When William the Conqueror became king of England, French took over as the language of the court, administration, and culture - and stayed there for 300 years.

自征服者威廉成为英格兰国王后，法语就成为了法庭、行政和文化教育领域使用的语言，而法语的统治也长达300年。

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We often forget that Quebec is something of a foreign country within Canada itself, with a different language and culture that is basically French.

我们经常会忘记魁北克是加拿大境内的一个异国，和基于法语的语言和文化。

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But the real edge lies with culture, particularly the English language, which has decimated all its traditional competitors - French, German and Russian - over the past two decades.

但真正的优势在于文化——尤其是在过去二十年里已彻底挫败诸如法语、德语及俄罗斯语等所有传统竞争对手的英语。

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Unlike Latin and French, German was never the language of diplomacy and culture.

ECONOMIST: The vain battle to promote German

In it he reminds us that, between the mid-17th century and World War I, French was the universal language of diplomacy, culture and fashion and that an ability to read and speak it was essential to anyone claiming to be educated.

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And the language divide is much less contentious in Wales and Scotland than it is in Canada, where pressure for independence in Quebec is intimately bound up with French-speakers' worry about the survival of their language and culture.

ECONOMIST: Devolution: The choice for Scotland and Wales | The