French Indochina
1
7.3
- proper noun
:
Indochina Francesa
- The French Indochina of the late 19th century included regions that are now part of Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam.
Examples
-
Even after Japanese forces had entered the southern part of French Indochina in July 1941, the United States was willing to negotiate while tightening economic measures against Japan.
Academic text (1994) -
American reconnaissance airplanes saw Japanese submarines, cruisers, transports, and destroyers in Camranh Bay and elsewhere along the French Indochina coast.
Academic text (1991) -
In July, when Japan occupied French Indochina, carrier communications again went dead.
Academic text (1991) -
Meanwhile, following their defeat in Europe, the French had withdrawn their troops from China and had signed a "Treaty of Friendship" with the Japanese that permitted the Japanese to use military air bases and naval facilities in French Indochina.
Fiction book (1999) -
As students do this exercise, learners will find that countries such as Cambodia, which were formerly part of French Indochina, continue to use French as well as local languages on their currencies.
Academic text (1991) -
Located between British-run Burma and French Indochina, Siam was modernized and open to Western trade.
Academic text (1994) -
But Japan's alliance with Germany in the Tripartite Pact and her thrust into French Indochina made Americans realize that they had to fight Japan if they had to fight Germany.
Academic text (1994) -
Along with this close linkage to Vietnam is the historical connection of the former French Indochina (Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia).
Academic text (2002) -
Japan, persisting in its three-year-old aggression in China, seemed now to cast a covetous eye on orphaned French Indochina and the Dutch East Indies.
Academic text (1991) -
The U.S. embargoed oil to Japan in July 1941, after Japan had invaded Southern French Indochina, which they planned to use as a jump-off point to invade Malaya, Singapore, and the real prize, the Dutch East Indies and its oil.
Blog text (26)
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'the part of Indochina associated with France / under French colonial rule' is directly and compositionally derived from combining the adjective 'French' with the place-name 'Indochina'. This ADJ + place construction is cross-linguistically common, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents would readily infer the historical/territorial sense.
Etymology
French Indochina gets its name from combining French (the country that ruled the area) and Indochina (a word meaning 'lands between India and China'). Picture the French flag on a map between India and China, and you get the idea: the name came to mean the group of colonies—Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam—that France controlled until 1954.