“These messages do not reflect the majority of our students who are not morons”reacted Wednesday June 22 on franceinfo Françoise Cahen, professor of letters at the Lycée Maximilien Perret in Alfortville (Val-de-Marne), member of the French Association for the teaching of French (AFEF), while the writer Sylvie Germain is threatened on the internet by high school students.
An excerpt from his novel angry days was offered for the French baccalaureate. For the past week, thousands of first-grade students have been unleashed on social networks on the excerpt in question and on the author with often insulting and sometimes threatening remarks. Françoise Cahen says to herself in particular “very disappointed but not very surprised” by these threats which have already targeted dead writers in the past.
franceinfo: What does this outburst of anger inspire in you?
Francoise Cahen: I am also very disappointed with these reactions and at the same time, not very surprised. Because each year, unfortunately, in a kind of immature outlet, there are a whole bunch of insults that are addressed to authors, even dead ones. This was the case with Perec last year. So I understand that Sylvie Germain may have had a very bad image of these high school students. But as she says very well herself, these messages, which are a concentrate of violent stupidity, do not reflect the majority of our students who are not illiterate morons as one might think.
You are currently correcting the copies of the French baccalaureate. Do you have good copies?
Yes, very good copies. I am in the process of compiling a collection of the best commentary quotes on his text to send to Sylvie Germain. Because there are really brilliant, inspired, sensitive analyses. His text was really encountered by first-year students. And it’s very beautiful to read this encounter between the students and a text that was unexpected, unknown, a little strange for them.
Did this text have anything to destabilize?
Certainly, because we can think that the somewhat organic link with nature is not necessarily the daily life of our students. But precisely, the students also have this somewhat ecological fiber that is specific to their generation. In any case, I saw students see, for example, the mythical aspect of this text, the biblical resonances, the links between nature, the forest, the sky and men. There are very beautiful things that are written by the students. So we cannot reduce the students’ reactions to these floods of insults that I deplore and condemn.