IN FRANCE, questions of language often touch off fiery national debates. Just last year reforms meant to simplify tricky spellings—including the optional deletion of the circumflex from some words—provoked outrage and an online protest called #JeSuisCirconflexe. France’s latest bout of linguistic anguish provoked an intervention from the prime minister and alarm from the French Academy, the official guardian of the French tongue, over a “mortal peril” to the language. It stems from the publication this autumn of a third-grade grammar textbook featuring a rare punctuation mark. Why the distress?

All French nouns require a gender, which is often unconnected to the thing itself. There is nothing especially masculine, for instance, about le bureau (the desk) or feminine about la table (the table). In other cases, a noun’s gender is derived from the biological sex of its referent: un directeur is a male director; une directrice is a female one. Since the 17th century, the rule for plurals has been that the masculine always trumps the feminine. The reason, according to an early member of the French Academy (which is housed in the pictured building), is that “the masculine is more noble”. Therefore, if only one directeur joins a group of 500 directrices, they collectively become les directeurs. The grammatical dominance of the masculine in French frequently creates conflict. A commission was created in 1984 to feminise job titles in order to recognise the growing numbers of women working in traditionally male-dominated professions. Its recommendations were so detested that the French government did not make the feminisation of professions mandatory until 1998.

The textbook offers a solution to what some feminists believe is an example of the sexism encoded in the French language. In order to refer to both genders, it inserts a floating dot, known as an interpunct, after the masculine version of certain plural nouns, and follows it with the feminine version. So the group of one male and 500 female directors, for instance, becomes les directeur·rice·s. Few paid attention in 2015 when the High Council for Gender Equality, a consultative state body tasked with promoting equal rights, proposed the fix in a list of recommendations on implementing gender-inclusive language. The backlash to the textbook’s publication has been rather swifter. The (predominantly male) French Academy, created by Cardinal Richelieu in 1635, warned that this “aberration” would create “a confusion close to illegibility” and allow other languages to “take advantage to prevail”. Édouard Philippe, the prime minister, has weighed in, asking ministers “not to make use of the so-called inclusive writing in official texts”.

This is unlikely to nip the issue in the bud. The controversy over gender-inclusive language comes just as France grapples with its own #MeToo protests against sexual abuse and harassment, called #BalanceTonPorc (“Expose your pig”). More than 300 French teachers signed a manifesto last month saying that they would no longer teach the rule that the masculine dominates the feminine. Technology, too, is playing a role in helping to regularise gender-inclusive language, despite the warning cries from the French Academy. The French Association of Normalisation, a national standard-setting body, said that it is designing a new French keyboard that will include an interpunct. There are good reasons to do so. Several studies suggest that gender-inclusive language can help reduce gender stereotyping and discrimination. Others suggest a link between gendered languages and lower rates of female work-force participation.