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Politics and Language: Language Strategy of Valois Kingshipin the First Half of the 14th Century

  • Korean Review of French History
  • Abbr : KRFH
  • 2012, (26), pp.63~91
  • Publisher : KOREAN SOCIETY FOR FRENCH HISTORY
  • Research Area : Humanities > History

홍용진 1

1고려대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

In order to understand the political communication between the kingship and the political society, it is natural to focus the problem of language as its medium, especially the language strategy carried by the kingship. The kingship under the first Valois, Philip VI and John II is very remarkable and its language politics was already studied by Serge Lusignan who presented the contrast between Philip VI, first user of the French in the royal acts and John II, returning to the Latin. But in relation to the formidable research of Serge Lusignan, we must avoid constructing a connection between the Latin and the power of Church, on the one hand, and between the French and the power of State, as secularized power, on the other. Id est, the ecclesiologic use which establishes a dichotomy between the authoritative Latin of the clerks and the vulgar vernaculars of the laymen is no more in question. A novelty with the birth of the modern State is not the use of the vernacular language itself, but a new mode of tactical application of languages in function of the political situations. This problem conducts us to research the royal acts belonging to the political field according to the language employed, the status of receivers and the political themes. In spite of the difference between Philip VI and John II, they hold a language strategy in common, a new attitude toward the language. A language is a medium selected in order to persuade effectively the members of the political society of their legitimity. In this strategy the hierarchy of the languages is demolished and the languages are interchangeable in function of the political situations. It is a new phenomena in the medieval life of language, appeared with the reigns of Philip VI and John II, in the time of the political crises that push the necessity of the political communication.

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