Académie Française

, responsible for the establishment of the Académie The Académie had its origins in an informal literary group deriving from the salons held at the Hôtel de Rambouillet during the late 1620s and early 1630s. The group began meeting at Valentin Conrart's house, seeking informality. There were then nine members. Cardinal Richelieu, the chief minister of France, made himself protector of the group, and in anticipation of the formal creation of the academy, new members were appointed in 1634. On 22 February 1635, at Richelieu's urging, King Louis XIII granted letters patent formally establishing the council; according to the letters patent registered at the Parlement de Paris on 10 July 1637, During the French Revolution, the National Convention suppressed all royal academies, including the . In 1792, the election of new members to replace those who died was prohibited; in 1793, the academies were themselves abolished. They were all replaced in 1795 by a single body called the . Napoleon Bonaparte, as First Consul, decided to restore the former academies, but only as "classes" or divisions of the . The second class of the Institut was responsible for the French language, and corresponded to the former . When Louis XVIII came to the throne in 1816, each class regained the title of "Académie"; accordingly, the second class of the Institut became the . Since 1816, the existence of the has been uninterrupted. The President of France is the "protector" or patron of the Académie. Cardinal Richelieu originally adopted this role; upon his death in 1642, Pierre Séguier, the Chancellor of France, succeeded him. Louis XIV adopted the function when Séguier died in 1672; since then, the French head of state has always served as the Académie's protector. From 1672 to 1805, the official meetings of the Académie were in the Louvre; since 1805, the has met in the Collège des Quatre-Nations (now known as the Palais de l'Institut). The remaining academies of the also meet in the Palais de l'Institut. ==Membership==

The has forty seats, each of which is assigned a separate number. Candidates make their applications for a specific seat, not to the Académie in general: if several seats are vacant, a candidate may apply separately for each. Since a newly elected member is required to eulogize their predecessor in the installation ceremony, it is not uncommon that potential candidates refuse to apply for particular seats because they dislike the predecessors. Members are known as "" ("the Immortals") in reference to the Académie's motto, ("To Immortality"), which is inscribed on the official seal of the charter granted by Cardinal Richelieu. Other famous members include Voltaire; Montesquieu; Victor Hugo; Alexandre Dumas, fils; Émile Littré; Louis Pasteur; Louis de Broglie; and Henri Poincaré. Many notable French writers have not become members of the . In 1855, the writer Arsène Houssaye devised the expression "forty-first seat" for deserving individuals who were never elected to the Académie, either because their candidacies were rejected, because they were never candidates, or because they died before appropriate vacancies arose. Notable French authors who never became academicians include Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Jean-Paul Sartre, Joseph de Maistre, Honoré de Balzac, René Descartes, Denis Diderot, Romain Rolland, Charles Baudelaire, Gustave Flaubert, Molière, Marcel Proust, Jules Verne, Théophile Gautier, and Émile Zola. Uniform and his colleague Eric Westhof, wearing the "Habit vert" of the The official uniform of a member is known as , or green clothing. The , worn at the Académie's formal ceremonies, was first adopted during Napoleon Bonaparte's reorganization of the . It consists of a long black coat and black-feathered bicorne, The swords can be particularly expensive as they are individually designed. Some new members have had funds for them raised by committees. ==Role as authority on the French language==

(1835) The Académie is France's official authority on the usages, vocabulary, and grammar of the French language. Dictionary The Académie publishes a dictionary of the French language, known as the . A special commission composed of several (but not all) of the members of the Académie compiles the work. These are: • Preliminary editions: • (from A to Aversion), pre-edition, Frankfurt am Main, 1687 • (from A to Confiture), pre-edition, Frankfurt am Main, 1687 • (from A to Neuf), pre-edition, Paris, 1687 • Complete editions: • ("1st edition"), Paris, 1694 • ("2nd edition"), Paris, 1718 • ("3rd edition"), Paris, 1740 • ("4th edition"), Paris, 1762 • ("5th edition"), Paris, 1798 • ("6th edition"), Paris, 1835 • ("7th edition"), Paris, 1879 • ("8th edition"), Paris, 1932–1935 • ("9th edition"), Paris, 1992-2024 • Supplementary editions for the sciences, arts, and technology: • Corneille, Thomas, , Paris, 1694 • Barré, Louis, , Paris, 1842 The ninth edition was completed in 2024 with the publication of its fourth volume (R to Zzz); the first volume (A to Enzyme) was published in 1992. The has informed government officials to stop using English gaming terms like "e-sports"; instead, "jeu video de competition" should be used. Likewise "streamer" should be "joueur-animateur en direct". Alleged conservatism The Académie, despite working on the modernization of the French orthography, has sometimes been criticized by many linguists for allegedly behaving in an overly conservative manner. For instance, in 1997, Lionel Jospin's government began using the feminine noun "la ministre" to refer to a female minister, following the official practice of Canada, Belgium and Switzerland and a frequent—though until then unofficial—practice in France. The Académie insisted, in accordance with French grammar rules on the traditional use of the masculine noun, on the use of "le ministre" for a minister of either gender. In 2017, 77 linguists retaliated with an opinion column to denounce the "incompetence and anachronism of the Académie". Use of either form remains highly controversial. ==Prizes==

The is responsible for awarding several different prizes in various fields (including literature, painting, poetry, theatre, cinema, history, and translation). Almost all of the prizes were created during the twentieth century, and only two prizes were awarded before 1780. In total, the Académie awards more than sixty prizes, most of them annually. The most important prize is the Grand prix de la francophonie, which was instituted in 1986, and is funded by the governments of France, Canada, Monaco, and Morocco. Other important prizes include the Grand prix de littérature (for a literary work), the Grand prix du roman (for a novel), the '' (for poetry), the Grand prix de philosophie (for a philosophical work), the René Clair Award (for film), and the Grand prix Gobert'' (for a work on French history). ==Opposition of regional languages==

The intervened in June 2008 to oppose the French Government's proposal to constitutionally offer recognition and protection to regional languages (Flemish, Alsatian, Basque, Breton, Catalan, Corsican, Occitan, Gascon, and Arpitan). ==Current members==

The current members of the are: == See also ==