What is the longest word in French?, a student asked me last week. ''Anticonstitutionnellement'' (''unconstitutionally'') and the longest town name in France is ''Saint-Remy-en-Bouzemont-Saint-Genest-et-Isson'', was my answer.
With a mere 38 letters, it simply cannot compete with the longest word in the English language, was his. He was talking about ''pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis'' with a grand total of 45 letters! Hopefully no one has to pronounce it on a regular basis, also because it describes a nasty lung disease.
To which I added that – and you probably know where this is going – that at this point, I'd rather use the word ''Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious'', especially since it doesn't belong in the dictionary!
Except... that it does! I checked. According to the Collins English dictionary, it means 'used as a nonsense word by children to express approval or to represent the longest word in English'.
Words fail me.