Word: french
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...when Johnson arrived in Cambridge, he says he was struck by what he believed to be the relative lack of religious organizations. While students were open to talking about everything from physics to French literature, he felt religion was not on the discussion agenda...
...final repose for France's greatest heroes, it's perhaps not surprising that efforts are now afoot to relocate the ashes of writer and philosopher Albert Camus to a site beneath the 18th century Paris building's cupola. But rather than earning plaudits from intellectuals and ordinary French people alike, the move to honor the man some call France's most influential postwar thinker is sparking controversy. Some pundits and historians say that Camus' legacy is being exploited for political gain, while others argue that glorification of the philosopher by the French government would make a mockery of Camus' deeply...
...President Nicolas Sarkozy said last week that he wanted to add Camus to the giants of French history who are buried at the Panthéon - figures like Voltaire, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Victor Hugo, Emile Zola and Louis Pasteur - as a way of revering an author whose defense of the downtrodden and veneration of the individual over the oppressive forces of society earned him fame and respect around the globe. But the announcement outraged Camus' son, Jean, who saw a motivation of a different sort - an attempt by Sarkozy to "requisition" the legacy of a ferociously independent thinker...
...only one against making the writer of The Stranger and The Rebel a quasi saint of the French state. Several leading French intellectuals and Camus experts have denounced what they claim is Sarkozy's effort to associate himself with a politically engaged writer who would doubtless oppose his leadership were he alive today. "I don't think Albert Camus has any need of Sarkozy, I think Sarkozy has greater need of some intellectual sparkle," Camus biographer Olivier Todd told France Inter radio on Saturday. "This is a gimmick - it's part of his technique of hijacking the intellectual milieu...
...countries have such a healthy appetite for it all. In 2004, after 10-year old María Isabel of Spain won with her ode to materialism called, I'd Rather Be Dead Than Plain, French broadcasters dismissed the show as "vulgar" and withdrew from all future contests. In 2006, Denmark and Norway followed suit, claiming that the high-profile event puts too much pressure on young children. With that in mind, the producers of the competition have taken steps to let children be children - and slow their maturation into the scantily clad stars common in the adult version...