Français fondamental ("Fundamental French") is a simplified version of the French language used for teaching the language to non-native speakers.
Origins
Français fondamental was developed by the Centre d'Etude du Français Élémentaire, which was renamed to the Centre de Recherche et d'Etude pour la Diffusion du Français (CREDIF) in 1959. It was headed by Georges Gougenheim, a linguist. The Ministry of Education of France sanctioned and promoted it as a method of learning French. The use of Français fondamental was common in French textbooks, and especially prevalent in audiovisual learning methods used in the 1960s.
Gougenheim, Réné Michea, Paul Rivenc, and Aurélien Sauvageot served as researchers for the project. There are 1,475 words in the "first degree" and 1,609 words in the "second degree."