Notes · FrenchUK · A-Levels

The positive features of a diverse society

Les aspects positifs d'une société diverse opens AQA's second theme, Aspects of French-speaking society: current issues, studied at A-Level only. It covers l'enrichissement dû à la mixité ethnique, diversité, tolérance et respect, and diversité comme apprentissage pour la vie. The notes explain the French republican framework - la laïcité, l'universalisme, the deliberate refusal of ethnic categories - alongside the vocabulary that Anglophone students most often mistranslate: intégration, assimilation, communautarisme, mixité and diversité do not map onto their English cognates.

5 sections~24 min reading time4 competenciesLevel Standard 3 · Advanced 2

T·0444 / 15

Exam profile

AO1 · Understand and respond, in speech and in writing, to spoken French on diversityAO2 · Understand and respond, in speech and in writing, to written French on a diverse societyAO3 · Manipulate the language accurately, using a range of lexis and structureAO4 · Show knowledge of, and respond critically to, diversity in French-speaking society

Operators:traduirerésumerdéfinirnuancerillustrerévaluer

basic level

This sub-theme belongs to the current-issues theme, which is not part of AS French (7651); AS candidates meet diversity only incidentally through other material.

higher level

The full A-Level requires the French conceptual framework to be used accurately - laïcité, universalisme républicain, intégration versus assimilation versus communautarisme - and requires diversity to be argued about, not simply celebrated.

Depth

Text

Contents · 5 sections

The positive features of a diverse society

The enrichment of diversity: l'enrichissement dû à la mixité ethnique#

StandardAQA 7652 3.1.2 - Les aspects positifs d'une société diverse : l'enrichissement dû à la mixité ethniqueDfE GCE modern foreign languages subject content

France has been a country of immigration for well over a century, and the successive layers are the concrete evidence this strand needs. Belgian, Italian, Polish and Spanish arrivals fed industry and agriculture from the late nineteenth century through the interwar years; Portuguese, Spanish, Italian and then Maghrebi and West African workers came during the post-war boom the French call les Trente Glorieuses; later arrivals have come from Asia, Eastern Europe and, through decolonisation, from the départements et territoires d'outre-mer. The historian Gérard Noiriel gave this process its standard name in his 1988 book Le Creuset français - the French melting pot. Using that reference accurately is a strong AO4 move.

The enrichment itself is easiest to argue when it is specific. La cuisine: le couscous, le tajine, le nem, the fact that so-called foreign dishes are now ordinary French family food. La langue: French has absorbed vocabulary from Arabic (le bled, le toubib, le souk, and much older borrowings such as l'algèbre), from West African languages, from the Antilles and from Romani through youth slang. La musique et les arts: le raï, le zouk, le rap francophone, francophone literature from the Maghreb, sub-Saharan Africa, the Antilles and Quebec. Le sport: French teams have long been a visible emblem of mixed origins, a fact used by all sides in political argument. And l'économie: entrepreneurship, essential-sector labour, demographic renewal.

The right French word for this mixing is not the same as the English. La mixité means mixing of groups within one space - la mixité sociale, la mixité ethnique, la mixité scolaire - and is a positive administrative goal in French policy. Le métissage means blending, cultural or biological, and is used positively of culture: un métissage musical. La diversité is the neutral umbrella term. Le brassage means stirring together, as of populations. Avoid the English calques: la diversité is not diversité of opinion here, and multiculturalisme in French carries a specific, contested meaning discussed in the next section - it is not a neutral synonym for diversity.

One genuinely French structural fact belongs here because it shapes every text you will read. The French Republic does not officially recognise ethnic or racial categories among its citizens: la République ne reconnaît que des citoyens, and the collection of ethnic statistics is tightly restricted by law. That is why French debate uses proxies such as les personnes issues de l'immigration or les quartiers prioritaires rather than the ethnic-group categories familiar in Britain. Knowing this explains why French texts sound different from British ones on the same subject, and saying so in French - la France refuse par principe les catégories ethniques, au nom de l'universalisme républicain - is precisely the kind of cultural knowledge AO4 exists to reward.

Worked example

Translation into English: an argumentative passage

Translate into English: « On oublie trop souvent que la France est un pays d'immigration depuis plus d'un siècle. Ce que nous appelons aujourd'hui la cuisine française doit beaucoup aux vagues successives d'arrivants. Loin d'appauvrir la culture nationale, ces apports l'ont renouvelée. »

Handle the impersonal on
On oublie trop souvent que - the impersonal on is best rendered as we or people, or turned round: It is too often forgotten that. Never translate on as one unless the register is formal enough to carry it.
Handle depuis plus d'un siècle
French present plus depuis becomes an English perfect: has been a country of immigration for more than a century. Same rule as depuis quatre ans in any testimony passage.
Unpack the cleft and the verb devoir
Ce que nous appelons... doit beaucoup à - devoir here means to owe: owes a great deal to. Not must. The cleft is preserved in English as What we now call French cooking.
Handle Loin de + infinitive
Loin d'appauvrir is a compressed concessive: Far from impoverishing. Keep it fronted; it is the rhetorical hinge of the passage.
Get the final tense and pronoun
ces apports l'ont renouvelée - passé composé with avoir, past participle agreeing with the preceding direct object l' (la culture nationale, feminine). English: these contributions have renewed it. Note that the agreement tells you what l' refers to; that is a reading skill as much as a grammar one.

Result: It is too often forgotten that France has been a country of immigration for more than a century. What we now call French cooking owes a great deal to the successive waves of arrivals. Far from impoverishing the national culture, these contributions have renewed it.

Typical mistakes

Assuming French public debate uses ethnic categories as British debate does - French law restricts ethnic statistics, and the vocabulary reflects that.
Writing la diversité est une richesse and stopping; the claim needs an example and, ideally, a counter-argument to answer.

Active revision

Rédigez 120 mots en français donnant trois exemples précis de l'enrichissement apporté par l'immigration à la société française, dans trois domaines différents.

Active recall

Recall the key points — then reveal.

Sources: AQA A-level French (7652) specification - subject content (AQA) · GCE AS and A level subject content for modern foreign languages (Department for Education)

Diversity, tolerance and respect: le modèle républicain et la laïcité#

AdvancedAQA 7652 3.1.2 - Les aspects positifs d'une société diverse : diversité, tolérance et respectDfE GCE modern foreign languages subject content

Intégration et assimilation

Fig. 1What the two models share and where they part. Both demand the common civic framework; only assimilation asks for private difference to disappear. The distinction is the conceptual core of the sub-theme.

The French framework for living with difference is le modèle républicain, and its central principle is l'universalisme: the Republic addresses citizens as individuals, not as members of communities. Its motto, Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité, is not decoration but the operative claim - equality is guaranteed to the individual regardless of origin, and in exchange the state declines to recognise groups. The counterpart principle is la laïcité, established by the law of 1905 separating the churches and the state. Laïcité is not hostility to religion and is badly translated as secularism alone: it guarantees la liberté de conscience and the free exercise of worship, while requiring the state itself, and its schools, to be neutral.

Three French terms must be kept apart, and confusing them is the single most common failure on this sub-theme. L'intégration is the French ideal: newcomers take on the common civic framework - the language, the laws, the republican values - while keeping their private culture, faith and traditions. L'assimilation goes further and expects the disappearance of visible difference; it is the older model, and today the word usually carries a critical charge. Le communautarisme is the pejorative French term for a society organised into separate communities living in parallel, which republican discourse presents as the failure mode to be avoided. British multiculturalism is often described in French debate as tending towards that model, which is why le multiculturalisme is a contested word in French, not a neutral one.

The law supplies concrete, nameable anchors. The law of 15 March 2004 prohibits the wearing of conspicuous religious symbols in state schools, applying laïcité to pupils as well as to the institution. Anti-racism has a legislative history too: the law of 1 July 1972, known as la loi Pleven, made public incitement to racial hatred and racial discrimination criminal offences. Institutionally, le Défenseur des droits, an independent constitutional authority created in 2011, handles discrimination complaints, and associations such as SOS Racisme, founded in 1984, and la LICRA campaign and bring cases. Naming a law and an institution converts an opinion into evidence.

The critical question examiners actually want argued is whether the republican model delivers what it promises. In its favour: it refuses to fix people in an ethnic identity, it makes equality a matter of right rather than of group representation, and it has produced a genuinely shared civic culture. Against it: formal equality can mask real discrimination - la discrimination à l'embauche, le contrôle au faciès, la ségrégation spatiale in some quartiers - and refusing to count makes discrimination harder to measure. The mature formulation, and one that will always score, is: l'universalisme républicain est un idéal généreux, mais l'égalité de droit ne garantit pas l'égalité de fait.

Worked example

Defining a contested term under exam conditions

The card asks: « Qu'est-ce que la laïcité et pourquoi divise-t-elle ? » Produce a 40-second answer that defines accurately and then explains the disagreement.

Define by its two halves
La laïcité repose sur deux principes complémentaires : la neutralité de l'État et la liberté de conscience de chacun. Naming both halves immediately distinguishes you from candidates who define it as anti-religion.
Anchor it in law
Elle découle de la loi de 1905, qui a séparé les Églises et l'État. One date, correctly used, is worth more than three sentences of paraphrase.
Explain the disagreement without taking sides prematurely
Le désaccord porte sur son extension : s'applique-t-elle seulement aux institutions, ou aussi aux usagers et à l'espace public ? La loi de 2004 sur les signes religieux à l'école illustre cette tension. Framing it as a question of scope is the accurate account of the French argument.
Give both readings in French
Pour les uns, elle protège les croyants en garantissant un espace neutre ; pour les autres, elle vise en pratique une religion en particulier. Note pour les uns... pour les autres, a compact way of presenting two camps.
Close with a position
AO4 wants a judgement. Quant à moi, je considère que la laïcité reste un principe protecteur, à condition qu'elle s'applique de la même manière à toutes les confessions. Note à condition que + subjunctive.

Result: La laïcité repose sur deux principes complémentaires : la neutralité de l'État et la liberté de conscience de chacun. Elle découle de la loi de 1905, qui a séparé les Églises et l'État. Le désaccord porte sur son extension : s'applique-t-elle seulement aux institutions, ou aussi aux usagers et à l'espace public ? La loi de 2004 sur les signes religieux à l'école illustre cette tension. Pour les uns, elle protège les croyants en garantissant un espace neutre ; pour les autres, elle vise en pratique une religion en particulier. Quant à moi, je considère qu'elle reste un principe protecteur, à condition qu'elle s'applique de la même manière à toutes les confessions.

Typical mistakes

Translating laïcité as secularism and leaving it there - the French concept includes a positive guarantee of freedom of belief.
Using le multiculturalisme as a neutral synonym for diversity; in French republican discourse it names a rival model and is frequently pejorative.

Active revision

Expliquez en français, en 100 mots, la différence entre intégration, assimilation et communautarisme, en donnant pour chacun une conséquence concrète.

Active recall

Recall the key points — then reveal.

Sources: AQA A-level French (7652) specification - subject content (AQA)

Diversity as a lifelong lesson: un apprentissage pour la vie#

StandardAQA 7652 3.1.2 - Les aspects positifs d'une société diverse : diversité - un apprentissage pour la vieDfE GCE modern foreign languages subject content

The third strand asks what diversity teaches, and the institution that carries most of that teaching in France is l'école républicaine. French state schooling has an explicit civic mission: l'enseignement moral et civique is a timetabled subject, and schools are formally charged with transmitting les valeurs de la République. The relevant vocabulary is la mixité sociale et scolaire (having pupils of different backgrounds in the same school), la carte scolaire (the catchment system that allocates pupils and which is blamed for reinforcing segregation when families circumvent it), and l'égalité des chances. The examinable tension is that schools are asked to produce mixing in a society whose housing is often segregated.

What is actually learned divides into three. Des connaissances: knowing about other cultures, religions and histories, including the colonial past which French curricula have progressively addressed. Des compétences: la capacité à dialoguer, l'écoute, la coopération, and languages themselves. Des attitudes: l'ouverture d'esprit, la remise en question de ses propres préjugés, l'empathie. The French verb phrases worth owning here are remettre en question ses préjugés, sortir de sa zone de confort, se décentrer (to see from another point of view - a genuinely French intellectual term), and déconstruire les stéréotypes.

The obstacles must be named too, or the section becomes a sermon. Les préjugés and les stéréotypes are learned early and are resistant. Le racisme ordinaire - everyday, low-level racism that its perpetrators do not consider racism - is a standard French formulation. L'entre-soi describes people mixing only with their own kind, and is a sharp, useful word. La peur de l'autre and le repli identitaire (identity withdrawal) name the political version of the same reflex. And the digital dimension returns here: les réseaux sociaux can enclose users in des bulles de filtre, so exposure to difference is not automatic even in a diverse society.

For the lifelong dimension, connect the school to what follows: le monde du travail, où la diversité des équipes est présentée comme un atout de créativité ; la mobilité, avec des programmes comme Erasmus qui font découvrir d'autres sociétés ; et l'engagement associatif, qui met en contact des milieux qui ne se croisent pas autrement. A high-value formulation to memorise: la diversité ne s'apprend pas dans les livres, elle s'éprouve dans la rencontre - diversity is not learned from books, it is experienced in encounter. Note the pronominal passives s'apprend and s'éprouve, an elegant French alternative to the passive voice.

Worked example

Translation into French: an education passage

Translate into French: School is where most young people first meet people who are different from them. That is why the mixing of social backgrounds matters so much. Unfortunately, families who can afford to often avoid the local school, which reinforces segregation instead of reducing it.

Handle School is where
C'est à l'école que... - a cleft. The calque L'école est où is not French. This construction, c'est... que for adverbials and c'est... qui for subjects, is one of the highest-value structures in the whole A-level.
Handle people who are different from them
des personnes différentes d'eux, or more idiomatically ceux qui ne leur ressemblent pas. Note différent de, not différent que - a frequent error.
Choose the noun for mixing of social backgrounds
la mixité sociale is the exact French term - a case where the right technical noun replaces a whole English phrase. matters so much = compte tant or revêt une telle importance.
Handle who can afford to
les familles qui en ont les moyens - the fixed expression avoir les moyens, with en replacing the understood complement. The English elliptical to disappears in French.
Handle which reinforces, instead of reducing
The relative refers to the whole clause, so ce qui renforce. instead of + gerund = au lieu de + infinitive: au lieu de la réduire. Note that au lieu de always takes an infinitive in French, never a present participle.

Result: C'est à l'école que la plupart des jeunes rencontrent pour la première fois ceux qui ne leur ressemblent pas. C'est pourquoi la mixité sociale compte tant. Malheureusement, les familles qui en ont les moyens évitent souvent l'établissement de leur quartier, ce qui renforce la ségrégation au lieu de la réduire.

Typical mistakes

Presenting school as automatically producing mixing, when the standard French critique is that residential segregation and school-choice strategies undermine it.
Using tolérance as the highest value; French discussion often points out that tolérer implies putting up with, and prefers le respect or la reconnaissance.

Active revision

Rédigez un paragraphe de 120 mots sur le rôle de l'école dans l'apprentissage de la diversité, en mentionnant au moins un obstacle réel.

Active recall

Recall the key points — then reveal.

Sources: AQA A-level French (7652) specification - subject content (AQA)

Le lexique et les tournures: precision on a contested subject#

StandardAQA 7652 3.1.2 - Les aspects positifs d'une société diverseAQA 7652 3.3 Grammar

The core field, with the traps flagged. Les concepts: la diversité, la mixité (sociale, ethnique, scolaire), le métissage, le brassage, le vivre-ensemble, la cohésion sociale, l'universalisme, la laïcité, l'intégration, l'assimilation, le communautarisme. Les personnes: un immigré (someone born abroad who has come to live in France), un étranger (a non-citizen, whether born in France or not - the two categories are not the same and French statistics keep them apart), une personne issue de l'immigration, un descendant d'immigrés, un binational. Les problèmes: les préjugés, les stéréotypes, la discrimination, le racisme ordinaire, la xénophobie, l'entre-soi, le repli identitaire, le contrôle au faciès.

The verbs do a lot of work on this sub-theme and are worth listing separately: s'intégrer, s'installer, s'enraciner, cohabiter, se mélanger, se côtoyer (to rub shoulders with), accueillir, favoriser, valoriser, discriminer, stigmatiser, exclure, marginaliser, lutter contre, dénoncer, sensibiliser. Note the reflexive se côtoyer and se croiser - two people can se côtoyer sans jamais se parler, which is the precise French for parallel lives and a far better formulation than the calque vivre des vies parallèles.

Because this subject is contested, the grammar you need is the grammar of nuance. Hedging: il semble que + subjonctif, on peut supposer que, dans une certaine mesure, en apparence, à première vue. Attribution: selon certains, aux yeux de ses détracteurs, ses partisans soutiennent que, d'après les défenseurs de ce modèle. Restriction: ne... que, seul(e), à l'exception de. Concession: quoique + subjonctif, même si + indicatif (note the difference: même si takes the indicative, bien que and quoique take the subjunctive - a reliable examiner target). Correction: non pas... mais, loin de + infinitif.

One more precision point that separates strong candidates. French distinguishes tolérer from respecter and from reconnaître, and the distinction is frequently made explicitly in French texts: tolérer suggests enduring what one dislikes, respecter grants equal standing, reconnaître goes further and grants public recognition. If a reading text uses tolérance where you would expect respect, that choice is significant and may well be what a comprehension question is targeting. In your own production, prefer le respect mutuel and la reconnaissance, and reserve la tolérance for when you mean exactly that.

Worked example

Repairing four sentences that misuse the key terms

Correct and justify: (1) La France préfère le multiculturalisme. (2) Bien que la diversité est une richesse, elle inquiète certains. (3) Il faut tolérer les autres cultures. (4) Les étrangers nés en France sont nombreux.

Sentence 1 - a factual error
The French republican model is explicitly opposed to what it calls le multiculturalisme, preferring l'intégration within l'universalisme républicain. Correct version: La France privilégie l'intégration républicaine plutôt que le multiculturalisme.
Sentence 2 - a mood error
bien que requires the subjunctive. Correct version: Bien que la diversité soit une richesse, elle inquiète certains. If you prefer the indicative, change the conjunction: Même si la diversité est une richesse, ...
Sentence 3 - a register and meaning error
tolérer implies putting up with. Correct version: Il faut respecter les autres cultures, or, stronger, il faut reconnaître l'apport des autres cultures.
Sentence 4 - a category error
Someone born in France is normally not un étranger in the statistical sense; the intended category is probably les descendants d'immigrés or les personnes issues de l'immigration. Correct version: Les personnes issues de l'immigration et nées en France sont nombreuses. Note the feminine plural agreement on nées and nombreuses, since personnes is feminine.
Draw the general lesson
On this sub-theme, most errors are conceptual before they are grammatical. Learn the French categories first; the accuracy follows.

Result: (1) La France privilégie l'intégration républicaine plutôt que le multiculturalisme. (2) Bien que la diversité soit une richesse, elle inquiète certains. (3) Il faut respecter, voire reconnaître, l'apport des autres cultures. (4) Les personnes issues de l'immigration et nées en France sont nombreuses.

Typical mistakes

Writing bien que c'est difficile - it must be bien que ce soit difficile.
Treating la tolérance as the highest praise; in French it can imply mere endurance, and le respect or la reconnaissance are stronger.

Active revision

Écrivez six phrases nuancées sur la diversité : deux avec « bien que » + subjonctif, deux avec « même si » + indicatif, deux avec une formule d'attribution (« selon certains », « aux yeux de ses détracteurs »).

Active recall

Recall the key points — then reveal.

Sources: AQA A-level French (7652) specification - grammar (AQA)

En épreuve: handling a contested sub-theme in French#

AdvancedAQA 7652 4.4 Paper 1 - Listening, reading and writingAQA 7652 4.6 Paper 3 - Speaking, part one

AQA requires that across the listening passages and across the reading texts, reference is made to at least two French-speaking countries other than France. This sub-theme is one of the most likely places for that requirement to be met, because diversity looks different across the francophone world: Belgium and Switzerland are multilingual federal states with their own linguistic settlements; Canada operates an explicit multicultural policy while Quebec pursues its own model of interculturalisme; Senegal, Côte d'Ivoire, Morocco and Algeria are plurilingual societies where French coexists with national and regional languages; the French Caribbean has créole alongside French. Prepare at least one non-French example you can describe accurately in two sentences.

In the reading section, texts on this sub-theme are frequently argumentative and may be polemical. Two reading skills pay off. First, separate what the text asserts from what it attributes to others: watch for selon, d'après, pour les partisans de, ses détracteurs estiment que. A question asking Quelle est la position de l'auteur ? is testing exactly that separation. Second, watch for irony and rhetorical questions, both common in French opinion writing; a rhetorical question usually states the opposite of what it appears to ask.

In the speaking test, this is a sub-theme where candidates can damage themselves by drifting into generality or, worse, into clumsy formulations. Two protections. Keep to the French conceptual vocabulary, which is precise and neutral: l'intégration, la mixité, l'égalité des chances, la lutte contre les discriminations. And attribute contested positions rather than voicing them flatly: certains estiment que..., ce que d'autres contestent en soulignant que... You can then take a position of your own, which AO4 requires, without caricaturing anyone.

For translation, expect the abstract-noun style. English writes people from different backgrounds live side by side; French writes la cohabitation de populations d'origines diverses. Practise the conversion in both directions, because the translation into English will ask you to turn French nouns back into natural English verbs, and the translation into French will reward you for the reverse. Also learn the small set of items that recur: to grow up = grandir; a background = un milieu or une origine; to fit in = s'intégrer or trouver sa place; a neighbourhood = un quartier; equal opportunities = l'égalité des chances.

Worked example

Separating assertion from attribution in a reading text

A reading text says: « Les défenseurs du modèle républicain soutiennent que refuser les statistiques ethniques protège les citoyens. Mais peut-on lutter contre une discrimination qu'on renonce à mesurer ? » Two questions follow: (a) Quelle est la position des défenseurs du modèle républicain ? (b) Quelle est la position de l'auteur ?

Locate the attribution verb
soutiennent que attributes the first claim to les défenseurs du modèle républicain. Everything inside that clause is theirs, not the author's. Answer (a) comes from there and nowhere else.
Answer (a) with only their claim
Ils estiment que l'absence de statistiques ethniques protège les citoyens en refusant de les enfermer dans une catégorie. Give what is asked and stop.
Identify the rhetorical question
Mais peut-on lutter contre une discrimination qu'on renonce à mesurer ? opens with Mais, which signals opposition, and takes the form of a question that expects the answer no. That is the author speaking.
Convert the rhetorical question into a statement
The author's position is: on ne peut pas efficacement combattre une discrimination qu'on refuse de mesurer. Answer (b) must state this as a position, not repeat the question.
Check the register of your answer
Use an attribution verb of your own: L'auteur met en doute..., L'auteur remet en cause... Those verbs show you have understood that the text is arguing, not describing.

Result: (a) Selon eux, refuser les statistiques ethniques protège les citoyens en évitant de les assigner à une catégorie. (b) L'auteur met en doute cette position : il suggère qu'on ne peut pas lutter efficacement contre une discrimination que l'on renonce à mesurer.

Typical mistakes

Reading a rhetorical question in a French opinion piece as a genuine question and answering it as if it stated the author's view.
Voicing contested claims flatly in the speaking test instead of attributing them (certains estiment que...) and then evaluating them.

Active revision

Choisissez un pays francophone autre que la France. Préparez deux phrases précises en français sur la manière dont il gère la diversité, et une phrase de comparaison avec le modèle français.

Active recall

Recall the key points — then reveal.

Sources: AQA A-level French (7652) specification - scheme of assessment (AQA)

References & sources

Sources

AQA

Department for Education

GCE AS and A level subject content for modern foreign languages

The positive features of a diverse society

5 sections~24 min reading time4 competenciesLevel Standard 3 · Advanced 2

The positive features of a diverse society

Key points

Translation into English: an argumentative passage

Key points

Defining a contested term under exam conditions

Key points

Translation into French: an education passage

Key points

Repairing four sentences that misuse the key terms

Key points

Separating assertion from attribution in a reading text

Sources

The positive features of a diverse society

Key points

Translation into English: an argumentative passage

Key points

Defining a contested term under exam conditions

Key points

Translation into French: an education passage

Key points

Repairing four sentences that misuse the key terms

Key points

Separating assertion from attribution in a reading text

Sources