Gender-inclusive language in French: Where do L2 learners stand?

Gender-inclusive language aims to improve the representation of women and gender minorities, while reducing male-biased interpretations. Critics, such as the Académie française , argue that inclusive language complicates literacy for L1 pupils and can hinder learning for L2 learners of French. Yet, empirical work on opinions towards inclusive forms has focused almost exclusively on L1 speakers, highlighting the role of factors such as ideology and prior knowledge. The perspective of L2 received limited recognition. This exploratory questionnaire study investigates the support for teaching and using inclusive forms in French class of 62 learners of French at a multilingual Dutch university. We examine whether support is predicted by learners’ opinions on gender-inclusive language in their L1, L1 background (18 different L1s), gender, French proficiency, prior knowledge of inclusive forms, and perceived difficulty. Learners are more supportive than neutral, and only L1 opinions and perceived difficulty significantly predict support.