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| Armoiries de la République française Dessiné par Jérôme BLUM Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 France license |
Proud French Expression
| Meaning | Long live the Republic! | |
| Register | normal | |
| Pronunciation | [veev lah ray poo bleek] | |
| IPA | [viv la ʁe py blik] | |
Usage notes: Vive la République is a companion expression to vive la France. While the French generally use them together (mostly during political rallies, as in the video below*), Francophiles of other nationalities only say the latter. But what’s the difference?
As you may know, there are several different names for France. La France is of course the general term, encompassing everything from the country’s geography to its culture. In comparison, la République refers to the government. After the French Revolution, France changed from a monarchy to a republic. It continued evolving through empires and different republics until the current incarnation, la Cinquième République (the Fifth Republic), was established in 1958 by Charles de Gaulle by constitution.** When the French refer to their country as la République, they do so with pride in their modern system of government.
In the image above, RF stands for République française.
* Video: Vive la République, vive la France in the wild
** This is an extremely abbreviated summary of hundreds of years of French history. Further reading:
- Bastille Day (bilingual article)
- Early Modern and Modern French History
- French Revolution
- The History of Modern France, by Jonathan Fenby
More French patriotism
- La Marseillaise
- Listening: Quatorze Juillet / Bastille Day
- Reading: Quatorze Juillet / Bastille Day
- 7 names for France
- French symbols and motifs
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