-----Original Message-----
From: Constructed Languages List [mailto:CONLANG@LISTSERV.BROWN.EDU] On
Behalf Of Christophe Grandsire
Sent: vendredi 24 mai 2002 09:24
To: CONLANG@LISTSERV.BROWN.EDU
Subject: Re: Optimum number of symbols
En réponse à Raymond Brown <ray.brown@...>:
>> Well, I assure you my daughter-in-law, whose 100% French through &
>> through,
>> takes a _very different_ view of her native orthography. She still
>> maintains that English is simpler.
>>
>I had that opinion until two years ago. Since then, I really took a
strong >look
>at the French orthography and discovered how regular and phonetic it
really >is.
>The only reason why people can have this opinion is that when we're
taught
>spelling the emphasis is strongly put on the irregularities, which
makes it
>look like French is nothing but a bunch of irregularities. Your
daughter->in-law
>is simply the victim of this, just like I was until two years ago or
so.
I believe French orthography to be not so phonetical, as a non-standard
French speaker. In my idiolect, "paume" and "pomme" are both pronounced
[pOm@] 'apple', I don't know about the final opposition /e/ vs /E/
("chanté" vs "chantais"). More generally, I don't do oppositions such
as mid-tense vs mid-lax. Distribution is :
Lax allophones are only and always found in closed syllables.
Tense allophones are only and always found in opened syllables.
I don't know if you have these oppositions (but I think so, fix me ;))
but I believe writing French is much harder when you have not,
especially when you're not interested in etymology, that is to say in
most of cases.
Julien.