LFSF Speaker Series

Cécile ALDUY : La Langue de Zemmour

MARCH 22 at 6pm on the Ortega campus
A public event | Free admissions with RSVP | This event follows LFSF health protocols

RSVP

LFSF Parent and Professor of French Literature and Culture at Stanford University, Cécile ALDUY will join us to talk about her new book "La Langue de Zemmour", on MARCH 22, in a new edition of our LFSF Speaker Series.

The far-right French presidential candidate Éric Zemmour uses words as weapons. And first of all against the language itself. Under his pen, the meaning of words is blurred, political concepts are inverted, irony and the grotesque attack humanist values like an acid. The twisting of words and history is the norm. Racial obsession is omnipresent. Yet his fictions fascinate... Why is this so? Deciphering this language, drained of its capacity to make us think, which carries the possibility of the worst.

Cécile Alduy is Professor of French literature and culture and Chair of the Division of Literatures, Cultures, and Languages at Stanford University and a research fellow at the CEVIPOF at Sciences Po, Paris. She is a specialist of political rhetoric, especially far right discourse in France. Her latest book, La Langue de Zemmour (Seuil: 2022) details how the former polemicist turned presidential candidate manipulates language, words and the minds. She is also the author of Ce qu’ils disent vraiment. Les politiques pris aux mots (Seuil: 2017), and Marine Le Pen Taken to Her Words: Deciphering the New National Front’s Discourse (Seuil: 2015). Both books have received international media coverage.

She is a regular contributor to The Nation, The Atlantic, Politico, Foreign Policy, The Boston Review, The Los Angeles Review of Books, The New York Times, The San Francisco Chronicle, Le Monde, AOC (Analyse – Opinion – Commentaire), L’Obs, les Inrocks, among others.

The event will include time for Q&As and will followed by a signing session of ALDUY's latest book, "La Langue de Zemmour" that will also be available for purchase.