La Langue de Bois... or the Art of Saying Nothing.
I recently received an email from my sister in law containing a form that is now probably going viral in France. The form looks official and is about one of the necessary courses in the curriculum of the E.N.A, l'Ecole Nationale d'Administration- France's National School of Administration.
For those interested to learn more about the school I have included a link below, but to make a long story short it is one of the most prestigious French graduate schools for aspiring civil servants.
The intention of this course is to teach future civil servants to communicate with their compatriots in France and around the world. The exercise consists of choosing a block from column 1, then adding any block from column 2, followed by any block from column 3 and so on. One must not forget to show "strength of conviction" and "intonation" when speaking!
For those who speak French it is soon obvious that these sentences sound great and mean absolutely nothing. We have all heard them before, they have zero substance but they sure sound great.
So, what am I talking about you may ask? Well, France has had its presidential campaign and on the other side of the Atlantic we are also hearing many civil servants speak with conviction and great intonation. The question is: are they getting to the point? It seems like regardless of our country of origin we all have heard those brilliant speeches that mean very little.
" Parler pour ne rien dire " the French say.
In short...
"Talking to say nothing."
"La Langue de Bois" indeed!
Click the link below to see the full size text
Caption of a French political cartoon:
"Let's not call it a "recession", let's call it "negative growth."
Christine Lagarde the Nobel prize winner for the "Langue de Bois".
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