A French linguist has controversially claimed that the English language 'doesn't exist' and is just 'badly pronounced French'. 

Bernard Cerquiglini, a linguistics professor from Lyon, points out that the English language uses thousands of words taken from French about 1,000 years ago. 

Ironically, many of these have since reentered the French language but in a bastardised English form – such as 'stew', 'people' and 'shopping'.