The French language in a multilingual world: roots, paths, challenges and lessons to learn

Abstract

The paper explores the hypothesis that the French international status in the contemporary multilingual world is determined by the specifics and practice of its functioning and shapes the relevant trends in the educational policy for learning French. The research materials integrated informative contributions of the institutional bodies and academic papers on the issues under study. The research methodology rested on the qualitative paradigm and followed a pathway of selected sources theoretical review with the following discussion thereof. The study has identified the main areas that characterize the role of the French language in the modern society. They include the history of the French language international status development, its position in international and regional organizations, in former French colonies, the Francophonie activities, language policy in France. The respective data is considered with regard to contemporary education related to the French language learning for various purposes from the angle of those lessons that may be learned by different countries across the world.