“The presidential elections”: don’t make the mistake anymore!

Can we speak

?

There are two rounds.

Or should we say

, since there is only one elected candidate?

The question is of burning topicality.

Two days before the first round of the elections, the situation is serious.

Use the right formula!

The editorial staff offers you a brief linguistic overview.

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The word, derived from

, appeared in French in the 16th century as

.

The spelling evolves from the 19th century and becomes:

.

The latter designates everything that relates to a president, in particular to the President of the Republic, informs the French Academy.

Which answers our question.

We say

since it is the election of a single president.

Admittedly, there are two rounds, and several candidates, but we are talking here about the choice of a single man.

On the other hand, we can speak of

,

or even

, since it is a question here of the election of several candidates.

In the context of the election of a head of state, the plural is only authorized when speaking of several presidential elections:

.

"President" or "president"?

“quinquennium” or “quinquennium”?

In the same vein, let us recall that in the formula

, the word

does not take a capital letter, while it is the case for

.

When we address him, without specifying his name and his regime, we write:

, out of courtesy.

Similarly, it is better language to refer to the

rather than the

, because there is no possible third vote.

We write the

and not the

.

The

is the set of sounds produced by the vibrations of the vocal cords.

It is what allows people to express themselves, and therefore to vote.

The

is different: it is a space, a path that one travels to go somewhere.

As for the word

, let's not forget the double

, which recalls its origin: it is derived from

, which contains the Latin

,

.