L’orthographe française en mouvement : le cas des emprunts rectifiés
French orthography in motion: the case of rectified loanwords

Summary/Abstract: This study examines the integration of rectified spellings of loanwords into contemporary French, with a focus on their presence in lexicographic resources (Dico en ligne Le Robert and Usito) and their frequency of use in the Aranea web corpora (France and Canada). Based on a selection of 123 loanwords affected by the 1990 French spelling reform, the analysis compares traditional and recommended spellings and observes their distribution across varieties of French. The results confirm a strong representation of English loanwords among the rectified forms, as well as a more systematic implementation of the reform in Usito than in Dico en ligne Le Robert. Corpus data show that 23% of the lexical items in both French and Canadian corpora occur more frequently in their rectified form, particularly those influenced by English. Although differences between traditional and rectified spellings remain limited overall, the study highlights an ongoing tendency toward stabilization of the reformed orthography. Further research is encouraged to assess the sociolinguistic and normative factors influencing the adoption of rectified spelling in the francophone world.

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