![]() ![]() The salient fact is that the French speakers of the metropolis are a minority of those French speakers. By some predictions it will soon be spoken by more people worldwide than any other language. French is now spoken by more than 150 million people around the world, give or take a half million. Yet despite the impression that English has “won,” statistics tell another story. You can even sit in a movie theater in Paris and smell popcorn. ![]() ![]() Every imaginable American product or food, including Oreos, is available on French grocery shelves. Professors are lecturing in English in the best French schools to prepare their students for a global economy. After three decades, the adventure of a young Midwesterner learning French, entering with passion into centuries of borrowed habits and rituals, seems like ancient history–so radically has the place of French in the world changed, along with the place of France. ![]()
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