Canadian vs. Parisian French

Jacobo   Sunday, March 20, 2005, 18:18 GMT
The differences between the European and American varities of say English, Spanish and Portuguese are well-known. Does anybody know how the Canadian and Parisian varieties of French compare? Are they mutually intelligible?
WIKIPEDIA   Sunday, March 20, 2005, 19:08 GMT
Interintelligibility of formally and informally spoken Quebec French with France French is a matter of heated debates between linguists. If a comparison can be made, the differences between both dialects are probably larger than those between American, British, and Australian English, but not as large as those between High and Swiss German. This being said, it is important for monolingual English speakers especially, to understand that in many other European languages there exist veritable dialects. Francophone Canadians abroad have to modify their accent somewhat in order to be easily understood, but very few francophone Canadians are unable to communicate readily with European Francophones. European pronunciation is not at all difficult for Canadians to understand; only slang expressions present any problems.

Television programmes and films from Quebec often must be subtitled for international audiences, which some Quebecers perceive as offensive, although they themselves sometimes can hardly understand European French pronunciation and slang. Recent increases in reciprocal exposure are slowly improving interintelligibility though, and slang expressions have even been crossing the ocean in both directions.

In general, European French speakers have no problems understanding newscasts or other moderately formal speech. However, they may have great difficulty understanding for example a sitcom dialogue. This is due more to idioms, slang, and vocabulary than to accent or pronunciation. European French users will also have difficulty with colloquial speech of Quebecers, for sitcom dialogue reflects everyday speech. However, when speaking to a European French speaker, a French speaker from Quebec is capable of shifting to a slightly more formal, "international" type of speech.

Quebec's culture has only recently been discovered in Europe, especially since the Quiet Revolution (Révolution tranquille), and the difference in dialects and culture is large enough that Quebec French speakers overwhelmingly prefer their own home-grown television dramas or sitcoms to shows from Europe. The number of such TV shows from France shown on Quebec television is about the same as the number of British TV shows on American television, outside of obscure cable channels: essentially none at all.

Quebec French was once stigmatized, among Quebecers themselves as well as among Continental French and foreigners, as a low-class dialect, sometimes due to its use of anglicisms, sometimes simply due to its differences from "standard" European French. Until 1968, it was unheard of for Quebec French vocabulary to be used in plays in the theatre for instance; in that year the huge success of Michel Tremblay's play Les Belles-Sœurs proved to be a turning point. Today, francophones in Quebec have much more freedom to choose a "register" in speaking, and TV characters speak "real" everyday language rather than "normative" French. In Europe, Quebec French is rediscovered as a charming variety of French that is sometimes difficult to understand: vous entendre parler, c'est comme une chanson (hearing you speak is like hearing a song).
greg   Sunday, March 20, 2005, 20:28 GMT
The post above is accurate.

I'm wondering if there are Canadian French variants. Sociolects notwithstanding, are there 'proto-dialects' within Québec, Ontario, the Maritimes and other Canadian provinces ?
I've watched some Canadian sitcoms : understanding is not that hard, but getting accustomed to 'la parlure' is another story.
Canadians tend to be less English-prone than their European counterparts. Sometimes the opposite is true : Canadians are surrounded by English-speaking areas.
Except words referring exclusively Canadian realities, written French is basically the same on either sides of the Atlantic.

Does anyone know if Acadian, Louisiannais and New England French share the same features as Québécois or Ontarien ?
greg   Sunday, March 20, 2005, 21:44 GMT
More about Ontarien (from Wikipédia) :

The term Franco-Ontarian in fact has two related usages, which overlap significantly but are not identical : it may refer to Francophone residents of Ontario, regardless of their place of birth, or to people of French Canadian ancestry born in Ontario, regardless of their primary language or current place of residence.

In popular usage, the first meaning predominates and the second is poorly understood. Although most Franco-Ontarians meet both definitions, there are notable exceptions. For example, although Louise Charron was the first native-born Franco-Ontarian appointed to the Supreme Court of Canada bench, she was preceded as a Francophone judge from Ontario by Louise Arbour, who was born and raised in Quebec but had her professional career as a lawyer and judge in Ontario. As a result, both women have been referred to as "the first Franco-Ontarian Supreme Court justice", although the more common practice is to credit Charron, Franco-Ontarian in both senses, with that distinction.

Conversely, two of the most famous rock musicians from Ontario, Avril Lavigne and Alanis Morissette, are Franco-Ontarian by the second definition but not by the first, since they were born to Franco-Ontarian parents but currently work and live predominantly in English.

Further, Canada's current Prime Minister, Paul Martin, is Franco-Ontarian, although many Canadians inaccurately consider him Québécois as his political career has been associated primarily with Montréal.

Both meanings are politically charged. Using the second to the exclusion of the first is potentially racist in excluding Francophones born in other countries, such as Haiti, Vietnam or Tunisia, from the Franco-Ontarian community, while using the first to the exclusion of the second obscures the very real cultural distinctions that exist between Franco-Ontarians, Québécois, Acadians, Métis and other Canadian Francophone communities, and the pressures toward assimilation into the Anglophone majority that the community faces.

As a result, the complex political and sociological context of Franco-Ontarian can only be fully understood by recognising both meanings and understanding the distinctions between the two.
Kazoo   Monday, March 21, 2005, 00:29 GMT
There is a variety of Acadian French spoken in New Brunswick called 'Chiat'. It is a completely different dialect from Quebec French, to the point that Quebecois can usually barely understand an Acadian, sometimes not at all.

To a Quebecois, hearing Acadian Chiat spoken has been compared to a modern English speaker meeting someone who speaks Shakespearean English. Chiat has been somewhat isolated for 400 years or so, and has also been heavily influenced by English and some aboriginal languages. An Acadian from Northern New Brunswick will usually have to change over to 'formal' french in order to be understood in Quebec.
Brennus   Monday, March 21, 2005, 05:52 GMT
Jacobo,

Literary Candian French seems to differ only a little from Parisian French. A few words are different just as between American and British English.

For example, Quebec uses gadue for 'slush', pavillon de ski for 'ski lodge' and lampadaires de rue for 'street lights' whereas Parisian French uses névasse, chalet and réverbères. The caribou and the wolverine (carcajou in Canadian French) are called renne (au Quebec) and gluton in France. French Canadian uses autobus scolaire for 'school bus' which is a loan translation for English but Parisian French doesn't really seem to have a word for it.

There are greater differences between Parisian French and a working class type of Canadian French called Joual derived from the word cheval, "horse". Joual has more English loan words too. Some examples of Joual are shn@:pa smart:aess "I'm not a smart-ass" and forh:f@n "Just for fun".
Paul   Monday, March 21, 2005, 07:05 GMT
There are different French Canadian dialects. I live in Ottawa, and the Francophones here have a differrent accent than the ones in New Brunswick for example. Generally, the closer the city or town is to English communities the more English slang you will hear. As mentioned, there are also plenty French terms that are used differently.

The curse words are another big difference. In Quebec, the curse words are all related to the Catholic Church. Hostie (Host), Tabernacle, Sacrement, Calice (Chalice) are all popular, and often strung together in various combinations. You'll never hear the France French ones here, with the exeption of 'merde" maybe.
greg   Monday, March 21, 2005, 11:54 GMT
Brennus,

That’s about the words you cited. I’m just talking about FFr use because I’m not too familiar with CFr.

FFr <gadoue> normally means ‘mud’ (sodden clay without snow) and can occasionally refer to ‘slush’, as you said it usually does in CFr. However, En <slush> may be rendered by FFr <neige fondue> = ‘melted snow’. I believe <névasse> is CFr rather than FFr : it may be a neologism forged to replace CFr <slotche> or CFr <sloche> (both being Anglicisms : En <slush>). I find CFr <névasse> a very apt innovation as it is rhyming with pejorative <asse>-suffixed words : Fr <mélasse> and Fr <bouillasse> (both close to En <muck>) and Fr <dégueulasse> (meaning ‘filthy’). Anyway, CFr <névasse> is likely to be soon adopted in FFr as was its illustrious Canadian precursor : <courriel> for En <e-mail>.

Stricto sensu, FFr <lampadaire> refers to the vertical prop supporting any electrical lighting device. But in actuality FFr <lampadaire> is used to for both the prop and the lighting device. You may find FFr <lampadaire de rue> (in the streets) as opposed to FFr <lampadaire d’appartement> (in your flat), but both acceptations are very rare and perhaps now restricted to literary use only. Originally FFr <réverbère> meant ‘reflecting mirror’. Now it is used to mean ‘street lights’ (necessarily the prop + the lighting device, not just each of both to the exclusion of the other). However, FFr <lampadaire> and FFr <réverbère> are often interchangeable in casual speech. But, as you said, <lampadaire de rue> is seldom – if never – heard in Parisian streets.

FFr <caribou> (of Canadian Algonquian origin) refers to North American reindeers (I’m not sure if <reindeer> is the right word in English). FFr <orignal> (deriving from a Basque (!) word meaning ‘deer’ or ‘stag’) refers to North American elks (called <mooses> in English ?). The carnivorous animal called <wolverine> in En is <glouton> in FFr (homophonous to Fr adj <glouton> meaning ‘gluttonous’ or ‘voracious’). I haven’t known the word CFr <carcajou> before you mentioned it, but actually it is a valid entry in the FFr dictionary I’m using. FFr <renne> refers to European reindeers, not to American ones (although most Franco-French might mix them up).

I confirm Fr <autobus scolaire> is not FFr. The FFr version of this CFr lexy would be <car scolaire>. And this is a source of problems since FFr <car> means En <bus> (even if FFr <car> may also mean ‘since’ or ‘because’ and if FFr <bus> also means ‘bus’…) and since CFr <char> means FFr <voiture> (I believe) , equivalent to En <car> (FFr <char> meaning ‘tank’ in English…) !

Good luck !
Ben   Monday, March 21, 2005, 22:26 GMT
As far as French in the US:

In Louisiana, the two dialects are Cajun (a twangy variation on Acadian, since that's where the Cajun's originated) and Creole (the dialect spoken by the descendents of slaves.

I'm not sure what is meant by "new England French." In the County I'm from in New England, something like 25% of the population is of Quebecois origin, but the only people who actually speak the language natively are the small percentage of recently arrived French-Canadian immigrants and a few older people.

The only place where you would here French spoken by a majority would be in a few very rural towns in Northern Maine and New Hampshire--and in that case the dialect wouldn't be any different from neighboring Quebec.
Brennus   Monday, March 21, 2005, 23:10 GMT
Greg,

Thanks for your message. No biggy; Just a few comments: 'Réverbères' obviously comes from the same source as the English verb 'to reverberate'. I find its development into the word for "street lights" in French to be interesting. I have a hunch that the Québécois French 'lampadaires de rue' is simply an older word for them. Canadian French still holds on to some 17th century words just as American English does. For example, American English still uses the 17th century 'hoodlum' (sometimes shortened to 'hood') for a young street criminal versus the British English 'teddy-boy'.

I misspelled 'gadoue' but Quebeckers use it to mean "slush" or "melting snow". I'm not sure about 'mud'. They also have the word 'sloche' from English which means "muddy snow in a town or village" but I think that the nearest equivalent in European French is just 'boue neigeuse'.

'Carcajou' is a borrowing from one of the American Indian languages, probably Cree or Montagnais. The regular French word for "wolverine",'gluton' comes from Latin gulo. Wolverines once lived all over Europe but are now found only in Finland and Scandanavia I'm told. In North America, they are rare in the U.S. due to overhunting, but more plentiful in Canada where they were not persecuted as much.

Prenne garde! / Take care!

Brennus
greg   Tuesday, March 22, 2005, 00:14 GMT
Brennus : thanx for all.

One thing. *<Prenne garde !> is a double calque from En <take care !>. Fr <prenne> is a form of Fr verb <prendre> = En <take> that is either the subjunctive present 1st & 3rd persons singular or imperative present 3rd person singular.

Subjunctive present 1st & 3rd persons singular :
<Il faut que je prenne des cours d'anglais> = <I have to take English lessons>
<À moins qu'elle prenne des cours d'anglais> = <unless she takes English lessons>.

Imperative present 3rd person :
<Qu'il prenne des cours d'anglais !> = <let him take English lessons !>.

If you want to translate En <take care !> into French, you have to notice that the English sentence is imperative present 2nd person, not 3rd person, not subjunctive. The imperative present 2nd person for En <take !> is Fr <prends !>.

So that finally the translation WOULD be Fr <prends garde !>.

Except that Fr phrasal verb <prendre garde> means En <take heed> or <beware>, which is not exactly the same meaning as En <take care> when you say good-bye to someone.

I think the closest equivalent here to En <take care !> would simply be Fr <salut !>.

Except, of course, if you fear something hazardous might strike me...
fabb   Tuesday, March 22, 2005, 22:49 GMT
the french of quebec is a variety of french, with its own characteristics, accent and expressions. But there is not such thing as a unique "european" french accent. I think that you consider the "official" french of televisions and medias to be "french french". But in fact there is a lot of varieties of french in europe, wich ones having almost as much differences between them than comparated to french canadian (there is also different varieties of canadian french)
In europe, french spoken in belgium sounds different than one of switzerland. inside france itself, there is even bigger differences, between the northern accent and the southern accent. the southern one sound very musical (similar to italian sounds), while the northern one (used in medias) sounds much more neutral and unmelodic.