VICE French in the Digital Space: Asset or Obstacle?

We often talk about the impact of digital technology on society and emphasize human and technological

aspects, but rarely do we connect them to language. Culture Montréal is organizing the forum French in the Digital Space, inviting the public to reflect and discuss the challenges of creating, doing business and gaining visibility in French. Is French a key factor in Montréal’s creative identity? Can digital technology foster more collaboration andconnections to help projects shine across the Francophonie? The topic clearly draws interest, as the event is sold out. Printemps numérique spoke with Philippe Gohier, editor-in-chief of VICE QC, the new Québec branch of the well-known media outlet launched last September. He is taking part in the panel Inspiring Project Laboratory – the use of French as a lever for creativity and visibility. Asked how VICE fits into the French-speaking cultural landscape, he says local journalists are good and VICE has no lesson to teach. Its advantage is to operate in an uninhibited space. VICE knows how to speak to young people because it hires young people; it is not weighed down by traditions and structures, and its audience is notshocked when it dares. The team has broad freedom as long as it remains transparent and authentic. The language challenge at VICE is to write in order to be understood, not to give lessons. The team refuses to be constrained and does not want to become the standard-bearer for a bureaucratized official language. Its documentary on Dead Obies addresses this with Franglais. The style is informal, comfortable with anglicisms and swear words, and still building its own linguistic identity. It belongs to a more conversational North American new-media lineage close to readers, pushing experience and access as far as possible. To avoid sensationalism, Gohier says everything comes down to public interest. Provocative subjects can be of public interest; sex, drugs, mortgages and technology are all part of life. French can be a lever for creativity and visibility if we choose to use it as more than a tool: to work with it, manipulate it and treat it as an entity that forms and deforms itself. Language is not static; it evolves. Any language can become a creative lever when there is the will to make it so. The author of this text has occasionally collaborated with VICE.