks had failed, for the last time. In 1995, the GIA turned on the AIS in earnest. Reports of battles between the AIS and GIA increased (resulting in an estimated 60 deaths in March 1995 alone), and the GIA reiterated its death threats against FIS and AIS leaders, claiming to be the "sole prosecutor of jihad" and angered by their negotiation attempts. On July 11, they assassinated a co-founder of FIS, Abdelbaki Sahraoui, in Paris (although some question the authenticity of their statement claiming credit for this.) The AIS, faced with attacks from both sides and wanting to dissociate itself from the GIA's civilian massacres, declared a unilateral ceasefire on September 21, 1997 (in order to "unveil the enemy who hides behind these abominable massacres"[http://membres.lycos.fr/troubles/gia1996.htm]), and disbanded in 1999[http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/1999/433/re4.htm]. On July 2, 2003, Belhadj and Madani were released. (The former had been in jail, the latter had been moved to house arrest in 1997.) Foreign media were banned from covering the event locally, and FIS itself remains banned. However, their release has had little apparent impact. After a decade of vicious civil conflict, there was little enthusiasm in Algeria for reopening old wounds.

Goals

FIS's founders disagreed (and disagree) on a variety of points, but agreed on the core objective of establishing an Islamic state ruled by sharia law. FIS hurriedly assembled a platform in 1989, the Projet de Programme du Front Islamique du Salut, which was widely criticized as vague. Following the first National Assembly ballot, it issued a second pamphlet. Economically, it strongly criticized Algeria's planned economy, urging the need to "protect the private sector" and encourage competition - earning it support from traders and small businessmen - and urged the establishment of Islamic banking (ie interest-free banking.) Socially, it suggested that women should be given a financial incentive to stay at home rather than working outside - thus protecting sexual segregation (Ali Belhadj called it immoral for men and women to work in the same office) and increasing the number of jobs available to men in a time of chronic unemployment. Educationally, the party was committed to continuing Arabization of the educational system by shifting the language of instruction in more institutions, such as medical and technological schools, from French to Arabic; this measure struck a particular chord with the large numbers of recent graduates, the first post-independence generation educated mainly in Arabic, who found the continued use of French in higher education and public life jarring and disadvantageous to themselves. Politically, the contradiction between Madani and Belhadj's words was noteworthy: Madani condemned violence "from wherever it came" (El Moudjahid, 26 December 1989), and expressed his commitment to democracy and resolve to "respect the minority, even if it is composed of one vote" (Jeune Afrique, 12 February 1990), while Belhadj said simply that "There is no democracy in Islam" (El-Bayane, Dec. 1989) and "If people vote against the Law of God... this is nothing other than blasphemy. The ulama will order the death of the offenders who have substituted their authority for that of God" (Horizons 23 February 1989). Its current platform (as of 2002) can be read online ([http://www.fisweb.org/moutamar/rm/ButsetMethodes.pdf PDF]), although events have made it relatively irrelevant; this document sets forth 43 "values and principles". Category:History of Algeria Category:Political parties in Algeria Category:Islamic political parties

Arabic language

The Arabic language (; , less formally, ) is the largest member of the Semitic branch of the Afro-Asiatic language family (classification: South Central Semitic) and is closely related to Hebrew and Aramaic. It is spoken throughout the Arab world and is widely studied and known throughout the Islamic world. Arabic has been a literary language since at least the 6th century and is the liturgical language of Islam.

Literary and Modern Standard Arabic

The term "Arabic" may refer either to literary Arabic, which no Arab speaks as a mother tongue, or Modern Standard Arabic or to the many spoken varieties of Arabic commonly called "colloquial Arabic." Arabs consider literary Arabic as the standard language and tend to view everything else as mere dialects. Literary Arabic, (Literally: "the most eloquent Arabic language" — ) refers both to the language of present-day media across North Africa and the Middle East and to the more archaic language of the Qur'an. (The expression media here includes most television and radio, and all written matter, including all books, newspapers, magazines, documents of every kind, and reading primers for small children.) "Colloquial" or "dialectal" Arabic refers to the many national or regional dialects/languages derived from Classical Arabic, spoken daily across North Africa and the Middle East, which constitute the everyday spoken language. These sometimes differ enough to be mutually incomprehensible. These dialects are not typically written, although a certain amount of literature (particularly plays and poetry) exists in many of them. They are often used to varying degrees in informal spoken media, such as soap operas and talk shows. Literary Arabic or classical Arabic, is the official language of all Arab countries and is the only form of Arabic taught in schools at all stages. The sociolinguistic situation of Arabic in modern times provides a prime example of the linguistic phenomenon of Diglossia -the normal use of two separate varieties of the same language, usually in different social situations. In the case of Arabic, educated Arabs of whatever nationality can be assumed to speak both their local dialect and their school-taught literary Arabic (to an equal or lesser degree). This diglossic situation facilitates code switching in which a speaker switches back and forth unaware between the two varieties of the language, sometimes even within the same sentence. In instances in which Arabs of different nationalities engage in conversation only to find their dialects mutually unintelligible (e.g. a Moroccan speaking with a Lebanese), both should be able to code switch into Literary Arabic for the sake of communication. Since the written Arabic of today differs from the written Arabic of the Qur'anic era, it has become customary in western scholarship and among non-Arab scholars of Arabic to refer to the language of the Qur'an as Classical Arabic and the modern language of the media and of formal speeches as Modern Standard Arabic. Arabs, on the other hand, often use the term to refer to both forms, thus placing greater emphasis on the similarities between the two. The difference between Arabic of the Qur'anic era and today's Classical Arabic is only in the degree of eloquance. The vocabulary, the syntatic and grammatical rules are the same. Quite a few English words are ultimately derived from Arabic, often through other European languages, especially Spanish, among them every-day vocabulary like sugar (sukkar), cotton (qutn) or magazine (). More recognizable are words like algorithm, algebra, alchemy, alcohol, azimuth, nadir, and zenith (see List of English words of Arabic origin). The Maltese language spoken on the Mediterranean island of Malta is the only surviving European language to derive primarily from Arabic (a North African dialect), though it contains a large number of Italian and English borrowings.

Arabic and Islam

It is sometimes difficult to translate Islamic concepts, and concepts specific to Arab culture, without using the original Arabic terminology. The Qur'an is expressed in Arabic and traditionally Muslims deem it impossible to translate in a way that would adequately reflect its exact meaning—indeed, until recently, some schools of thought maintained that it should not be translated at all. A list of Islamic terms in Arabic covers those terms which are too specific to translate in one phrase. While Arabic is strongly associated with Islam (and is the language of salah), it is also spoken by Arab Christians, Oriental (Sephardic) Jews, and smaller sects such as Iraqi Mandaeans. Even so, a majority of the world's Muslims do not actually speak Arabic, but only know some fixed phrases of Arabic, such as those used in Islamic prayer. However, to counteract this, there is great encouragement for non-Arabic-speaking Muslims to learn the language.

Dialects

See Varieties of Arabic for a fuller overview. "Colloquial Arabic" is a collective term for the spoken languages or dialects of people throughout the Arab world, which, as mentioned, differ radically from the literary language. The main dialectal division is between the Maghreb dialects and those of the Middle East, followed by that between sedentary dialects and the much more conservative Bedouin dialects. Maltese, though descended from Arabic, is considered a separate language. Speakers of some of these dialects are unable to converse with speakers of another dialect of Arabic; in particular, while Middle Easterners can generally understand one another, they often have trouble understanding Maghrebis (although the converse is not true, due to the popularity of Middle Eastern—especially Egyptian—films and other media). One factor in the differentiation of the dialects is influence from the languages previously spoken in the areas, which have typically provided a significant number of new words, and have sometimes also influenced pronunciation or word order; however, a much more significant factor for most dialects is, as among Romance languages, retention (or change of meaning) of different classical forms. Thus Iraqi aku, Levantine fiih, and North African kayen all mean "there is", and all come from Arabic (yakuun, fiihi, kaa'in respectively), but now sound very different. The major groups are:
- Egyptian Arabic (Egypt) Considered the most widely understood and used "second dialect"
- Maghreb Arabic (Algerian Arabic, Moroccan Arabic, Tunisian Arabic and western Libyan)
- Levantine Arabic (Western Syrian, Lebanese, Palestinian, and western Jordanian, Cypriot Maronite Arabic)
- Iraqi Arabic or Gulf Arabic (Iraqi, Eastern Syrian, Kuwaiti, Saudi Arabian, Persian Gulf coast from Iraq to Oman including much of Saudi Arabia's Eastern Province, and minorities on the other side) Other varieties include:
- (in Mauritania and Western Sahara)
- Andalusi Arabic (extinct, but important role in literary history)
- Maltese
- Sudanese Arabic (with a dialect continuum into Chad)
- Hijazi Arabic (West Cost of Saudi Arabia, Northern Saudi Arabia, eastern Jordan, Western Iraq)
- Najdi Arabic (Najd region of central Saudi Arabia)
- Yemeni Arabic (Yemen to southern Saudi Arabia)

Phonology

The consonant phonemes below reflect the pronunciation of Standard Arabic, which has only three vowels, in short and long variants, namely and . Naturally, considerable allophony occurs.

Consonants

Standard Arabic has 28 consonants: See Arabic alphabet for explanations on the IPA phonetic symbols found in this chart. # is pronounced as by some speakers. This is especially characteristic of the Egyptian and southern Yemeni dialects. In many parts of North Africa and in the Levant, it is pronounced as . # is pronounced only in , the name of God, i.e. Allah. # is usually a phonetic approximant. # In many varieties (if not most), are actually epiglottal (despite what is reported in many earlier works).

Emphatic Consonants

The consonants traditionally known as "emphatic" are either velarised or pharyngealised . In some transcription systems, emphasis is shown by capitalizing the letter e.g. is written ‹D›; in others the letter is underlined or has a dot below it e.g. ‹ḍ›.

Long Consonants

Vowels and consonants can be (phonologically) short or long. Long (geminate) consonants are normally written doubled in Latin transcription (i.e. bb, dd, etc.), reflecting the presence of the Arabic diacritic mark shaddah, which marks lengthened consonants. Such consonants are held twice as long as short consonants. This consonant lengthening is phonemically contrastive: e.g. qabala "he received" and qabbala "he kissed".

Syllable Shape

Arabic has two kinds of syllable: open syllables (CV) and (CVV) - and closed syllables (CVC), (CVVC) and (CVCC). Every syllable begins with a consonant - or else a consonant is borrowed from a previous word through elision – especially in the case of the definite article THE, al (used when starting an utterance) or _l (when following a word), e.g. baytu –l mudiir “house (of) the director”, which becomes bay-tul-mu-diir when divided syllabically. By itself, definite mudiir would be pronounced .

Word Stress

Although word stress is not phonemically contrastive in Standard Arabic, it does bear a strong relationship to vowel length and syllable shape, and correct word stress aids intelligibility. In general, "heavy" syllables attract stress (i.e. syllables of longer duration - a closed syllable or a syllable with a long vowel). In a word with a syllable with one long vowel, the long vowel attracts the stress (e.g. ki-'taab and ‘kaa-tib). In a word with two long vowels, the second long vowel attracts stress (e.g.ma-kaa-'tiib). In a word with a "heavy" syllable where two consonants occur together or the same consonant is doubled, the (last) heavy syllable attracts stress (e.g. ya-ma-’niyy, ka-'tabt, ka-‘tab-na, ma-‘jal-lah, ‘mad-ra-sah, yur-‘sil-na). This last rule trumps the first two: ja-zaa-i-‘riyy. Otherwise, word stress typically falls on the first syllable: ‘ya-man, ‘ka-ta-bat, etc. The Cairo (Egyptian Arabic) dialect, however, has some idiosyncrasies in that a heavy syllable may not carry stress more than two syllables from the end of a word, so that mad-‘ra-sah carries the stress on the second-to-last syllable, as does qaa-‘hi-rah.

Dialectical Phonologies

In some dialects, there may be more or fewer phonemes than those listed in the chart above. For example, non-Arabic is used in the Maghreb dialects as well in the written language mostly for foreign names. Semitic became extremely early on in Arabic before it was written down; a few modern Arabic dialects, such as Iraqi (influenced by Persian) distinguish between and . Interdental fricatives ( and ) are rendered as stops and in some dialects (principally Levantine and Egyptian) and as and in "learned" words from the Standard language. Early in the expansion of Arabic, the separate emphatic phonemes and coallesced into a single phoneme, becoming one or the other. Predictably, dialects without interdental fricatives use exclusively, while those with such fricatives use . Again, in "learned" words from the Standard language, is rendered as in dialects without interdental fricatives. Another key distinguishing mark of Arabic dialects is how they render Standard (a voiceless uvular stop): it retains its original pronunciation in widely scattered regions such as Yemen and Morocco (and among the Druze), while it is rendered in Gulf Arabic, Iraqi Arabic, Upper Egypt and less urban parts of the Levant (e.g. Jordan) and as a glottal stop in many prestige dialects, such as those spoken in Cairo, Beirut and Damascus. Thus, Arabs instantly give away their geographical (and class) origin by their pronunciation of a word such as qamar "moon": , or .

Grammar

See Arabic grammar

Alphabet

Arabic alphabet

Main article: Arabic alphabet The Arabic alphabet derives from the Aramaic script (which variety - Nabataean or Syriac - is a matter of scholarly dispute), to which it bears a loose resemblance like that of Coptic or Cyrillic script to Greek script. Traditionally, there were several differences between the Western (Maghrebi) and Eastern version of the alphabet—in particular, the fa and qaf had a dot underneath and a single dot above respectively in the Maghreb, and the order of the letters was slightly different (at least when they were used as numerals). However, the old Maghrebi variant has been abandoned except for calligraphic purposes in the Maghreb itself, and remains in use mainly in the Quranic schools (zaouias) of West Africa. Arabic, like other Semitic languages, is written from right to left.

Calligraphy

See Arabic calligraphy for a fuller overview. After the definitive fixing of the Arabic script around 786, by Khalil ibn Ahmad al Farahidi, many styles were developed, both for the writing down of the Qur'an and other books, and for inscriptions on monuments as decoration.
Kufic font
Arabic calligraphy has not fallen out of use as in the Western world, and is still considered by Arabs as a major art form; calligraphers are held in great esteem. Being cursive by nature, unlike the Latin alphabet, Arabic script is used to write down a verse of the Qur'an, a Hadith, or simply a proverb, in a spectacular composition. The composition is often abstract, but sometimes the writing is shaped into an actual form such as that of an animal. Two of the current masters of the genre are Hassan Massoudy and [http://arabworld.nitle.org/gallery.php?module_id=7 Khaled Al Saa’i].

Arabic using the Latin alphabet

See Arabic transliteration and Arabic Chat Alphabet for more information. There are a number of different standards of Arabic transliteration: methods of accurately and efficently representing Arabic with the Latin alphabet. The more scientific standards allow the reader to recreate the exact word using the Arabic alphabet. However, these systems are heavily reliant on diacritical marks, which may be difficult to pronounce at first sight. Other, less scientific, systems often use digraphs (like sh and kh), which are usually more simple to read, but sacrifice the definiteness of the scientific systems. During the last few decades and especially since the 1990s, Western-invented text communication technologies have become prevalent in the Arab world, such as personal computers, the World Wide Web, email, Bulletin board systems, IRC, instant messaging and mobile phone text messaging. Most of these technologies originally had the ability to communicate using the Latin alphabet only, and some of them still do not have the Arabic alphabet as an optional feature. As a result, Arabic speaking users communicated in these technologies by transliterating the Arabic text using the Latin script. To handle those Arabic letters that do not have an approximate equivalent in the Latin script, numerals and other characters were appropriated. E.g., the Latin numeral "3" is used to represent the Arabic letter "ع" ("ayn"). There is no universal name for this type of transliteration, but some have named it Arabic Chat Alphabet.

See also


- Learn Standard Arabic WikiBook
- Arabist
- Arabic alphabet
- Arabic calligraphy
- Semitic languages
- Arabic literature
- The Maltese language is closely related to Arabic
- altahmam -- One of the ten non-English words that were voted hardest to translate in June 2004 by a British translation company
- Common phrases in various languages
- Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic

External links


- [http://arabic-media.com/ Arabic-Media] on-line access to Arabic newspapers, radio, and television
- [http://st-takla.org/Learn_Languages/01_Learn_Arabic-ta3leem-3araby/Learn-Arabic_00-index_El-Fehres.html Learn Arabic language online with audio pronunciation] from [http://St-Takla.org St. Takla Egyptian Church]
- [http://www.nicoweb.com/sirpus/learn%20arabic%20course%20mp3.htm Arabic Writing and Reading with MP3]. Arabic Writing and Reading Course Online with MP3 audio.
- [http://pince31.free.fr/lang/arabic/liens.htm Links to learn Arabic language with online course]
- [http://www.madinaharabic.com Arabic language learning course with audio]
- [http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=4&article_id=6173 "Antonyms in Arabic are a strange phenomenon" by Tamim al-Barghouti]
- [http://arabworld.nitle.org/texts.php?module_id=1&reading_id=17 "The Development of Classical Arabic" by Kees Versteegh]
- [http://arabworld.nitle.org/audiovisual.php?module_id=1&selected_feed=118 Wellesley College Professor of Arabic on the forms and dialects of the language]
- [http://www.uga.edu/islam/arabic_windows.html Multilingual Computing in Arabic with Windows, major word processors, web browsers, Arabic keyboards, and Arabic transliteration fonts]
- [http://www.gomideast.com/arabic/index.htm gomideast - Learning to Speak Arabic phrases]
- [http://language-directory.50webs.com/languages/arabic.htm List of online Arabic-related resources] Web references and examples:
- [http://transliteration.org/quran/Pronunciation/Letters/TashP.htm Arabic language pronunciation applet] with audio samples
- [http://www.sunna.info/teaching/ Learn Arabic]
- [http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=1289272 E2 article]
- [http://www.sprachprofi.de.vu/english/ar.htm Sprachprofi]
- [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/definition/Arabic-english/ Arabic - English Dictionary]: from [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org Webster's Online Dictionary] - the Rosetta Edition.
- [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=arb SIL's Ethnologue]
- [http://www.nitle.org/arabworld/texts.php?module_id=1&reading_id=113 Dialects of Arabic]
- [http://www.muftah-alhuruf.com Muftah-Alhuruf.com]: Write and send Arabic emails without having an Arabic keyboard or operating system. Arabic languages samples:
- [http://www.language-museum.com/a/arabic.php Arabic]
- [http://www.language-museum.com/a/arabic-chadian-spoken.php Arabic Chadian Spoken]
- [http://www.language-museum.com/a/arabic-judeo-iraqi.php Arabic Judeo Iraqi]
- [http://www.language-museum.com/a/arabic-north-levantine-spoken.php Arabic North Levantine Spoken]
- [http://arabworld.nitle.org/texts.php?module_id=1&reading_id=17 "The Development of Classical Arabic" by Kees Versteegh]
- Category:Arab ko:아랍어 ms:Bahasa Arab ja:アラビア語 simple:Arabic language th:ภาษาอาหรับ

French language

French (French: français) is the third of the Romance languages in terms of number of speakers, after Spanish and Portuguese, being spoken by about 67 million people as a mother tongue, and altogether by some 128 million people, which includes second-language speakers who use French for daily communication. French is thus the 18th most spoken language in the world by number of native speakers, and 9th in terms of daily speakers. It is an official language in 29 countries. It is also an official or administrative language in various communities and organisations (such as the European Union, IOC, United Nations and Universal Postal Union). Before World War II, French was considered the international language, particularly in such fields as diplomacy, trade, shipping, and transportation.

History

The Roman invasion of Gaul

The French language is a Romance language, meaning that it is descended from Latin. Before the Roman invasion of what is modern-day France by Julius Cæsar (58–52 BC), France was inhabited largely by a Celtic people that the Romans referred to as Gauls, although there were also other linguistic/ethnic groups in France at this time, such as the Iberians in southern France and Spain, the Ligurians on the Mediterranean coast, Greek colonies such as Massalia (i.e. present-day Marseille), Phoenician outposts, and the Vascons on the Spanish/French border. Although in the past many Frenchmen liked to refer to their descent from Gallic ancestors (nos ancêtres les Gaulois), perhaps fewer than 200 words with a Celtic etymological origin remain in French today (largely place and plant names and words dealing with rural life and the earth). In the reverse direction, some words for Gallic objects which were new to the Romans and for which there were no words in Latin were imported into Latin – for example, clothing items such as les braies. Latin quickly became the lingua franca of the entire Gallic region for mercantile, official and educational purposes, yet it should be remembered that this was Vulgar Latin, the colloquial dialect spoken by the Roman army and its agents and not the literary dialect of Cicero.

The Franks

From the third century on, Western Europe was invaded by Germanic tribes from the east, and some of these groups settled in Gaul. For the history of the French language, the most important of these groups are the Franks in northern France, the Alemanni in the German/French border, the Burgundians in the Rhone valley and the Visigoths in the Aquitaine region and Spain. These Germanic-speaking groups had a profound effect on the Latin spoken in their respective regions, altering both the pronunciation and the syntax. They also introduced a number of new words: perhaps as much as 15% of modern French comes from Germanic words, including many terms and expressions associated with their social structure and military tactics.

Langue d'Oïl

Linguists typically divide the languages spoken in medieval France into three geographical subgroups: Langue d'oïl and Langue d'oc are the two major groups; the third group, Franco-Provençal, is considered a transitional language between the two other groups. The Oïl–Oc divide is broadly comparable to the divide illustrated by the use of "yes" in English and "aye" in Scots. Langue d'oïl, the languages which use oïl (in modern usage, oui) for "yes", is the language group in the north of France. These languages, like Picard, Walloon, Francien and Norman, were influenced by the Germanic languages spoken by the Frankish invaders. From the time period Clovis I on, the Franks extended their rule over northern Gaul. Over time, the French language developed from either the Oïl language found around Paris (the Francien theory) or from a standard administrative language based on common characteristics found in all Oïl languages (the lingua franca theory). Langue d'oc, the languages which use oc for "yes", is the language group in the south of France and northern Spain. These languages, such as Gascon and Provençal, have relatively little Frankish influence. (Modern French has two words for "yes", oui and si; the latter is used to contradict negative statements. Si derives from Latin sic "thus", and is cognate to the word for "yes" in Spanish, Italian, and Catalan. Oïl/oui derive, according to Larousse, from Latin hoc ille "thus he (did)".)

Other linguistic groups

The early middle ages also saw the influence of other linguistic groups on the dialects of France: From the 5th to the 8th centuries, Celtic-speaking peoples from southwestern Britain (Wales, Cornwall, Devon) travelled across the English Channel, both for reasons of trade and as a result of the Anglo-Saxon invasions of England. They established themselves in Bretagne (Brittany). Their language was a dialect of the Brythonic languages, which has been named Breton in more recent centuries. It is part of the larger Celtic language family, though the modern dialects reflect a noticeable influence from French in their vocabulary. From the 6th to the 7th centuries, the Vascons crossed over the Pyrénées, a mountain range in the south of France. Their presence influenced the Occitan language spoken in southwestern France, resulting in the dialect called Gascon. Scandinavian vikings invaded France from the 9th century onwards and established themselves in what would come to be called Normandie (Normandy). They took up the langue d'oïl spoken there and contributed many words to French related to maritime activities, amongst other things. With their conquest of England in 1066, the Normans brought their language. The dialect that developed there as a language of administration and literature is referred to as Anglo-Norman. Anglo-Norman served as the language of the ruling classes and commerce in England from the time of the conquest until 1362, when the use of English became dominant again. Because of the Norman Conquest, the English language has borrowed a considerable amount of its vocabulary from French. The Arab peoples also supplied many words to French around this time period, including words for luxury goods, spices, trade stuffs, sciences and mathematics.

History of French

For the period up to around 1300, some linguists refer to the oïl languages collectively as Old French (ancien français). The earliest extant text in French is the Oaths of Strasbourg from 842; Old French became a literary language with the chansons de geste that told tales of the paladins of Charlemagne and the heroes of the Crusades. By the Ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts in 1539 King Francis I made French the official language of administration and court proceedings in France, ousting the Latin that had been used before then. With the imposition of a standardised chancery dialect and the loss of the declension system, the dialect is referred to as Middle French (moyen français). Following a period of unification, regulation and purification, the French of the 17th to the 18th centuries is sometimes referred to as Classical French (français classique), although many linguists simply refer to French language from the 17th century to today as Modern French (français moderne). The foundation of the Académie française (French Academy) in 1634 by Cardinal Richelieu created an official body whose goal has been the purification and preservation of the French language. This group of 40 members is known as the Immortals, not, as some erroneously believe, because they are chosen to serve for the extent of their lives (which they are), but because of the inscription engraved on the official seal given to them by their founder Richelieu—"À l'immortalité" ("to the Immortality (of the French language)"). The foundation still exists and contributes to the policing of the language and the adaptation of foreign words and expressions. Some recent modifications include the change from software to logiciel, packet-boat to paquebot, and riding-coat to redingote. The word ordinateur for computer was however not created by the Académie, but by a linguist appointed by IBM (see :fr:ordinateur). From the 17th to the 19th centuries, France was the leading power of continental Europe; thanks to this, together with the influence of the Enlightenment, French was the lingua franca of educated Europe, especially with regards to the arts, literature, and diplomacy; monarchs like Frederick II of Prussia and Catherine the Great of Russia could both speak and write in French. Through the Académie, public education, centuries of official control and the role of media, a unified official French language has been forged, but there remains a great deal of diversity today in terms of regional accents and words. For some critics, the "best" pronunciation of the French language is considered to be the one used in Touraine (around Tours and the Loire River valley), but such value judgments are fraught with problems, and with the ever increasing loss of lifelong attachments to a specific region and the growing importance of the national media, the future of specific "regional" accents is difficult to predict.

Modern issues

There is some debate in today's France about the preservation of the French language and the influence of English (see franglais), especially with regard to international business, the sciences and popular culture. There have been laws (see Toubon law) enacted which require that all print ads and billboards with foreign expressions include a French translation and which require quotas of French-language songs (at least 40%) on the radio. There is also pressure, in differing degrees, from some regions as well as minority political or cultural groups for a measure of recognition and support for their regional languages.

Geographic distribution

regional language
French is an official language in the following countries or parts thereof: La Francophonie is an international organization of French-speaking countries and governments.

Legal status in France

Per the Constitution of France, French is the official language of the Republic since 1792 [http://www.languefrancaise.net/dossiers/dossiers.php?id_dossier=50]. France mandates the use of French in official government publications, public education outside of specific cases (though these dispositions are often ignored) and legal contracts; advertisements must bear a translation of foreign words. See Toubon Law. Contrary to a misunderstanding common in the American and British media, France does not prohibit the use of foreign words in websites or any other private publication, which would anyway contradict constitutional guarantees on freedom of speech. The misunderstanding may have arisen from a similar prohibition in the Canadian province of Quebec which made strict application of the Charter of the French Language between 1977 and 1993, although these regulations addressed language used in advertising and the provision of commercial services offered within the province, not the language of private communication. There exist in addition to French a variety of languages spoken in France by minorities; see Languages of France.

Legal status in Canada

About 12% of the world's francophones are Canadian, and French is one of Canada's two official languages, with English; various provisions of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms deal with the right of Canadians to access services in English and French all across Canada. By law, the federal government must operate and provide services in both English and French; proceedings of the Parliament of Canada must be translated into both English and French; and all Canadian products must be labelled in both English and French. Overall about 22% of Canadians speak French as a first language and 18% are bilingual. French has been the only official language of Quebec since 1974, although it is commonly (and incorrectly) believed that the designation of French as the sole official language occurred in 1977 with the adoption of the Charter of the French Language (which is popularly referred to as Bill 101). By far the provision of Bill 101 with the most significant impact has been that which mandates French-language education, unless a child's parents or siblings have received the major part of their own education in English within Canada. That provision has reversed a historical trend whereby a large number of immigrant children were being sent to English schools by their parents. In so doing, Bill 101 has greatly contributed to the "visage français" (French face) of Quebec. Other provisions of Bill 101, on the other hand, have been ruled unconstitutional over the years, including those mandating French-only commercial signs, court proceedings, and debates in the legislature. Some of those provisions have remained in effect, for a while, using the constitutional "notwithstanding" clause that permits a non-compliant law to temporarily remain. No "notwithstanding provision" is currently in effect. In 1993 the Charter was changed to allow signage in other languages so long as French is markedly "predominant". The Charter also provides for a measure of access by Anglophones to health and social services in their own language. The only province which has French as an official language is New Brunswick. In Ontario and Manitoba, French does not have full official status, although the provincial governments do provide full French-language services in all communities where significant numbers of francophones live. All of the other provinces do make some effort to accommodate the needs of their francophone citizens, although the level and quality of French-language service varies significantly from province to province.

Legal status in Switzerland

French is an official language in Switzerland. It is spoken in the part of Switzerland called Romandy.

Dialects of French


- Acadian French
- African French
- Belgian French
- Cajun French
- Canadian French
- Cambodian French
- Louisiana Creole French
- français d'Aoste
- français-germanique
- Indian French
- Levantine French
- Maghreb French
- Newfoundland French
- North American French
- Oceanic French
- Quebec French
- South East Asian French
- Swiss French
- West Indian French
- [http://www.linguasphere.org/langues_romanes.pdf linguasphere on Romance languages]

Languages derived from French


- Antillean Creole
- Haitian Creole
- Lanc-Patuá
- Mauritian Creole
- Michif
- Louisiana Creole French
- Réunionese Creole
- Seychellois Creole
- Tay Boi

Sounds

:Main article: French phonology and orthography French pronunciation follows strict rules based on spelling, but French spelling is often based more on history than phonology. The rules for pronunciation vary between dialects, but the standard rules are:
- liaison or linking: Final single consonants, in particular s, x, z, t, d, n and m, are normally silent. (The final letters 'c', 'r', 'f', and 'l' however are normally pronounced.) When the following word begins with a vowel, though, a silent consonant may once again be pronounced, to provide a "link" between the two words and avoid a glottal stop between them. Some liaisons are mandatory, for example the s in les amants or vous avez; some are optional, depending on dialect and register, for example the first s in deux cents euros or euros irlandais; and some are forbidden, for example the s in beaucoup d'hommes aiment. The t of et is never pronounced and the silent final consonant of a noun is only pronounced in the plural and in set phrases like pied-à-terre. Doubling a final consonant and adding a silent e at the end of a word (e.g. Parisien → Parisienne) makes it clearly pronounced, always.
- elision or vowel dropping: Monosyllabic words such as je or que drop their final vowel before another word beginning with a vowel. The missing vowel is replaced by an apostrophe. (e.g. je ai is instead pronounced and spelt → j'ai)
- nasal "n" and "m". When "n" or "m" follows a vowel combination, the "n" and "m" become silent and cause the preceding vowel to become nasalized (i.e. pronounced with the soft palate extended downward so as to allow part of the air to leave through the nostrils). Exceptions are when the "n" or "m" is doubled, or immediately followed by a vowel. The prefixes en- and em- are always nasalized. The rules get more complex than this but may vary between dialects.
- digraphs French does not introduce extra letters or diacritics to specify its large range of vowel sounds and diphthongs, rather it uses specific combinations of vowels, sometimes with following consonants, to show which sound is intended. (See French phonology and orthography or [http://www.languageguide.org/francais/grammar/pronunciation/ French Pronunciation Guide] for more details.)
- accents are used sometimes for pronunciation, sometimes to distinguish similar words, and sometimes for etymology alone.
  - Accents that affect pronunciation:
    - "é", is pronounced instead of the defaults or,
    - "è" (e.g., secrète) means that the vowel is pronounced (as usual),
    - dieresis (e.g. naïve, Noël) as in English, specifies that this vowel is pronounced separately from the preceding one (or following one in some cases), not combined,
    - the "ç" means that the letter c is pronounced in front of A, O, or U. ("c" is otherwise hard before a hard vowel.)
    - The circumflex (e.g. pâté, forêt) shows that an e is pronounced and that an o is pronounced . In some dialects it also signifies a pronunciation of for the letter a, but this differentiation is disappearing. It usually indicates a former long vowel created by the dropping of an "s" from the Latin root (as in English "paste", "forest"),
  - Accents with no pronunciation effect:
    - The circumflex does not affect the pronunciation of the letters i or u, and in most dialects, a as well.
    - All other accents are used only to distinguish similar words or for etymological reasons, as in the case of distinguishing the adverbs là and où ("there", "where") from the article la and the conjunction ou ("the fem. sing.", "or") respectively.

Grammar

:Main article: French grammar French grammar shares several notable features with most other Romance languages, including:
- the loss of Latin's declensions
- only two grammatical genders
- the development of grammatical articles from Latin demonstratives
- new tenses formed from auxiliaries French word order is Subject Verb Object, except when the object is a pronoun, in which case the word order is Subject Object Verb.

Vocabulary

Word origins

The majority of French words derive from vernacular or "vulgar" Latin or were constructed from Latin or Greek roots. There are often pairs of words, one form being popular (noun) and the other one savant (adjective), both originating from Latin. Example:
- brother: frère (brother) / fraternel
- finger: doigt / digital
- faith: foi (faith) / fidèle
- cold: froid / frigide
- eye: œil / oculaire The French words which have developed from Latin are usually less recognisable than Italian words of Latin origin because as French developed into a separate language from Vulgar Latin, the unstressed final syllable of many words was dropped or elided into the following word. It is estimated that 12 percent (4,200) of common French words found in a typical dictionary such as the Petit Larousse or Micro-Robert Plus (35,000 words) are of foreign origin. About 25 percent (1,054) of these foreign words come from English and are fairly recent borrowings. The others are some 707 words from Italian, 550 from ancient Germanic languages, 481 from ancient Gallo-Romance languages, 215 from Arabic, 164 from German, 160 from Celtic languages, 159 from Spanish, 153 from Dutch, 112 from Persian and Sanskrit, 101 from Native American languages, 89 from other Asian languages, 56 from Afro-Asiatic languages, 55 from Slavic languages and Baltic languages, and 144 from other languages (3 percent of the total). Source: Henriette Walter, Gérard Walter, Dictionnaire des mots d'origine étrangère, 1998.

Levels of register

French, like many other languages, possesses a continuum of several levels of register. The colloquial register is used in almost any circumstance of life, and should not be confused with slang or rude talk. Formal French is used in writing or in formal occasions (when people make official speeches or when they are interviewed on television, for instance). Some level of formality is also normally used in classrooms in France, although colloquial French is now spoken by more and more professors with their students. Colloquial French differs from formal French in terms of grammar. For instance, the negation in formal French is "ne... pas", whereas in colloquial French it is simply "... pas", such as "I don't think so", which is "Je ne crois pas" in formal French, and "Je crois pas" in colloquial French. Another example of change in grammar is the way to ask a question: by inverting verb and subject in formal French, or also by using "est-ce que", whereas in colloquial French a question is phrased exactly as an affirmation, with the voice rising in the end. E.g.: "Is he sick?" would be "Est-il malade?" or "Est-ce qu'il est malade?" in formal French, and "Il est malade?" in colloquial French. On the other hand, questions with "est-ce que" are more colloquial than using inversion. Secondly, colloquial French differs from formal French in terms of pronunciation. Some words undergo shortening, or sound change, whereas some syllables are dropped altogether. For instance, "yes" is "oui" in formal French, and becomes "ouais" in colloquial French; "I" is "je" in formal French, but becomes "j' " in colloquial French; so a sentence like "I think he'll come" is "Je pense qu'il viendra" in formal French, and "J'pense qu'i'viendra" in colloquial French. There are many instances of shortening of words, such as "teacher", which is "professeur" in formal French, but becomes "prof'" in colloquial French.

Counting system

The French counting system is partially vigesimal: twenty () is used as a base number in the names of numbers from 70-99. So for example, means 4 times 20, i.e. is the French word for 80, and (literally "sixty-fifteen") means 75. This is comparable to archaic English use of "score", as in "fourscore and seven" (87), or "threescore and ten" (70). Belgian French and Swiss French are different in this respect.

Writing system

French is written using the Latin alphabet, plus five diacritics (the circumflex accent, acute accent, grave accent, diaeresis, and cedilla) and two ligatures (æ, œ). French spelling, like English spelling, tends to preserve obsolete pronunciation rules. This is mainly due to extreme phonetic changes since the Old French period, without a corresponding change in spelling. However, some conscious changes were also made to restore Latin orthography:
- Old French doit > French doigt "finger" (Latin digitum)
- Old French pie > French pied "foot" (Latin pedem) As a result, it is nearly impossible to predict the spelling on the basis of the sound alone. Final consonants are generally silent, except when the following word begins with a vowel. For example, all of these words end in a vowel sound: nez, pied, aller, les, finit, beaux. The same words followed by a vowel, however, may sound the consonants, as they do in these examples: beaux-arts, les amis, pied-à-terre. On the other hand, a given spelling will almost always lead to a predictable sound, and the Académie française works hard to enforce and update this correspondence. In particular, a given vowel combination or diacritic predictably leads to one phoneme. The diacritics have phonetic, semantic, and etymological significance.
- grave accent (à, è, ù): Over a or u, used only to distinguish homophones: à ("to") vs. a ("has"), ou ("or") vs. où ("where"). Over an e, indicates the sound .
- acute accent (é): Over an e, indicates the sound , the ai sound in such words as English hay or neigh. It often indicates the historical deletion of a following consonant (usually an s): écouter < escouter.
- circumflex (â, ê, î, ô û): Over an e or o, indicates the sound or , respectively. Most often indicates the historical deletion of an adjacent letter (usually an s or a vowel): château < castel, fête < feste, sûr < seur, dîner < disner. By extension, it has also come to be used to distinguish homophones: du ("of the") vs. dû (past participle of devoir "to owe"; note that dû is in fact written thus because of a dropped e: deu).
- diaeresis or tréma (ë, ï, ü): Indicates that a vowel is to be pronounced separately from the preceding one: naïve, Noël. Diaeresis on ÿ only occurs in some proper names (such as l'Haÿ-les-Roses) and in modern editions of old French texts. Since the 1990 orthographic rectifications, the diaeresis in words containing guë (such as aiguë or ciguë) was moved onto the u: aigüe, cigüe. Words coming from German retain the old Umlaut if applicable but uses French pronounciation, such as capharnaüm(mess).
- cedilla (ç): Indicates that an etymological c is pronounced when it would otherwise be pronounced /k/. Thus je lance "I throw" (with c = before e), je lançai "I threw" (c would be pronounced before a without the cedilla). The ligature œ is a mandatory contraction of oe in certain words (sœur "sister" , œuvre "work [of art]" , cœur "heart" , cœlacanthe "Coelacanth" ), sometimes in words of Greek origin, spelled with an οι diphthong which became oe in Latin, pronounced in French (and other Romance languages): œsophage , œnologie . It may also appear in œu digraph (or œ alone in œil "eye"), in words that were once written with eu digraph (which could be read or , depending on the word): bœuf "ox" (Old French buef or beuf), mœurs "custom", œil "eye" , etc. In these cases, the Latin etymon must be spelled with an o where the French word has œu: bovem > bœuf, mores > mœurs, oculum > œil. Some attempts have been made to reform French spelling, but few major changes have been made over the last two centuries.

Some common phrases


- French: français ("fran-seh")
- hello: bonjour ("bon-zhoor")
- I love you.: Je t'aime. ("jhe tem")
- My name is _____: Je m'appelle _____ ("jhe-ma-pelle")
- good-bye: au revoir ("o-ruh-vwar")
- please: s'il vous plaît (Literally: if it please you) ("sill voo pleh")
- thank you: merci ("mairr-see")
- you are welcome: de rien (Literally: Of nothing) ("duh ryeh"), je vous en prie, il n'y a pas de quoi (France); bienvenue ("byeh-venuh") (Quebec)
- that one: celui-là ("su-lwee la"), colloq. ("swee la"), or celle-là (feminine) ("cell-la")
- how much?: combien? ("kom-byen")
- English: anglais ("ahng-gleh")
- yes: oui ("wee"), colloq. ouais (seldom written) ("way")
- no: non ("non")
- I am sorry: Je suis désolé(e). (add the "e" if the speaker is feminine); ("zhahn swee deh-zo-leh"), colloq. ("shswee deh-zo-leh"). Pardon ("par-dohn")
- I do not understand: Je ne comprends pas. ("zhuh nuh comprahn pa"), colloq. Je comprends pas (with dropping of "ne") ("shcomprahn pa")
- Where are the toilets?: Où sont les toilettes ? ("oo son leh twa-let")
- Cheers (toast to someone's health): Tchin ("chin"), Santé ("san-teh") or À la vôtre ("a la votr")
- Do you speak English?: Parlez-vous anglais ? ("par-leh voo ang-gleh") OR "Est-ce que vous parlez anglais?" ("voo par-leh ang-leh")
- Excuse me: Excusez-moi. ("eh-skyu-zay mwa")
- Good night: Bonne nuit ("bun nwee")
- Hi!: Salut ! ("sal-oo")
- I am tired: Je suis fatigué(e). (add the "e" if the speaker is feminine) ("jhe swee fah-tee-gay")
- Are you coming?: Venez vous ?, Est-ce que vous venez ? (or with close friends and relatives: tu viens?)
- I am thinking about it: J'y pense. ("jhee pahnss")
- I am going to the grocery store: Je vais à l'épicerie. ("jhe vay a lay-pee-ser-ee")
- We are going to school: On va à l'école. (colloquial) ("ohn va a lay-cohl")
- She is so pretty.: Elle est si jolie. ("el ay see jho-lee")
- our neighbors to the South: Nos voisins du sud ("noh vwah-zen due sued")
- Could you help me?: Pourriez-vous m'aider ? ("poo-ree-ay voo may-day")
- May I help you?: Puis-je vous aider? ("pwee-jha voo zay-day")
- It is the best of worlds: C'est le meilleur des mondes. ("say le may-yuhr day mohnd")
- Go to bed!: Va te coucher ! ("vah te coo-shay")
- I'm watching TV.: Je regarde la télé. ("jhe re-gard lah tay-lay")
- Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: Wikipédia, l'encyclopédie libre. ("wee-kee-pay-dee-ah, lahns-ee-kloh-pay-dee lee-bruh")
- I am the state.: L'État, c'est moi. ("leh-tah seh-mwa")

See also


- Académie française
- common phrases in different languages
- List of English words of French origin
- List of French phrases
- French in the United States
- French Language Wikipedia
- French phrases used by English speakers
- French proverbs
- Reforms of French orthography
- Morphology of the French verb
- Louchebem
- Verlan
- French Creole languages

External links


-
- [http://www.dicts.info/dictlist1.php?k1=33 All free French dictionaries] Collection of free French dictionaries.
- [http://www.declan-software.com/french French language learning audio software]
- [http://www.window.to/french/ Learn French online]
- [http://www.academie-francaise.fr/ Académie Française]
- [http://french.about.com/library/begin/bl_begin_vocab.htm Beginning French Vocabulary]
- [http://radio-canada.ca/education/francaismicro/ Capsules linguistiques - Radio-Canada.ca]
- [http://www.moelc.moe.edu.sg/french/ Département de Français, Ministry of Education Language Centre, Singapore]
- [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=fra Ethnologue report for French]
- [http://www.sprachprofi.de.vu/english/f.htm Free online resources for learners]
- [http://www.lexilogos.com/french_language_dictionary.htm French-English : all online dictionaries]
- [http://www.jump-gate.com/languages/french/ French Language Course]
- [http://www.ielanguages.com/french.html French Language Tutorial at ielanguages.com]
- [http://www.intuxication.org/~webtypo/le_francais_facile.htm Le français facile]
- [http://portal.wikinerds.org/rapidfrench How to learn French in 10 months]
- [http://dhost.info/defu/wiki/index.php?id=French_accentuation_rules Basic tips of French accentuation]
- [http://www.languagehelpers.com/words/french/basics.html LanguageHelpers]
- [http://www.lightandmatter.com/french/ Liberté, an online first-year French textbook]
- [http://www.listenandlearn.org/learn/french/index.php Learn French by reading and listening]
- [http://www.how-to-learn-any-language.com/e/languages/french/index.html A profile of the French language]
- [http://dhost.info/defu/wiki/index.php?id=Virtual_French_Keyboard A virtual French keyboard]
- [http://linearb.co.uk:8080/memory/ Searchable French-English dictionary, with example sentences]
- [http://atilf.atilf.fr/ Le Trésor de la Langue Française informatisé] (very comprehensive)
- [http://truckspeak.monsite.wanadoo.fr Truck Drivers' French - English, English - French Dictionary]
- [http://www.loecsen.com/travel/discover_pop.php?lang=en&to_lang=3&learn-French/ Listen to useful French expressions]
- [http://www.FrenchLanguageTips.com/ Learn French Fast & Easy]
- [http://www.wordreference.com/ Wordreference.com dictionary]
- [http://www.my-french-dictionary.com/ My French Picture Dictionary] Category:French language Category:Oïl languages Category:Languages of Belgium Category:Languages of Canada Category:Languages of France Category:Languages of Luxembourg Category:Languages of Switzerland Category:Languages of French Guiana Category:Languages of Morocco Category:Languages of French Polynesia Category:Languages of Wallis and Futuna Category:Languages of New Caledonia Category:Synthetic languages Category:Guttural R als:Französische Sprache zh-min-nan:Hoat-gí ko:프랑스어 ja:フランス語 simple:French language th:ภาษาฝรั่งเศส

Political party

A political party is a political organization that seeks to attain political power within a government, usually by participating in electoral campaigns. Some parties are not permitted to or choose not to seek power through elections and so may turn to other forms of pressure, sometimes terrorism. Parties often espouse a certain ideology, but may also represent a coalition among disparate interests. In parliamentary systems of government, most political parties have an elected leader who, if his or her party is elected, becomes head of government. In presidential systems, especially those with full separation of powers, there may not be a formal leader. In certain electoral situations, more common in elections using proportional representation than First Past the Post, a government may be formed of more than one party, called a coalition government. Partisanship is the tendency of supporters of political parties to subscribe to or at least support their party's views and policies in contrast to those of other parties. Differentiation is essential to most political parties: they must be different at least in some ways to other parties to compete in politics and win elections. Extreme partisanship is sometimes referred to as partisan warfare.

Nonpartisan, Single-party, two-party, and multi-party governments

In a nonpartisan system, no official political parties exist, or the law does not permit political parties. In nonpartisan elections, each candidate for office runs on her or his own merits rather than as a member of a political party. In nonpartisan legislatures, there are no typically formal party alignments within the legislature; even if there are caucuses for specific issues. Despite being nonpartisan, most members have consistent and identifiable voting patterns. Historians have frequently interpreted Federalist No. 10 to imply that the Founding Fathers of the United States intended the government to be nonpartisan. The administration of George Washington and the first few sessions of the US Congress were nonpartisan. The unicameral legislature of Nebraska is the only nonpartisan state government body in the United States. Many city and county governments are nonpartisan. Unless there are legal prohibitions against political parties, factions within nonpartisan governments generally evolve into political parties. In single-party systems, only one political party is legally allowed to hold effective power. Although minor parties may sometimes be allowed, they are legally required to accept the leadership of the dominant party. This party may not always be, however, identical to the government, although sometimes positions within the party may in fact be more important than positions within the government. In Dominant-party systems, opposition parties are allowed, and there may be even a deeply established democratic tradition, but other parties are widely considered to have no real chance of gaining power. Sometimes, political, social and economic circumstances, and public opinion are the reason for others parties' failure. Sometimes, typically in countries with less of an established democratic tradition, it is possible the dominant party will remain in power by using patronage and sometimes by voting fraud. In the latter case, the definition between Dominant and single-party system becomes rather blurred. Examples of dominant party systems include the People's Action Party in Singapore and the African National Congress in South Africa. Also, one party dominant systems existed in Mexico with the Institutional Revolutionary Party until the 1990's, and in the southern United States with the Democratic Party from the 1880s until the 1970s. Two-party systems are states such as the United States and Jamaica in which there are two political parties dominant to such an extent that electoral success under the banner of any other party is extremely difficult. One right wing coalition party and one left wing coalition party is the most common ideological breakdown in such a system but in two-party states political parties are traditionally catch all parties which are ideologically broad and inclusive. The relationship between the voting system used and the two-party system was described by Maurice Duverger and is known as Duverger's Law. Duverger's Law Multi-party systems are systems in which there are multiple parties. In nations such as Canada and the United Kingdom, there may be two strong parties, with a third party that is electorally successful. The party may frequently come in second place in elections and pose a threat to the other two parties, but has still never formally held government. In some rare cases, such as in Finland, the nation may have an active three-party system, in which all three parties routinely hold top office. It is very rare for a country to have more than three parties who are all equally successful, and all have an equal chance of independently forming government. More commonly, in cases where there are numerous parties, no one party often has a chance of gaining power, and parties must work with each other to form coalition governments. This has been an emerging trend in the politics of the Republic of Ireland.

Parties and directions

Political parties are often considered on a political spectrum. One typical spectrum has the Left associated with radical or progressive policies and the Right with conservative or traditional policies. Other analyses include other dimensions such as the political parties' acceptance of parliamentary democracy as opposed to authoritarian or totalitarian attitudes, and economic policies, the Left favoring social-democracy, socialism or communism, while the Right tends to favor laissez-faire economics or Fascism. Centrist parties often adopt a collection of policies that defy easy placing on the political spectrum. Many parties will have (formal or informal) factions within them that have differing views on policy direction.

Colors and emblems for parties

:Main article: see political colour Generally speaking, over the world, political parties associate themselves with colors, primarily for identification, especially for voter recognition during elections. Red usually signifies leftist, communist or socialist parties. Conservative and Christian democratic parties generally use blue or black. Recently in the United States, this trend has been reversed. Pink sometimes signifies socialist. Yellow is often used for liberalism. Green is the color for green parties and Islamist parties. Orange is sometimes a color of nationalism, such as in The Netherlands, or is a color of reform such as in Ukraine. In the past, Purple was considered the color of royalty, but is rarely used in modern-day political parties. Brown is generally associated with fascist or neofascist parties, going back to the Nazi Party's brownshirt security guards. Color associations are useful for mnemonics when voter illiteracy is significant. Another case where they are used is when it is not desirable to make rigorous links to parties, particularly when coalitions and alliances are formed between political parties and other organizations, for example: Red Tory, "Purple" (Red-Blue) alliances, Red-Green Alliances, Blue-Green Alliances, Pan-green coalitions, and Pan-blue coalitions. The emblem of socialist parties is often a red rose held in a fist. Communist parties often use a hammer, a sickle, or both.

International organizations of political parties

During the 19th and 20th century, many national political parties organized themselves into international organizations along similar policy lines. Notable examples are the International Workingmen's Association (also called the First International), the Socialist International (also called the Second International), the Communist International, (also called the Third International), and the Fourth International, as organizations of Working class parties, or the Liberal International (yellow), and the International Democrat Union (blue). Worldwide green parties have recently established the Global Greens. The Socialist International, the Liberal International, and the International Democrat Union are all based in London.

See also


- List of politics-related topics
- List of political parties
- Party class
- Political faction (both pre- and within a modern party)

External links


- [http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/platforms.php U.S. Party Platforms from 1840-2004 at The American Presidency Project: UC Santa Barbara]
- [http://www.electionworld.org/parties.htm Political parties around the world]
- [http://www.politicalresources.net/ Political resources on the net]
- [http://www.broadleft.org/ Leftist political parties of the world] Category:Elections Category:Political parties ko:정당 ja:政党 simple:Political party

AlgeriA

Algeria

November 3

November 3 is the 307th day of the year (308th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 58 days remaining.

Events


- 1493 - Christopher Columbus first sights the island of Dominica in the Caribbean Sea.
- 1783 - John Austin, a highwayman, is the last to be publicly hanged at London's Tyburn gallows.
- 1783 - The Continental Army is disbanded.
- 1793 - French playwright, journalist and feminist Olympe de Gouges is guillotined.
- 1817 - The Bank of Montreal, Canada's oldest chartered bank, opens in Montreal, Quebec.
- 1838 - The Times of India, the world's largest circulated English language daily broadsheet newspaper is founded as The Bombay Times and Journal of Commerce.
- 1844 - Debut of Giuseppe Verdi's I due Foscari, at Teatro Argentina, Rome.
- 1848 - A greatly revised constitution, drafted by Johan Rudolf Thorbecke, severely limiting the powers of the Dutch monarchy, and strengthening the powers of the parliament and the ministers, is proclaimed. This constitution is still in effect today.
- 1868 - U.S. presidential election: Republican Ulysses S. Grant is elected to the first of his two terms in a victory over Democrat Horatio Seymour.
- 1883 - American Old West: Self-described "Black Bart the Po-8" gets away with his last stagecoach robbery, but leaves an incriminating clue that eventually leads to his capture.
- 1896 - U.S. presidential election: Republican William McKinley is elected over Democrat William Jennings Bryan.
- 1903 - With the encouragement of the United States, Panama proclaims itself independent from Colombia. US President Theodore Roosevelt had wanted the United States to build the Panama Canal, but was not willing to pay what Colombia asked.
- 1908 - U.S. presidential election: Republican William Howard Taft defeats William Jennings Bryan, Democratic candidate in his third and final nomination.
- 1911 - Chevrolet officially enters the automobile market in competition with the Ford Model T.
- 1913 - The USA introduces an income tax.
- 1918 - Austria-Hungary enters an armistice with the World War I Allies, and the Habsburg-ruled empire dissolves.
- 1918 - Poland declares its independence from Russia.
- 1923 - Lady Louise Mountbatten marries Gustav, Crown Prince of Sweden
- 1930 - Getúlio Dornelles Vargas became Head of the Provisional Government in Brazil after a bloodless coup on October 24.
- 1935 - George II of Greece regains his throne.
- 1936 - U.S. presidential election, 1936: Franklin D. Roosevelt is reelected to a second term in a landslide victory over Alf Landon.
- 1942 - World War II: Second Battle of El Alamein ends - German forces under Erwin Rommel are forced to retreat during the night.
- 1954 - The first in the Godzilla series of films is released in Japan.
- 1955 - The musical film Guys and Dolls, starring Marlon Brando and Frank Sinatra, debuts.
- 1956 - The Wizard of Oz is shown on television for the first time, with a viewing audience estimated at 45 million people.
- 1957 - Sputnik program: The Soviet Union launches Sputnik 2. On board is the first animal to enter orbit: a dog named Laika.
- 1964 - U.S. presidential election, 1964: Incumbent US President Lyndon B. Johnson defeats Republican challenger Barry Goldwater, Sr with over 60 percent of the popular vote.
- 1967 - Vietnam War: Battle of Dak To begins - Around Dak To (located about 280 miles (450 km) north of Saigon near the Cambodian border), heavy casualties are suffered on both sides, with the Americans narrowly winning the battle on November 22.
- 1969 - Vietnam War: US President Richard M. Nixon addresses the nation on television and radio, asking the "silent majority" to join him in solidarity on the Vietnam War effort and to support his policies.
- 1970 - Salvador Allende is inaugurated as president of Chile.
- 1971 - The UNIX Programmer's Manual is published.
- 1973 - Mariner program: NASA launches the Mariner 10 toward Mercury, on March 29, 1974 becoming the first space probe to reach that planet.
- 1975 - An independent audit of Mattel, one of the United States's largest toy manufacturers, reveals that company officials fabricated press releases and financial information to "maintain the appearance of continued corporate growth."
- 1975 - The television breakfast show Good Morning America premieres with co-anchors David Hartman and Nancy Dussault.
- 1978 - Dominica gains its independence from the United Kingdom.
- 1978 The sitcom Diff'rent Strokes premieres on NBC.
- 1979 - Greensboro massacre: Five members of the Communist Workers Party are shot dead and seven are wounded by a group of Klansmen and neo-Nazis during a "Death to the Klan" rally.
- 1982 - The Salang tunnel fire in Afghanistan kills up to 2,000+ people.
- 1986 - Iran-Contra Affair: The Lebanese magazine Ash-Shiraa reports that the United States has been selling weapons to Iran in secret in order to secure the release of seven American hostages held by pro-Iranian groups in Lebanon.
- 1988 - Sri Lankan Tamil mercenaries try to overthrow the Maldivian government. At President