French Sound Structure

French Sound Structure

FRENCH STRUCTURE Douglas C. Walker

© 2001 Douglas C. Walker. All rights reserved. University of Calgary Press 2500 University Drive NW Calgary, Alberta Canada T2N 1N4 www.uofcpress.com Further information relevant to the use of this book and to the study of French phonology in general may be found on the following www site: http://www.ucalgary.ca/~dcwalker/ National Library of Canada Cataloguing in Publication Data Walker, Douglas C. French sound structure Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 1-55238-033-5 1. French language — Phonetics. 2. French language — Pronunciation. 3. French language — Phonology. I. Title. PC2135.W34 2001 441’.5 C2001-910584-3

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Table of Contents Sound Charts and Transcription . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . viii Abbreviations and Symbols . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .x Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi 1. The Object of Description . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1 1.0 Preliminaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1 1.1 The French Language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 1.2 A Brief Historical Review . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6 2. Key Descriptive and Theoretical Concepts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 2.0 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 2.1 Orthography and Pronunciation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 2.2 Morphological and Lexical Notions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .13 3. Basic Descriptive Units and Domains . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .21 3.0 Introduction: The Segment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .21 3.1 The Syllable . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .23 3.2 The SF Phonological Word . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .30 3.3 The Phonological Phrase . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31 3.4 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .37 4. Vowels and Semi-vowels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .41 4.0 The Vowel System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .41 4.1 Vowel Length . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .42 4.1.1 Lengthening Consonants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 4.1.2 Intrinsically Long Vowels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .44 4.1.3 The /' – ':/ Opposition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .45 4.1.4 Supplementary Comments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .47 4.2 The Mid Vowels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .48 4.2.1 Mid Vowels in Final Open Syllables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .49 4.2.2 Mid Vowels in Final Closed Syllables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .50 4.2.3 Mid Vowels in Nonfinal Closed Syllables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .51 4.2.4 Mid Vowels in Nonfinal Open Syllables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .52 4.2.4.1 Analogy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .53 4.2.4.2 Vowel Harmony . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .54 4.2.4.3 The loi de position . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .55 4.2.5 Grammatical Consequences of the Constraints on Mid Vowels . . . . .57 4.2.6 Orthography and Pronunciation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .59 4.2.7 The Potential Merger of /n/ and /œ/ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .59 4.3 The Low Vowels /a/ and /#/ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .60 4.4 Nasal Vowels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .62 4.4.1 The Merger of /'/ and / . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .63 4.4.2 Distribution of Nasal Vowels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .64 4.4.3 Alternations between X and VN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .65

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4.4.4 History and Orthography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .73 4.4.5 Dialects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .75 4.5 Schwa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .76 4.5.1 Orthographic Representations of Schwa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .77 4.5.2 Distributional Constraints on Schwa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .77 4.5.3 The Phonetic Realization of Schwa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .78 4.5.4 The Deletion of Schwa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .80 4.5.4.1 Schwa in the Phonological Phrase . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .80 4.5.4.2 A Rhythmic Constraint . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .84 4.5.4.3 Epenthesis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .85 4.5.4.4 The Tendency Towards Irregularity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .86 4.5.4.5 Stylistic Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .88 4.5.4.6 The Stabilization of Schwa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .90 4.5.5 Alternations Involving Schwa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .92 4.5.6 Dialects and History . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .95 4.6 Semi-vowels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .100 4.6.1 Orthographic Representations of the Semi-vowels… . . . . . . . . . . . .102 4.6.2 The Phonology of the Semi-vowels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .103 4.7 Further Effects of the Phonological Phrase . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .106 4.8 Concluding Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .107 5. Consonants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119 5.0 The Consonant System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119 5.1 Geminate Consonants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .130 5.2 Nasal Consonants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .132 5.2.1 The /Õ/ – /nj/ Interchange . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .132 5.2.2 The Importation of /0 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .134 5.2.3 Nasal Assimilation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .135 5.3 Voicing Assimilation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .136 5.4 Aspirate-h . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .140 5.4.1 Other Types of ‘Aspiration’ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .146 5.4.2 Historical Comments Regarding < h > . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .147 5.5 Final Consonants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .148 5.5.1 Stable Final Consonants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .148 5.5.2 Latent Final Consonants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .152 5.6 Linking Phenomena: Enchaînement and Liaison . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .160 5.7 Liaison . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .160 6. Prosody . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .177 6.0 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .177 6.1 Stress and Rhythm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .177 6.1.1 Phrasal Stress . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .178 6.1.2 Emphatic Stress . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .181 6.2 Intonation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .182 6.3 Colloquial Constructions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .187

vii

7. Around the Phonological Periphery: Playing with Language . . . . .191 7.0 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .191 7.1 Abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .191 7.2 Acronyms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .195 7.3 Reduplication . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .199 7.4 Word Games: Verlan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .200 Appendix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .207 References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .213 Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .227

viii

ix

Standard French Vowels and Semi-vowels front

back

spread round

round

semi-vowels

L

Ä

w

high

K

[

W

higher-mid

G

1

lower-mid

'



Q

‹ n C

low

nasal ' 

#

n #

Standard French Consonants labial

apical palatal velar uvular

obstruents stops voiceless

p

t

k

voiced

b

d

g

voiceless

f

s

5

voiced

v

z


* m., f., sg., pl. ind. subj.

Standard French Canadian French French of the Midi (the southern part of France) Old French Classical Latin any segment any consonant any vowel any nasal vowel any glide (semi-vowel) a liquid (/l/ or /¯/) any nasal consonant schwa; a neutral, lax, unstressed vowel subject to deletion placed before a vowel to indicate that it is stressed the null symbol; no sound is pronounced a syllable syllable boundary morpheme boundary word boundary phonological phrase boundary word-initial position word-final position in an open syllable in a closed syllable at the beginning of a phonological phrase at the end of a phonological phrase obligatory liaison optional liaison prohibited liaison encloses optional material encloses specifically orthographic representations derives from (historically) becomes (historically) indicates an incorrect or impossible form masculine, feminine, singular, plural indicative, subjunctive

Note on translations: Most of the French examples cited have been translated into one of their English equivalents, except in certain cases where the meaning is transparent (e.g., incorrect ‘incorrect’) or where the meaning is irrelevant because the discussion bears on exclusively phonological issues.

xi

Preface The material that follows reflects my efforts over the past several years to understand the fascinating complexities and the theoretical implications of the sound patterns of French, and to communicate them to my classes in a comprehensive and comprehensible fashion. As a consequence, I owe significant debts of gratitude to the many students who, through their questions and comments, have prodded me to clarify both my thinking and my presentation. I hope the result is a detailed, well-illustrated, and useful description of the pronunciation of Modern Standard French, incorporating occasional comments on regional and social variation, on abbreviatory processes and word play, on certain historical phonological changes that continue to be reflected in the contemporary language, and on the interdependence of phonology and morphology in an appropriate manner. This work is intended primarily for university students studying French, not as a practical guide to pronunciation improvement but as a discussion of the sound system of the language. It is written in a way that presupposes little or no formal training in linguistics proper (other than some familiarity with basic terminology and with phonetic notation, to which students are normally exposed independently). The work should also provide data of interest to students of linguistics, where discussions of French phonology (schwa, liaison, final consonants, and aspirate-h, in particular) have played a major role in attempts to resolve certain theoretical matters. Finally, there should be some material of relevance to those members of the general public with an interest in the nature of the French language, since pronunciation is rarely considered in any detailed way in the general introductory handbooks of French. Now that the text is complete, I must also acknowledge the stimulation provided by the community of scholars working on French phonology, a domain that provides seemingly endless fodder for the theoretical cannons of the day, and that, in a more neutral and (at least potentially) less contentious manner, fascinates and challenges those seeking to understand it in all its heterogeneity. I trust this work, complemented by a relatively detailed list of references, furnishes an appropriate way to begin to confront the challenges involved. Among French phonologists, two names require special acknowledgement: Jurgen Klausenburger and Yves-Charles Morin. Their well-informed and insightful studies of a vast range of French phonological issues provide models that none can ignore and that all would do well to emulate. More importantly in this context, however, they were kind enough to provide detailed and constructive criticism of virtually every element of this presentation, and it is immensely improved as a result. À ces deux collègues, un grand merci. Preparation of this book has benefited from the advice of a group of students who suffered through its earlier versions and who have given me insightful feedback. Thanks are due to Shauna Haas, Sarah Johnson and Meghan McIntyre, and also to Anne Marie Hallworth-Duez, laboratory instructor extraordinaire, who subjected previous versions of this manuscript to a meticulous reading. The six speakers, Georges Blary, Jean-Bernard Gauthier, Etienne

xii

Preface

Grangé, Séverine Lamontre, Fleur Larocque, and Eileen Lohka, who lent their voices to the CD ROM, deserve special acknowledgment for adding a bit of reality to alleviate the potentially abstract and arid theoretical discussions in the text. Both directly and indirectly, this work has been supported in a variety of ways: by grants from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada that have allowed me, over the years, to pursue the study of French linguistics; by a fellowship from the Camargo Foundation in Cassis, France, during which the work was brought into focus; and by a sabbatical leave from the University of Calgary. More immediately, I must acknowledge the generous financial support received from Alberta Learning and Canadian Heritage, through the Canada-Alberta Agreement on the Official Languages in Education 1999-2000, and a Fellowship from the University of Calgary Learning Commons that provided for technical support in the preparation of the CD-ROM. The Learning Commons team, led ably by Kathy Schwarz, Instructional Designer, included Greg Phillips, Sound Engineer, Lane Turner, Audio Technician, Michelle McGrath, Graphic Artist, and Programmers Julian Wood, Robert Purdy, Ashley Rollke, and Rob Loh, Testers Mike Walker and Eric Rogers, and Production Assistant Gord Southam. At the University of Calgary Press, Joyce Hildebrand edited the text with great acumen; Kristina Schuring spent many hours on the details of design; and Walter Hildebrandt, John King and Tim Au Young provided very helpful general support from the outset of the project. My sincere thanks to each of these organizations and to all of the individuals involved. And finally, with much gratitude to Tracy, Cris, and Dave, sine quibus non.

1

Chapter 1 The Object of Description

1.0

1.0 Preliminaries

While the title of this book, French Sound Structure, appears relatively straightforward, it also provides a starting point for general discussion of a number of concepts that will allow us to place the details to follow in a larger context. It will be useful, for example, to understand in some detail what the term ‘French’ refers to. ‘Sound,’ moreover, is at once too general and too specific. It is not just any sounds that are of interest, but that subset of possible human sounds that play a variety of roles in the linguistic system we call the French language. Nor is it just French sounds in isolation that we need to examine, but sounds as constitutive of words, as conveyors of different types of meaning, as participants in different phonological and grammatical processes. Sound systems are, in other words, highly structured: classes of sounds, general phonological processes, grammatical consequences are all notions that will be important in the descriptions to follow.

1.1

1.1 The French Language

Originating in the Latin spoken in Northern Gaul and establishing itself as a recognizably independent language in the early Middle Ages,1 the French language is now spoken worldwide. It enjoys official status in several dozen countries (including France, Belgium, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Canada, Cameroon, Ivory Coast, French Guiana, Madagascar, and French Polynesia) and is a widely used medium of communication or education in many others (such as Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, much of sub-Saharan Africa, and Vietnam). It is one of the official languages of the United Nations and of numerous other international organizations. Internationally, French numbers approximately 75 million speakers who count it as their native language and upwards of an additional 150 million who use it readily for communicative purposes. The French language has long been associated with the prestige attached to French scientific, literary, and cultural contributions and continues, despite increasing pressure from English, to play a major role on the world stage.

2

Chapter 1

The wide geographic distribution of the French language is understandably correlated with linguistic differences. The French of Liège is not that of Marseilles, Geneva, Montréal, Port-au-Prince, Algiers, Dakar, or La Réunion. In fact, even within the borders of France itself,2 Alsace, Picardie, Normandie, Touraine, Bourgogne, Auvergne, Provence, and other regions offer recognizable local varieties. The French language, then, is geographically diversified, perhaps even to the extent that widely separated versions pose difficulties of mutual comprehension. To this geographic diversity may be added social diversity. The speech of la haute bourgeoisie or even a residual aristocratie will differ from that of the middle class, recent immigrants, technocrats, labourers, or the SDF (sans domicile fixe, ‘the homeless’). The speech of the young differs from that of older generations. (Reflection on the use of slang, nicknames, tutoiement, or profanity, for example, provides immediate confirmation of generational differences.) The speech of men differs from that of women. Each profession enjoys its own jargon. Finally, we must recognize differences correlated with various speech situations, where the nature of the context requires (or favours) different degrees of formality, different styles or registers. Usage differs in courtrooms, classrooms, family rooms, and locker rooms, and expressions appropriate in one context may bring censure or derision in another. Against this background of dramatic regional, social, and stylistic variation, what is the analyst (or the student) to do? Fortunately, there exists a widely accepted response to this challenge, adopted by linguists and speech communities alike. The solution involves identifying a geographically, socially, and stylistically circumscribed variety and using it as a reference point. This reference point, usually called a standard language or, in the case of French, ‘le bon usage,’ is considered by its speakers to be the most appropriate variety for use in formal and educational contexts. It is traditionally employed in the media and codified in grammars.3 Often, it is the object of attention of a national ‘linguistic legislature’ such as the Académie française. Thus, the object of discussion here will be Standard French (abbreviated SF), that variety of the language identified most often with the speech of the Parisian middle class (‘la bonne bourgeoisie parisienne; le Parisien cultivé’) when its members are engaged in polite conversation. Warnant (1987), in a discussion of the reasons underlying his choice of recommended pronunciations, puts it as follows: 4 Géographiquement, nous avons choisi de consigner la prononciation d’un des français de Paris et, dans un sens large, de la région parisienne. Paris est sans conteste le centre de la très grande majorité des activités intellectuelles et culturelles de la France. Nous pensons plus particulièrement à celles qui se manifestent par et dans la parole. Socialement, nous avons choisi de recueillir la prononciation des intellectuels et des gens cultivés, qui, dans des domaines extrêmement divers, s’expriment d’ordinaire non seulement avec clarté, mais encore avec élégance.

The Object of Description

Nous avons aussi choisi de ne décrire que le parler d’une génération, celle qui compte actuellement entre 20 et 45 ou 50 ans. Nous ne risquons pas ainsi, d’une part, de proposer pour demain l’usage d’une prononciation déjà vieille dans l’un ou l’autre de ses traits. Nous évitons, d’autre part, de donner en exemple une prononciation non encore définitivement installée. Despite Warnant’s efforts to circumscribe the object of his description, his comments still do not rule out alternative pronunciations for one and the same form (and, in fact, he often lists alternates particularly where schwa is involved). Martinet and Walter, much more sensitive to the great heterogeneity of current SF pronunciation, approach the matter pragmatically rather than normatively in this way (1973: 16–17): Est-ce à dire que toutes les prononciations qu’on peut entendre soient également recommandables? Et d’abord qu’est-ce qu’une prononciation recommandable?… Il semble qu’en cette matière l’idéal soit de ne rien faire qui attire l’attention et la détourne ainsi de la compréhension de ce qui est dit. Les bonnes prononciations sont celles qui passent inaperçues, les mauvaises celles qui soudain vous rappellent, ne serait-ce qu’à un niveau très inférieur de la conscience, que votre interlocuteur est de telle origine, nationale, géographique ou sociale. Ce que recherche l’étranger qui apprend une autre langue, c’est précisément d’éviter que les formes qu’il emploie révèlent sa nonappartenance à la société dont il cherche à utiliser l’idiome. While these quotations give us a very good general idea of our descriptive target, they still leave room for a certain flexibility. First, even within an unmarked, standard pronunciation, there will exist variants, often related to age differences, between innovative and conservative realizations. These distinctions have certain descriptive consequences, some of which we will address below. Secondly, despite our concentration on Standard French, we may occasionally wish to venture into an exploration of nonstandard territory, particularly the domain of popular or colloquial speech. It would be appropriate, then, to review briefly the nature of other registers. It is important to recognize, however, that stylistic (and social) variation forms a continuum and that levels of usage (and the distinctions made by analysts) may grade subtly from one into another. That being said, we may think of at least the following general distinctions: (1) Levels of usage (registers) 5 (a) formal (niveau cultivé, soigné, soutenu): implies a formal or perhaps official speech situation in which careful attention is paid to the organization and delivery of the message; may include archaisms of various types; normally conservative rather than

3

4

Chapter 1

innovative (although highly formal speech can also be innovative under certain circumstances, as in the phenomenon of ‘liaison sans enchaînement’ [Encrevé 1988], which characterizes in particular the public pronouncements of certain politicians). (b) standard (français courant, usuel, commun, ordinaire): the unmarked register recognized as the norme by native speakers; the usage described by Martinet and Walter above. (c) familiar: used in less formal situations, primarily in oral communication between family members, friends, or those of similar status. (d) popular (très familier, vulgaire): spontaneous, unmonitored speech replete with phonetic reductions, ‘errors’ (e.g., avoir for être as auxiliary, lack of agreement, absence of subjunctive), slang, and often profanity. The following graded examples, moving from formal to familiar or popular, may give an indication of the passage from one level to another:6 (2) (a) Où demeurez-vous?

‘Where do you reside?’

Où est-ce que vous habitez?

‘Where do you live?’

Vous habitez où?

‘You live where?’

(b) Voilà une voiture qui fait sensation.

‘This car is creating a sensation.’

Elle est sensationnelle cette voiture.

‘This is a sensational car.’

Elle est sensas cette bagnole.

‘What a terrific car!’

(c) Que dites-vous?

‘May I ask what you’re saying?’

Qu’est-ce que vous dites?

‘What are you saying?’

Vous dites quoi?

‘You’re saying what?’

Quoi?

‘What?’

Hein?

‘Huh?’

(d) Elle s’est éprise de lui au premier regard. ‘She became enamoured of him at first sight.’ Elle est tombée amoureuse de lui dès leur première rencontre. ‘She fell in love with him on the first date.’ Elle est allée s’amouracher de ce petit voyou. ‘She’s head over heels in love with the guy.’

The Object of Description

(e) importuner

‘to importune’

ennuyer

‘to bother’

enquiquiner, emmerder

‘to bug’

(f) Je vous prie de ne pas fermer la porte. ‘May I ask you not to close the door?’ Ne fermez pas la porte, s’il vous plaît. ‘Please don’t close the door.’ Fermez pas la porte. ‘Don’t close the door.’ (g) Qui fut le premier ministre? Qui était le premier ministre? C’était qui le premier ministre? (h) Je n’ai pas vu ce film. Moi, ce film, je l’ai pas vu. (i) Pourquoi dites-vous cela? Pourquoi que vous dites ça?

‘Who was the first prime minister?’ ‘Who was the first prime minister?’ ‘Who was he, the first prime minister?’ ‘I haven’t seen this film.’ ‘This film, I haven’t seen it.’ ‘Why do you say that?’ ‘How come you say that?’

(j) l’homme avec qui ils sont venus ‘the man with whom they came’ l’homme qu’ils sont venu avec

‘the man they came with’

While our concern in this work will be primarily with the phonology of the standard register, it is important to realize that the concept ‘French’ encompasses both extensive phonological variation and the use of other mechanisms (e.g., vocabulary choice, extensive syntactic modifications) to permit subtle adjustment of usage to fit a rich diversity of speech situations. Although in what follows we will concentrate on the Standard French of Paris or the Île-de-France, it is also evident, given the great geographic diversity in French, that one can recognize regional standard languages (and even include Paris as one among many regions). That is to say, the notion of ‘standard,’ in terms of an unmarked register recognized as the norme by native speakers, is not limited to any specific region. In social or stylistic terms, ‘standard’ can be applied to a variety recognized as prestigious within any community. One often sees reference, for example, to Standard Canadian French, just as the standard in English-speaking Canada is defined with respect to a style significantly different from ‘the Queen’s’ or ‘BBC English’ in Great Britain.

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Chapter 1

Minor lexical or phonetic differences aside, in fact, Standard Canadian French and Standard Parisian French are highly similar – the differences only become dramatically significant in the popular registers, and even here we would still have no difficulty in recognizing both vernaculars as inherently French, rather than as separate languages. Finally, although we have spoken of ‘standard’ and norme, the speech we refer to by these terms is in a direct way a historical accident. The prestige attached to the standard associated with Parisian French reflects the political and economic importance of Paris, mirroring its role as capital of France, focus of intellectual activity, seat of the government, industrial centre, and so on. Had French history been different, the dialect of Dijon, Poitiers, or Toulouse might just as easily have become the standard. Thus, in strictly linguistic terms (in tems of the linguistic structures involved), the forms of one dialect are no more worthy or unworthy than those of another. This is not to say that one cannot make value judgements about certain forms or styles, nor that these judgements are unimportant or without consequence. Opinions about speech forms, or particularly about their appropriateness to the context in which they are used, are crucial in all societies. But they reflect the social values attached, at a limited set of times and places, to language and its use, and constitute judgements about the users, rather than an evaluation of the inherent merit of one pronunciation or one structure over another.

1.2

1.2 A Brief Historical Review

As the foregoing remarks have indicated, SF is a product of a combination of historical circumstances. The French of Paris in the Middle Ages is markedly different from (and perhaps incomprehensible to) that of a speaker in the court of Louis XIV or a Parisian lycéen of our days. Here we will review, very briefly, some of the key events and stages leading to the current situation. Restricting our discussion to historical times (roughly from the eighth century B.C. onwards), the territory we now call Gaul was at that period inhabited by a variety of Celtic tribes who occupied lands previously settled by Ligurians, Iberians, and Aquitanians, among others. Eventually, the Celts took (or were given) the name of Gaulois, lending as well their name to the land they occupied: La Gaule.7 From about 125 B.C., Roman presence in southern Gaul (la Gaule transalpine) increased, and subsequently Caesar led a conquest of the remaining Gallic territory (58–50 B.C.). Little by little, aided by the importance of the Roman administrative and educational structures, the Latin language replaced the earlier Celtic dialects, at least in the urban centres. Latin became the language of Gaul, but Latin itself, through the centuries, evolved into distinct spoken and written versions that increasingly diverged from each other. Following the fall of the Roman Empire in A.D. 476, local varieties multiplied and a linguistic frontier solidified between the more heavily Romanized south and the northern regions, now occupied and governed by the Francs, a

The Object of Description

Germanic tribe from the region of the Rhine. The langue d’oc or occitan in the south and the langue d’oïl in the north became increasingly distinct. In the north, the Francs assimilated linguistically to the local Latin-speaking population, but not without a certain amount of influence on the lexicon8 and on pronunciation, the latter usually attributed to the heavy stress accent of their Germanic speech. Gaul remained, in other words, a Romance-speaking territory, even following the Viking invasions of the early eighth century. These normands (hommes du nord) adopted in turn the Romance vernacular, eventually exporting it to England following the Norman Conquest of 1066. In England, Anglo-Norman literature flourished, and French played a dominant role in British administrative and cultural life for several centuries. By the mid-ninth century (Serments de Strasbourg) and certainly by the beginning of the tenth (Cantilène de sainte Eulalie) the indigenous Romance language of the north of France had diverged sufficiently from the earlier spoken Latin that one can speak of the birth of the French language (français, language of the Francs). At this time, however, social and political conditions were influenced not so much by a unique ‘national’ capital but by strong regional centres, so one must inevitably speak of regional dialects including, among others, picard, champenois, anglo-normand, bourguignon, l’ouest and, needless to say, the francien of the Île-de-France. At the Old French stage,9 many of the regional courts rivalled that of Paris, and literature in these dialects was easily the match of that written in francien. With time, however, French kings extended their military and political domain much further throughout the territory, and the language of the Ile-deFrance benefited from increased prestige: francien was on its way to becoming the national standard. In 1539, under François Ier, the Ordonnance de Villers-Cotterêts made French (i.e., francien) the official language (replacing Latin) for all court orders and judgements. In 1549, Du Bellay, on behalf of La Pléiade, published the manifesto Défense et illustration de la langue française, a work, along with those of Rabelais, leading to much linguistic innovation, innovation aided by the explosion of literary works following the invention of printing. The increasing importance of Paris had further linguistic consequences. As Bonnemason (1993: 28) puts it, “l’Etat monarchique fait de la langue française son affaire. Le pouvoir politique est à Paris, la langue est celle de Paris et elle sera codifiée et régentée.” The Académie française, created in 1635 by Richelieu, codified the orthography and published its first dictionary in 1694. The Grammaire de Port-Royal of 1660 established a general standard to be met by even the greatest writers. Linguistic prescriptivism took firm root. Despite the influence and prestige of Paris, however, regional dialects (patois) and regional languages persisted. Still, the industrial revolution, the development of science and technology, the importance of the writings of the philosophes, extensive exploration, and colonization all contributed to the expansion of French and to the suggestion of le français comme langue universelle. Regional languages and the patois suffered under the uniformizing pressures of the Revolution and the imposition of French as the general

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Chapter 1

language of schooling, pressures that exist to this day. Nor is the role of the mass media negligible as a standardizing force. Nonetheless, alongside the national standard, linguistic variation in the form of both dialects and distinct regional languages remains characteristic of contemporary France, a variation that is sometimes discouraged officially and sometimes (as in some recent legislation inspired by the European Union) officially supported. And the standard language itself is a mixture containing a foundation of words from the original Latin source, supplemented by early Celtic and Frankish contacts (among others), a technical and learned vocabulary necessitated by corresponding intellectual or industrial developments, and loans from the many languages with which its long history has brought it into contact. Against this complex background, it is consequently not difficult to grasp why the notion of Standard French is at the same time both an arbitrary and ever-changing construct and a useful reference point. In any event, SF, as described above in all its complexity, is the object of this work. Before we undertake a study of the specific sound structures of SF, however, it is necessary to provide some further, theoretically oriented detail concerning the concepts to be used in a description of this material. This brief orientation is the task of the next chapter.

Notes 1.

The Serments de Strasbourg from 842, a document confirming a political alliance between two of Charlemagne’s grandsons concerning the partition of his empire, is often given as indicating the birthdate of French since it contains the earliest surviving text in the vernacular of Gaul.

2.

Despite what may be thought, France itself is not linguistically homogeneous: other languages spoken to a greater or lesser degree within continental French territory include Catalan, Occitan or Provençal, Italian, Basque, Breton, Flemish, and the Germanic dialects alsacien and lorrain. Recent immigration has also significantly increased the number of speakers of Arabic.

3.

See Morin (1999) for a detailed and up-to-date survey of this question, incorporating the significant term ‘le français de référence,’ a designation perhaps preferable to ‘Standard French’ or ‘le français standard’. We retain the latter on the basis of its wide familiarity. Morin also provides much detail concerning pronunciation variation within various normes, as well as the difficulties inherent in the notion of norme itself. Martinet (1990) addresses some of the same issues. In this context, spoken media have become more tolerant of a range of regional accents, provided that they are not too marked, as witnessed, for example, by the popularity on national television of the literary critic Bernard Pivot with his Burgundian accent (in Apostrophes and Bouillon de culture). In a parallel fashion, national television in Great Britain is also more accepting of regional pronunciations, as indicated by the presence of Welsh, Scottish, or Yorkshire

The Object of Description

readers of the national news. In North America, the situation on national television news does not yet appear to be as diverse. 4.

Warnant, interestingly enough in this context, is Belgian. The quotation is taken from the cover of his pronouncing dictionary but is compiled from material on pp. xx–xxi.

5.

Muller (1985: 225–262) provides an excellent survey of these issues, with copious examples. Guiraud (1969: 24) contrasts the two ‘poles’ of usage in the following indicative terms: “Bref, il est légitime de distinguer deux formes limites de la langue conditionnées par un ensemble de variables complexes dont les unes tiennent à l’histoire, à la culture, à la société, les autres aux conditions de la communication ou à la nature du message. Ainsi s’opposent ‘populaire’/’bourgeois,’ relâché/soutenu, libre/préscriptif, spontané/stylisé, oral/écrit, héréditaire/savant, dialectal/national, expressif/cognitif, locutif/prédicatif, naturel/cultivé.”

6.

Examples are drawn from Batchelor and Offord (1993a, 1993b) and Muller (1985).

7.

Celtic traces in French are few, but include some sixty surviving words: sapin ‘fir,’ chêne ‘oak,’ lotte ‘monkfish,’ bouc ‘goat,’ mouton ‘sheep,’ chemin ‘road,’ dune ‘dune,’ druide ‘Druid,’ etc., as well as several place names, perhaps most notably Paris, from the Celtic tribe Parisii.

8.

Frankish lexical remnants are much more numerous than Celtic, including France itself, le pays des Francs. Additional Frankish words include banc ‘seat,’ blé ‘wheat,’ bois ‘wood,’ choisir ‘to choose,’ cruche ‘pitcher,’ danser ‘to dance,’ framboise ‘raspberry,’ garder ‘to keep,’ guérir ‘to cure,’ guetter ‘to watch,’ hache ‘axe,’ haîr ‘to hate,’ honte ‘shame’ (and numerous other aspirate-h words), jardin ‘garden,’ lécher ‘to lick,’ maréchal ‘marshall,’ orgueil ‘pride,’ regarder ‘to look at,’ soupe ‘soup’.

9.

Old French is commonly divided into two periods, Early Old French, from the middle of the ninth to the end of the eleventh century, and Later Old French, from the beginning of the twelfth to the middle of the fourteenth (Pope 1934: 9). Middle French comprises the fourteenth, fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Later Old French constitutes a period of spectacular literary and cultural development.

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Chapter 2

Key Descriptive and Theoretical Concepts

2.0

2.0 Introduction

The preceding chapter discussed the general notion ‘French,’ noting the ambiguities and complexities inherent in treating a domain with the long history, extensive geographic range, and sociolinguistic complexity that characterize la francophonie. Here, we will focus on the remaining words in the title of this book, ‘sound’ and ‘structure,’ reviewing briefly a number of concepts or distinctions that will prove useful in the description to follow.1 First among these is the need to explore the difficulties arising from the nature of French orthography.

2.1

2.1 Orthography and Pronunciation

Clearly, there exists some type of systematic relationship between French orthography and the corresponding ways of pronouncing French words. It is not the existence, but rather the nature of this relationship that is of concern: how regular is it? what types of exceptions are found? where does it fail to inform us of the appropriate pronunciation? Unlike languages such as Spanish, where the link between writing and speaking is close and direct, French presents a number of difficulties in interpreting phonologically the orthographic representations of words. Consider the examples in (1). (1) Orthographic puzzles (a) one sound – many spellings /k/: coup, occuper, kilo, qui, cinq, grecque, acquérir, echo, ecchymose, khalife /s/: si, cible, soixante, assez, ça, science, balbutie /a/: art, là, grâce, drap,2 femme, paonne, habituer, Jeanne /o/: vélo, aube, eau, eaux, côte, hôte, hauteur, heaume, faux

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Chapter 2

(b) one spelling – several sounds < e >: rue Ø, breton /‹/, serpent /'/, effacer /e/, femme /a/, en /#/ (This problem can extend to sequences of letters: < ent > [couvent as /kuv/ or /kuv#/], < ai > [faisan /f‹z#/; faisceau /f'so/; faillir /faji¯/], for example.) (c) silent final consonants plomb, caoutchouc, noeud, clef, poing, fusil, drap, donner, gros, salut, six, nez, il est, exact, gars, corps (d) etymological spellings doigt /dwa/ < CL digitus, sept /s't/ < CL septem, vingt /v'/ < CL viginti, compter /knte/ < CL computare, baptème /bat'm/ < Greek baptisma, corps /kn¯/ < CL corpus, sculpter /skylte/ < CL sculpere, sculptus (e) contextually determined variation deux petits chiens

/døpti5j'/

cinq petits chiens

/s'kp‹ti5j'/

dix postes

/dipnst/

dix emplois

/diz#plwa/

plomb – plombier

/pln/ – /plnbje/

fusil – fusiller

/fyzi/ – /fuzije/

exact – exactitude

/'gza/ – /'gzaktityd/

(f) stylistic variation je ne sais pas / such as saut-de-lit ‘negligee’ and sauvegarde ‘safeguard,’ all with /o/ in closed syllables since /.dl/ and /.vg/ are impossible syllable onsets. More importantly, since /n/ is also possible in open syllables, nothing prohibits the syllabification /bn.sk'/, and so on. However, what remains to be explained in this latter case is the impossibility of /o/ in many words like postal, since /o/ is normally permitted in such structures. Nor do the related mid vowels /e – '/ help here, despite the frequent claim that /e/ is excluded from closed syllables in French. 4 If such an exclusion were valid, we would not expect to find /e/ in words such as festin if these words were syllabified /…es.CV…/ since they would violate the exclusion of /e/ from closed syllables. Hence, the argument goes, the proper syllabification is /…V.sCV…/. Unfortunately for this proposal, SF does contain many words of the form /esCV/ rather than /'sCV/, whether syllabified /e.sCV/ or /es.CV/, and the behaviour of the mid vowels is consequently irrelevant in discussions of the syllabification of /sC/ clusters. 5 It is perhaps reassuring to know that cross-linguistically /s/ (and on occasion other fricatives) raise similar problems with respect to the structure of consonantal clusters, phonotactic restrictions, and the apparent violation of expected patterns. The preceding discussion has dealt with VCCV syllabification and illustrated the role of principles (8a-b). It is when we turn to VCCCV sequences that the role of (8c) is most evident. Consider the words in (10). (10) Word-internal triconsonantal clusters 6 portrait

‘portrait’

filtrer

‘to filter’

surplus

‘surplus’

surplis

‘surplice’

spectral

‘spectral’

perdrix

‘partridge’

cercler

‘to ring’

directrice

‘director (f).’

meurtrier

‘deadly’

arbrisseau

‘shrub’

marbrer

‘to marble, mottle’

administrer

‘to administer’

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Chapter 3

orchestral

‘orchestral’

escrime

‘fencing’

esclave

‘slave’

esprit

‘mind’

musclé

‘muscular’

embarquement

‘boarding’

forcené

‘deranged’

harcelé

‘harassed’

Here we are confronted with two possibilities: VC.CCV or VCC.CV. Often, the CC. will form a perfectly acceptable final cluster and .CC an acceptable initial cluster. In orchestral, for example, final /…Vst./ occurs in ouest, test, veste, etc., while initial /.t¯V…/ is widespread (très, trois, trop, and so on). Principle (8c) dictates the syllabification /n¯.k's.tral/, however, since this results in a minimal coda at the expense of a more complex onset. The other forms behave in an analogous fashion: if both a complex coda and a complex onset are possible, 7 minimize the coda and choose the complex onset. We see, then, how templates and syllabification principles interact to define both possible syllables in French and the proper division of longer sequences into appropriate syllabic units. Before moving to the next section, we should consider briefly one further potential unit in the phonological hierarchy, a combination of syllables into a unit known as the foot. Feet are well known in poetry, where they are used to represent relationships between strong and weak (accented and unaccented) units in accounting for the rhythmic patterns of sequences: iambic feet start with weak syllables; trochaic feet with strong, for example. The foot has been extended into phonological analyses to indicate not just strong and weak rhythmic patterns but more general relationships between strong and weak units – so-called full vowels versus schwa in French, to name one obvious possibility. However, because SF is usually seen as a language where syllables are isochronous and of equal strength (except for the last syllable in a phonological phrase), the foot is of less relevance to our current discussion, and we will not use it further here. 8 This allows us to pass to a consideration of the word in French.

3.2

3.2 The SF Phonological Word

In his classic article “Le mot est-il une entité phonétique en français,” Pierre Delattre questions the necessity of the word as a phonological unit in French. The question arises because two of the fundamental phonological attributes of SF, stress placement and the operation of liaison and enchaînement (the linking of a word-final consonant with the initial vowel of a following word), are

Basic Descriptive Units and Domains

apparently defined in terms not of words but of phonological phrases. Stress in French, for example, normally falls on the last syllable of the phonological phrase, and words in nonfinal position have no word stress independently of that affecting the last syllable of the phrase. When liaison and enchaînement are considered, we also see that the word loses its independence, in that wordfinal consonants are resyllabified to the beginning of the following unit. This, too, is seen as demonstrating lack of independence for the word in French and minimizing its importance in the description of SF. Recent work, however, some of which we will discuss in following chapters, indicates that in spite of Delattre’s concerns, the word must be retained as a unit in the description of French phonology.9 Many phonotactic constraints, for example, make reference to the word, such constraints being violated within larger units. Thus, if we consider words in isolation, nasal vowels do not normally precede nasal consonants in French (an isolated word such as /mnn/ is ill-formed),10 but /mnn/ occurs both in liaison (mon ami ‘my friend’ /mnnami/) and in phrases (mon nez ‘my nose’ /mnne/ (compare Monet /mnne/)). Various phonological processes – glide formation and the behaviour of nasal vowels in particular – also refer to the notion of phonological word, as Hannahs (1995b) has demonstrated.11 Thus, high vowels may become glides when followed by another vowel within words (il joue ‘he’s playing’ /il