France

Linguist Geoffrey Nunberg reviews "Cultural Misunderstandings: The French-American Experience" by Raymonde Carroll. It's a look at the different ways different cultures behave and think.

Two of the band's members, Sterfane Mellino and Mathieu Canavese join Fresh Air to talk about the history of their group, and their new album, Mlah. The liner notes are entirely in French -- the band says the decision helps preserve their national identity abroad.

Book critic John Leonard says the historian's newest work, called Citizen, is intellectually reprehensible, ignoring both past and present scholarship to craft a familiar and tired narrative of French democracy. Yet the writing is lovely, and propelled Leonard to the end of the book, kicking and screaming.

Film critic Stephen Schiff says that Louis Malle's Murmur of the Heart was overshadowed by the string of exceptional movies also released in 1971. The film is shocking in its sexuality and subtlety.

Director Stephen Frears directed the adaptation of the play, Les Liaisons Dangereuses, about a contest of sexual conquest and infidelity. Film critic Stephen Schiff praises how it handles eroticism. Despite some casting missteps, he believes it's "a brilliant tarentella" of a movie.

Language Commentator Geoffrey Nunberg will discuss the effects of Minitel, the computer distributed by the telephone system in France that has brought a word processor to every home with a phone.

While vacationing in France, linguist Geoff Nunberg visited a museum exhibit showcasing an early edition of the Grand Larousse dictionary. He considers the cultural significance of this text, and what it says about how the French view language.