The French Academy , founded in 1634 and made official in 1635 by Cardinal Richelieu , is a French institution whose mission is "to contribute on a non-profit basis to the improvement and influence of letters" and the function of keeping a dictionary up to date. of reference for French, and to approve the publication in the Official Journal of French-language equivalents of foreign technical terms in the French language [ 2 ] . It consists of forty members elected by their peers, and is the first of the five academies of the Institut de France .
The mission originally assigned to it, and which was specified by letters patent from Louis XIII on, is to work to "give certain rules to our language and to make it pure, eloquent and capable of dealing with the arts and sciences" . With this in mind, she composed a Dictionary of the French Academy , the first edition of which was published in 1694 and the ninth is in preparation. It also awards literary prizes , the most renowned of which is the Grand Prize for Literature of the French Academy .
The French Academy brings together personalities who have illustrated the French language: poets , novelists , playwrights , literary critics , philosophers , historians , scientists , and, by tradition, high-ranking soldiers , statesmen and religious dignitaries.
There is no condition of titles or nationality to enter the Company, except that of having illustrated the French language.
The usefulness of the French Academy, which no longer has normative but only moral authority today, is sometimes disputed [ 2 ] . Criticisms also concern the ethics of the institution, which offers many advantages to its members [ 3 ] .