an essay on french
TRANSCRIPT
1
An Essay on History and Linguistic Characteristics of
French Language
F. Samet Aguş
1667369
İbrahim Çelik
1668243
Özgül Başaran
1667492
FLE 261.1
Linguistics II
2009-2010
20.01.2010
2
Contents 20.01.2010..............................................................................................................................1
1 Introduction .....................................................................................................................5
2 The French Speaking World ............................................................................................5
3 Variation, Varieties and Variables ...................................................................................6
4 Phonology .......................................................................................................................7
4.1 Phonology and Orthography .....................................................................................7
4.2 Syllables and Stress ..................................................................................................7
4.3 Vowels and Semi-vowels .........................................................................................8
4.4 Consonants ...............................................................................................................9
4.5 Liaison, Elision and „Mute‟ (Latent) e .................................................................... 10
5 Morphology and morphosyntax ..................................................................................... 10
5.1 The verb phrase in written language ....................................................................... 11
5.2 Pronouns in written language .................................................................................. 12
5.3 The verb phrase and pronoun in the spoken language ............................................. 13
5.4 The Noun Phrase .................................................................................................... 14
6 Syntax and Pragmatics................................................................................................... 15
6.1 Topicalising Structures ........................................................................................... 16
6.2 Focalising Procedures ............................................................................................. 18
7 Lexicon ......................................................................................................................... 18
8 References ..................................................................................................................... 20
3
F. Samet Aguş
İbrahim Çelik
Özgül Başaran
An Essay on History and Linguistic Characteristics of French Language
This paper is on the history and linguistic characteristics of the French language. We
have chosen French, because it is one of the major languages in the world. It is used in many
of the countries as official language and it has great influence on English accepted as the
communication medium of the word. We will see together the specific characteristics and
common characteristics with other languages.
4
Abbreviations
UN United Nations
EU Europe Unions
Sg Singular
Pl Plural
Indef Indefinite
DObj Direct object
IObj Indirect object
Ref Reflexive
5
1 Introduction
French is a Romance language derived from Latin which was spoken during the reign of
Roman Empire. While the Roman Empire was breaking down, a number of major dialectic
divisions developed. There are the dialects of the North and centre known as langue d’oїl, the
dialects of South known as langue d’oc ( oїl and oc being the words for „yes‟), and the
dialects of a smaller area in the southeast known as Franco-Provençal. The difference between
the dialect of North and South is so obvious that the dialects of the South, known as occitan,
was not regarded as Gallo-Romance (French), but instead they are more related to Catalan,
distict from Hispano-Romance. Within these major dialectal areas, linguistic disintegration
which was triggered by the lack of social cohesion during the Dark ages occurred. Francien
which is one of the dialects of the langue d‟oil was emerged in this way. It is the dialect of the
area where Paris is located. Moreover, this dialect created the situations which accelerated the
development of the modern standard French, in other words „national language‟. During 12th
and 13th centuries, while francien was accepted as a language for writing and speaking by
upper class, in northern and central France, progress was slow. It was not until 19th century
that French became totaly dominant within the boundaries of French, firstly among the
bourgeoisie and in the cities and then in the rural areas. French being as an international
language of culture and diplomacy came before its use as spoken language within France.
2 The French Speaking World
French ranks eleventh among the world‟s mostly spoken languages. However, it‟s hard to
estimate the number of French speaking people in the world, but it makes sense to assume that
there are between 90 and 110 million. 70 million people speak French as a mother tongue,
and 20-40 million people speak French as a second language. In some countries, its position is
6
more than a foreign language. For instance, it is the official language in 28 countries. It is
widely used in various major international organizations and it is one of the six official
languages of the UN and one of the three „working languages‟ of the EU. It is also learned as
a foreign language. In Europe, for instance, 9 million study French, Within Europe, French is
now spoken by some 60 million people in and by some 4 million Walloons in Belgium. In the
district of Brussels, French is spoken by 80 percent of the population. The rivalry between
French and Dutch within Belgium is well known. Around half a million people live in the
Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, where the native language of most speakers is a German
dialect but where French is the language of education and administration. Recent surveys
suggest that in Switzerland, 20 percent of the total population is French speakers. Around
90.000 people in northern Italy, in the Aosta Valley, speak French.
French speakers can be found on almost every continent. In Canada 8 million people
speak. French is generally in competition not with another European language but with non-
European languages and with French-based creoles in former French colonies. For example,
French is found in Haiti and on islands such as Martinique and Guadeloupe. French is
generally not in a good position as a first language. However, in many countries where it is
used for a variety of purposes, its future as a second language seems comparatively secure.
3 Variation, Varieties and Variables
Like all languages, French is not a single entity. In the different areas where it is spoken,
its status related to its frequency of use and its speakers‟ degree varies. In the countries which
are the members of la Francophonie, its use is encouraged like in Lebanon, and Romania.
French also varies due to the geographical differences, speakers‟ status (social status,
education, sex, age, and urban or rural dweller), and usage. Concepts referring to social
variation in French are français familier and français populaire. The first refers to the
7
informal way of speaking of elite, while the second is seen as typical of the uneducated
people. Although uneducated people live in the countryside as well as in cities français
populaire has largely been attributed to the Parisian working classes. Both français familiar
and français populaire are part of everyday language.
There is a difference between everyday French and formal varieties of the language in
terms of phonology, grammar and lexicon. Therefore, the differences between the written and
oral form of language is important. Recently, scholars have begun to put great importance on
the spoken language. There is also an increasing interest in urban forms of French as those
spoken in the slums of large French cities.
4 Phonology
4.1 Phonology and Orthography
French has undergone radical changes since Vulgar Latin was brought to Gaul by
Roman conquerors. These changes have urged to use the 26-letter Latin alphabet along with
other means The French Orthography has been a controversial issue over the centuries. There
have been many attempts to reform French orthography, most of which have led to small
changes. In the following part, when we transcribe the sounds of French, we will use the
symbols of the International Phonetic Association (IPA) to represent them.
4.2 Syllables and Stress
The functional spoken units in French are phrases, not single words. The tendency in
French is to have what is called enchaînement: that is, not to make word boundaries within
tightly bound groups of words (e.g. the noun phrase, the verb phrase). For example in On leur
8
a offert | une aide immense | „one offered them = they were offered | tremendous help |‟, only
the two phrasal boundaries (marked by | in the examples) are perceived. Stress in French is on
the vowel in the last syllable of the phrasal group, whether it is a single word or a sequence of
tightly bound words. Therefore, we may say that modern French is a final-stress, phrase-stress
language.
4.3 Vowels and Semi-vowels
Vowels are formed with no major obstacles in the vocal tract. They are formed by
several moving speech organs, the so-called articulators, that „shape the mouth‟ into different
resonance cavities giving a characteristic „color‟ (acoustic quality) for each vowel. The size
and shape of the vocal tract is varied primarily by positioning the tongue and the lips. Besides
the vibration of the vocal folds placed in the larynx, which creates voicing (most vowels are
voiced), the raising and lowering of the velum (soft palate or uvula) is responsible for the
closing and opening of the nasal passage, and thus creating a difference between oral and
nasal vowels. The tongue, the lips, the glottis, and the velum are referred to as active
(moving) articulators.
There are several points to be noted about this system. The most complex part of the
vowel system is the series of higher mid (close, tense) and lower mid (open, lax) vowels (/e/
vs /ε/, /o/ vs /ø/ vs /æ/). This is a common pattern in the languages of the world and is shared
with Italian; however, few languages have the /ø/ vs /æ/ opposition. Another feature of
French is its four nasal vowels, /ε/, /ǽ/, and /ã/. Nasal vowels are not so common in the
languages of the world, and are common only with Portuguese. The series of front rounded
vowels, /y, ø, æ, ǽ/ is another uncommon aspect. In addition, the difference between front /a/
9
and more backed /ǽ/ is obscure, for some speakers it is replaced by a length opposition, as in
pâte „paste‟ /pa:t/ vs patte „paw‟ /pat/, whereas for others it is lost.
In addition to these vowels, French has three semi-vowels „/j/ (cf. /i/), /Ч/ (cf. /y/), /w/
(cf. /u/)‟. The most interesting of these vowels is the front rounded [Ч], and it is rare in the
languages of the world. Only /j/ can occur in syllable-final position (as in paye „pays‟ /pεj/).
There is a high functional link between the vowels and semi-vowels such that /i/, /y/ and /u/
can be /j/, /Ч / and /w/ before another vowel: e.g. tuer „to kill‟ /tЧe/ vs tue „kills‟ /ty/.
4.4 Consonants
The consonantal made. Phonemes of the French norm are shown in Table 1.1
Among the nasals, the /ŋ/ is unstable for many speakers, who instead use [nj]. In addition, /ŋ/
exists, for certain speakers, in words borrowed from English (camping /kãpiŋ/).
Consonant Phonemes of the French Norm:
Table 1.1
Labial Dental (Alveo)
Palatal
Velar Uvular
Stop
(Occlusive,
Plosive)
Unvoiced/tense P T k
Voiced/lax B D g
Fricative
Unvoiced/tense F S ∫
Voiced/lax V Z
Nasal M N ŋ
Liquid
(Approximant)
L ʁ
10
4.5 Liaison, Elision and ‘Mute’ (Latent) e
As noted above, in French, syllabification and stress function according to phrases, not
according to words. There are also two sandhi phenomena that result in the pronunciation or
non-pronunciation of some latent sounds within phrases in certain conditions. These
conditions are liaison, when a latent consonant is pronounced; the other is elision, when a
latent vowel is not pronounced.
Liaison, elision, the loss of latent e, enchaînement, and syllabification produce many
homophones, not only at the level of the word, but also at the level of the phrase or even the
sentence. These lead to ambiguities and a host of word games. Il est tout vert, il est ouvert
„it‟s all green, it‟s open‟. And all of this, in addition to the issue of the relation between sound
and letter have led to the famous dictée „dictation exercise‟ of French classrooms, which has
even found its way into popular culture through the media, which often engage the French
nation innational dictées contests.
5 Morphology and morphosyntax
French was not the same language in the past as it is now. It has many alterations in its
morphosyntactic features. For instance, it has lost the neuter gender, and case structure. It
had a tendency towards subject-verb-object (SVO) word order. Grammatical morphology in
French is divided between the verb on the one side, and the noun, adjective and determiners
on the other side. We will also examine the pronouns and as it is obvious in French that there
is a difference between the morphology of the written language and the morphology of the
spoken language, we will take into account the differences of pronouns and verb phrases in
written and spoken language.
11
5.1 The verb phrase in written language
Only obligatory constituent of the verb phrase is a verb, of course. But it can be
accompanied by other elements such as noun phrases or their pronominal equivalents. There
are some verbs that it is necessary to use another element than verb. For example, it is
necessary to use a direct object with transitive verbs like laver (tu laves la ta voiture „you
wash your car‟) and it is necessary to use prepositional phrases with the verbs taking
preposition like aller ( il va à Ankara ‘he goes to Ankara‟)
French has three types of conjugation. The first type is –er type ( parler ‘speak‟, penser
‘think’). Second type is –ir type ( avertir ‘warn‟, choisir „choose‟ ) and the last type is –r/re
type (venir „come‟, rompre „break‟). Furthermore, there are some irregular verbs such as être,
aller, avoir and faire. Most of the verbs belong to –er type and new verbs are generally
derived by this type. However, some verbs are derived by the second type (e.g. alunir ‘to land
on the moon’ and atterrir ‘to land on earth’).1
French has four tenses as the present, the past, the imperfect and the future. The
compound tenses tepms composés are constructed with the auxiliary avoir „to have‟ and the
past passive participle participe passé (Il a oublié acheter le livre de Samet). A few
intransitive verbs such as mourir „to die‟, naitre „to be born‟, aller „to go‟ and all of the
pronominal reflexive verbs are conjugated in the compound tenses with être „to be‟ ( Leur
parent sont mort en France l’année dérniere and Özgül s’est lavée le visage a sept heures).
The simple past tense is used only in highly formal written language. So, the compound
verbal forms have more than one meaning, that is, they mean both present perfect and past
tense. For example, ıl a dit que means both „he said that‟ and „he has said that‟.
In addition, French has five moods: indicative, subjunctive, imperative, infinitive and
conditional mood. By using the verb demander „ask‟, we will show all the conjugations of
tenses in the table 1.2 and the table 1.3
12
Table 1.2
Present
Indicative
Imperfect Simple Past Subjunctive
Present
Je Demande demandais demandai que je demande
Tu Demandes demandais demandas que tu demandes
Il-Elle Demande demandait demanda qu‟il demande
nous Demandons demandions demandâmes que nous demandons
vous Demandez demandiez demandâtes que vous
demandez
Ils-Elles Demandent demandaient demandèrent qu‟ils
demandent
Table 1.2
Future Conditional Perfect Imperative
je Demanderai demanderais ai demandé
tu Demanderas demanderais as demandé demande !
Il-Elle Demandera demanderait a demandé
nous Demanderons demanderions avons
demandé
Demandons !
vous Demanderez demanderiez avez demandé demandez !
Ils-Elles Demanderont demanderaient ont demandé
5.2 Pronouns in written language
When we examine the pronouns in French language, we can see two different kinds of
pronouns in general. They are dependent (clitic, conjunctive) pronouns and independent
pronouns. The clitics cannot be alone and cannot be stressed and they normally only used
with the verb. In the table 1.4, the pronouns are divided into three persons and two numbers.
13
They also divided into genders in the third singular and third plural persons. There becomes a
difference between the direct object pronouns and indirect objects pronouns of the third
singular and plural persons.
Table 1.4
Clitic Independent
Su DObj IObj other moi
1sg je, j‟ me, m‟ me, m‟ toi
2sg Tu te, t‟ te, t‟
3sg
m. Il le, l‟ lui lui
f. Elle la, l‟ lui elle
İndef. On soi
y, en
1pl Nous nous nous nous
2pl Vous vous vous vous
3pl m. Ils les leur eux
f. Elles les leur elles
3sg/pl ref. se, s‟ se, s‟ Soi, lui,
eux,elle(s)
5.3 The verb phrase and pronoun in the spoken language
As it is doesn‟t have a standard form, the spoken French has some changes. Some of
them exist for centuries and some new ones are emerging. For instance, the word on started to
be used as a personal pronoun and mainly, it is used instead of nous „we‟. In addition, the
relationship between tu and vous is not only a singular plural person relationship. Vous is used
to address to a person if the speaker means to be polite or if he addresses to a hearer from a
higher status. However, this situation started to change. Tu „2sg you‟ started to gain ground in
all places as the word „you‟ has in English.
Another point is that the clitic subjects are tending to be prefixes to the verb. Moreover,
all of the clitics can be shortened by elision even before the consonants. For example, je
deteste can be j’deteste „I hate‟. The pronoun il can be omitted totally if t is used in an
impersonal expressions (il y a…‟there is‟ can be just /ja/).
14
The loss of preverbal negation element, ne, is another characteristic of the spoken
language. If we look at the written language, we can see that there is to components of making
negative form. They come after and before the verb. Ne comes before the verb and the other
element, mostly pas comes after the verb. But in the spoken language, ne can be ignored. Je
ne sais pas, for example, can be said as /ʃepa/.
So, from all these differences between the written and the spoken language, we can say
that in the spoken language there is an attempt to simplify the structure as much as possible.
In addition, it has a tendency towards being a prefixal language.
5.4 The Noun Phrase
In terms of morphology, main components of a noun phrase are the noun, adjective and
determiner, because they show the gender and the number. All of the nouns, regardless of
being animate or inanimate, have gender. There are some nouns that gender is determined by
the determiners such as une enfant „a female child‟ and un enfant „a male child‟. Pluralization
in the nouns are mostly done by putting an –s at the end of the noun, but there are some
nouns made plural by –x such as journal „newspaper‟, journaux.
As for determiners, there are a lot of determiners, but all of them based on the
masculine feminine and singular plural forms. We will give these determiners in the tables
1.5-1.9
Table 1.5 Definite Articles
Masculine Feminine
Singular le,l‟ le chien „the dog‟ la, l‟ la femme „the
woman‟
Plural les les homes ‘the men’ les les voitures „the cars‟
15
Table 1.6 Indefinite articles
Masculine Feminine
Singular un un chat „a cat‟ une une maison „a house‟
Plural des des livres „books‟ des des femmes „ women‟
Table 1.7 Partitive Articles
Masculine Feminine
Singular du, de l‟ du pain „some bread‟ de la, de l‟ de la pizza „some
pizza‟
Plural des des fromage „some
cheese‟
des des cerise „some
cherries
Table 1.8 Demonstrative Articles
Masculine Feminine
Singular ce cet cet ami „this
friend‟
cette cette maison „this
house‟
Plural Ces ces livres „these
books‟
ces ces maisons „these
houses‟
Table 1.9 Possessive Adjectives
The Thing Possessed
Owner Masculine Feminine Masculine Feminine
Pl
1sg Mon ma mes
2sg Ton ta tes
3sg son sa ses
1pl notre notre nos
2pl votre votre vos
3pl Leur leur leur
6 Syntax and Pragmatics
Sentences can be examined syntactically according to their categorical components.
These categories are NP and VP. Semantically, sentences can be examined in terms of their
verbs and their function. They can also be examined pragmatically. This level is concerned
with the type of information being transmitted. This information is said about someone or
something. Normally the order (SVO) reflects the information order. Therefore in the
sentence Le président n’a pas répondu au journaliste „The president did not answer (to) the
journalist‟, the NP subject le président is the topic, while the other part of the sentence is the
16
comment. One important point is that generally the topic is represented by a substantially
determined NP. However, the word order can be bothered in order to have a pragmatic
meaning. In “Au journaliste, le président n’a pas répondu – au journaliste“ „to the
journaliste‟ is the thème. Because the French language cannot emphasize sentential elements
in the phonological level or by morph syntactic level, it leans upon only structural strategies
to communicate pragmatic meaning. By Tradition, a number of these unordered structures
were referred to as “syntaxe expressive” „expressive syntax‟. Lately they have come to an end
to be behaved as stylistic variations and are now studied as part of the core syntax of the
language.
6.1 Topicalising Structures
French has a number of topicalising structures, i.e. constructions that bring into initial
sentence position verb arguments that are not necessarily prototypical. Some of them are
common in every speaker‟s speech; however, still not considered as part of the norm. The
main topicalising structures are listed below:
a. focus fronting (placement of non-subject complements to the front of the sentence):
Les montagnes, j’aime „Mountains, I like‟.
b. segmentation by clefting: in cleft sentences the focus is extracted from the
sentence and stressed with c’est + qui/que/dont, etc. (Relative pronoun forms), while
the other part of the sentence constitutes the idea. For example C’est la philosophie
qu’il étudie „It‟s philosophy that he studies‟, in this sentence the focus is la
philosophie. Subjects can be focalized by clefting when they signify significant or new
information: C’est Pasteur qui a mis au point ce vaccine” „It‟s Pasteur who perfected
this vaccine‟. Pseudo-cleft sentences Ce qu’il étudie, c’est la philosophie „What he
17
studies is philosophy‟ have the inverse effect and transmit new information to the end
of the sentence.
c. ‘presentative’ segmentation: in everyday language, indefinite subjects are seldom
found exactly in the beginning of sentences. To Quelqu’un a téléphoné „Someone
called‟ or Des gens ont tout perdu „Some people lost everything‟ speakers prefer Il y a
quelqu’un qui a téléphoné; Il y a des gens qui ont tout perdu, where the indefinite
subjects are arranged with il y a … qui „there is … who/which‟; as said above, il y a is
often pronounced /ja/).
d. left dislocation: NPs can be transferred to the left side of the sentence and
replicated by clitic pronouns/prefixes within the base of the sentence. Clitic means the
function word that is unstressed and pronounced as part of the neighboring word, word
which has no independent accent and comes only in combination with another word
(e.g.:'m in I'm; 'em in we see 'em ) (this resumption is called double marquage in
French Language): Pierre, cette fille, il n’arrête pas de lui téléphoner „Peter, this girl,
he doesn‟t stop calling her‟. Right dislocations are also possible, the dislocated NP
being sometimes referred to as „antitopic‟: Alors tu l’achètes, cette maison? „So
you‟re buying it, this house?‟ The dislocated NP cette maison takes up a position
previously significant in earlier everyday language.
e. passive constructions as topicalising: passive structures put forward to the
beginning of the sentence an argument which is not a common word order theme, and
these passive structures relegate or even withdraw the subject/agent of the active
sentence. For example Le sénat a voté la loi hier „The senate passed the law
yesterday‟is an active sentence and paralleled by the passive sentence La loi a été
votée (par le sénat) hier „The law was passed (by the senate) yesterday‟. Passive
sentences are not frequently used in French. When the agent is unknown or
18
unimportant, active sentences that begin with “one” or “they” are used. For example:
On a voté la loi hier.
6.2 Focalising Procedures
The word order in French is SVO if, however, the speaker wants to stressed
information, the word order can be changed and verb comes before subject. This is called
focus or rhyme position. There are two main focalizing ways in French:
a. simple inversion (VS): Vint la nuit „Came the night‟, i.e. „Night came‟. In this structure a
prepositional or adverbial phrase comes before the verb. The only rule of this structure is that
the verb must be intransitive or transitive with no expressed object. Dans le champ poussaient
des oliviers centenaries „In the field were growing hundred-year-old olive trees‟.
(b) impersonal constructions (Il VS): The impersonnel sentence Il arrive toujours à mon
frère des aventures incroyables corresponds to Des aventures incroyables arrivent toujours à
mon frère „Incredible adventures always happen to my brother‟. In an impersonal
construction, the subject comes after the verb, but its gap is packed with impersonal
pronoun/prefix il, and there is an agreement between it and verb.
7 Lexicon
The main vocabulary of French comes from the Latin spoken in Gaul; the lexical items
have changed over the centuries and become sharply different from any language that based
on Latin. COLAPHUM and CHORDAM are the basic source of Christian vocabulary and
with the expanding borders of Roman Empire other languages such as Celts words became
source of vocabulary for Latin and so French. After The Roman Empire, Gaul was invaded
by Germanic tribes and this had a significant effect on French and German became one of the
19
most important sources of vocabulary for French and now of the 1000 most frequently used
words in contemporary French, 35 are from this source. The greatest influence on the French
lexicon; However, is from Latin The main reason of it that from the time of the very earliest
texts and even more during the Renaissance. The main part of the vocabulary of French was
inherited directly by means of spoken language from Latin and in the process of enrichment
many words were borrowed and learned technically so they have not undergone phonological
changes. However, the most important source in present day language is English. Because of
the cultural, industrial and fashionable interaction, English is the most important source for
French in Today. Another source for French vocabulary is Argot. It was formerly a secret
jargon used by thieves and other criminals. They could communicate with this jargon secretly
but over the years some words have been used in everyday French e.g. flic means policeman
and mouchard for police informer.
The lexicon is the element of language that gets changed the most rapidly. It is estimated
that currently about 25,000 new words come into French every year. Moreover, usage
develops persistently, words become out of date while others widen their meanings, and
synonyms emerge. Lexical variation determined by social and register/ style factors is
therefore complex. One characteristic feature of twentieth-century and present-day current
French is indeed that it is permeable to unconventional usage, even in written forms of the
language.
In conclusion, as one of the major languages of the world, French has many specific
features and as it belongs to romance languages, it has many common features with Italian
and Spanish. We have examined and described many of the linguistic characteristics of it and
while doing this, we got the great help of the book World’s Major Languages. For example,
we used the heading system of this book with slight differences. Maybe this language will not
be a “universal language” again, but it will always be one of the greatest languages.
20
8 References
Monville-Burston, L. R. (1987). French. In B. Comrie, The World's Major Languages (p.
182). New York: Routledge.
Zsuzsanna Fagyal, D. K. (2006). French A Linguistic Introduction. New York: Cambridge
University Press.
http://lerc.educ.ubc.ca/LERC/courses/489/worldlang/french/frenchsyntaxmorphology.html