Re: How to Make Chicken Cacciatore (was: phonetics by guesswork)

--- Christian Thalmann <cinga@...> wrote:
>
> Hmmm...  in my personal French, the open /O/ and
> close
> /o/ are separate phonemes.  For example, the name
> "Maude" /mod/ is distinct from "mode" /mOd/.
>
I personnally make no distinction at all, but the fact
is that I very seldom have to say "Maude"... But I
very well remember that when I was at school, in
Alsace, and we learned to sing the "Chant du Départ":

"Et du Nord au Midi, la trompette guerrière..." (great
words, BTW)

we nearly all heartily sang "Et du Nôôrd", which made
our teacher crazy (he was from "Inner France", as we
said - un Français "de l'intérieur" - and he used to
yell : "du Nard ! pas du Nôôrd ! you damned Alsacians
!", which was very disobliging, especially for me who
am only 50% Alsacian. But the fact is that when I
moved to Paris, I stopped saying "Nôrd", because
people were making fun of me.
>
> By the way, we had heated discussion about French
> /E/
> vs. /e/ on this list a while ago.  Christophe
> Grandsire
> claimed that "ai" was always pronounced [E] in
> French,
> while I clearly use [e] in words like "baigner,
> saisir,
> j'ai" etc.  On the other hand, he pronounces the
> ending
> -et as [e] while I have [E].  In fact, my
> pronunciation
> of "jet" and "j'ai" ([ZE] vs [Ze]) is exactly
> opposite
> to his ([Ze] vs [ZE]).  I wonder what your take on
> this
> matter is.
>
It is completely contingent. In the South of France,
the difference between [e] and [E], if that's the way
it should be written, is so to say inexistant. I
noticed that in Montpellier, for ex. They can make
"j'ai", or "jais", or "jet", rhyme with "horloger" or
"danger" without the slightest hesitation.
>
>
> Yes, but in Conlanging, we usually want to explain
> to
> each other how the language is *meant* to sound, not
> how a Frenchman or Anglophone would horribly mangle
> it.
> =P  The best option, of course, is to record a few
> MP3
> samples and put them online together with the
> grammar.
Certainly. But French (or any other language) is
mangled not only by foreigners, but also by natives:
think of the Alsacians, the South-Westerns, the
Corsicans, the Northeners, the Burgunders, the people
from Paris suburbs, not to speak about the Wallons,
the French Swiss, and the Quebecois :-) And the
French-speaking Africans, of course. So, all in all,
who does speak real good French ? Jacques Chirac and
I. (And the former king of Morocco, I've been told).
>
> Anyway, since /D/, /z/ and /d/ are separate phonemes
> in
> English (/D/ is what you call a "mild th", a voiced
> dental fricative), that can lead to
> misunderstandings.
> For example, "breathe", "breeze" and "breed" mean
> three
> different things.
>
Sure. But they are many homonyms too, in French like
in English, and pronunciation won't help you to make a
distinction because they sound exactly alike. So there
will always be a part of ambiguity in it. Confusing
"th" and "z" in English just will add a small rate of
extra ambiguity, ususally annihilated by context.
Since the natives themselves pronounce their own
language a thousand different ways, why should I, a
foreigner, not do so ? It will add charm and exotism
to what I say. Think of Jane Birkin speaking French.


=====
Philippe Caquant

"High thoughts must have high language." (Aristophanes, Frogs)

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