Leaders gather in unlikely locale of Armenia for summit of la Francophonie
MONTREAL — Armenia isn’t top of mind when one thinks of thriving French culture.
But this week the Armenian capital of Yerevan will be briefly transformed into a francophone mecca, a sign of the relaxed admission standards of the organization representing the French-speaking world.
Armenia, host of the two-day la Francophonie summit opening Thursday, counts a little more than 10,000 fluent French speakers out of a population of three million. That represents about 0.33 per cent of the population; it is roughly as many French speakers as live in the Quebec town of Baie Comeau.
Martin Normand, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Ottawa, said the organization’s acceptance of marginally French-speaking states “certainly dilutes in a certain way the status of French, even within the Francophonie.” He says criteria for joining the 48-year-old organization have become “less and less stringent” when it comes to an expectation to promote French.