ABSTRACT
The rationale is ultimately French cultural exceptionalism; the idea that what distinguishes culture in France is that it is treated not just as a commodity but as an ineffable part of being human and being French, just like chanson is. France’s chances of pursuing the cultural exception without taking stock of the realities are doubtless limited. Pop was not, of course, the first Anglo-Saxon music to invade France, for jazz had disembarked with the American troops posted there during the First World War, just as it did again in 1944, in the form of be-bop and swing. French pop only really took off in the wake of May, gradually ceasing to be a superimposed product and becoming the more complex, organic phenomenon it already was in America or Britain. In the English-speaking world, French popular music is sometimes more sinned against than sinning.
