My French Accent Sample

herman   Mon Mar 08, 2010 11:31 am GMT
Here is me reading a small passage in French. Any comments from native or non-native speakers are welcome. Merci Bien!

http://www.toofiles.com/en/oip/audios/mp3/herman_franchsample.html
@herman   Mon Mar 08, 2010 12:22 pm GMT
I'm a native speaker. You have a very good accent compared to what I'm used to hearing from non native speakers.

Your vowels are almost perfect all the time, so no problem there. Even your front rounded vowels and your nasal vowels are spot on, which is quite rare.

Your problem is consonants.

You don't make enough difference between voiceless and voiced consonants. When you said "Les bistrots à Paris", I heard "Les bistrots à Baris".
When you said "quatre-vingt-dix" I heard "quatre-vingt-dizz"

I think you added a few ghost R's here and there. ("Champs-Elysées vous pRose un portrait"), yet you left some of them out (traveRs)

From 00:30 to 00:32 :
trop cheR (the R isn't silent)
and I don't know what that other word is. "...et parce que c'est *something that sounds like "cayant""
Did you mean "payant"?

Another voicing problem: "ils ont été" which sounded like "ils ont aidé"
And then you said "nombreuses" instead of "nombreux" (masculine)
Then you used an American L in "clé" (it sounded like "clay" in English)

remise is pronounced remiZ (not remi)

And in general, your R's are a bit too harsh. Try to voice them more and use less friction.

Sorry about the lack of structure.
me again   Mon Mar 08, 2010 12:25 pm GMT
Sorry, I meant that your INITIAL R's are too harsh. (RReportage for example)
Herman   Mon Mar 08, 2010 12:35 pm GMT
Well fuck you, you little bitch.
Gervaise   Mon Mar 08, 2010 12:44 pm GMT
Hi,

I think that you've posted it in the wrong section, that's the English Forum.

About your sample:

- you don't distinguish [z] from [s]: you put an [s] sound almost everywhere, it should be [z] in 'ChampS-Élysées', 'pariSien', 'redynamiSer'. Basically, you have a [z] sound when it's between two vowels;

- your 'Rs' sound more like the English 'h', when you say 'Reportage' for instance, the sound should be voiced;

- your endings : travERS and chER, should be [ɛʁ] and not [e], diX, [s] and not [z], nombreux, the x is silent;

- you omit syllables: 'prose' instead of 'propose';

- there are some [b] and [d] pronounced [p] and [t] (voiceless consonants instead of the voiced ones), even though you managed to pronounce it correctly in some words.

Your pronunciation is OK on the whole, we can understand you easily except for 2 or 3 words, in spite of a strong accent (Chinese?).
Gervaise   Mon Mar 08, 2010 12:48 pm GMT
Oh, didn't think that the 'prose' could be a 'pose', no syllable omitted then.
herman   Tue Mar 09, 2010 4:36 am GMT
first of all, the first herman is not me but just some weirdo using my name to curse people. terribly sorry for that

@herman and Gervaise, thank you so so much for your wonderful comments. you guys do spot out my accent problems.

my way to practice french accent is based on my understanding in english accent. to me, the french b & p, t & d, s & z and etc have always been a mystery. from my ear, they sound exactly the same. however, a lot of instructions tell me (just as @herman says) they should be differenciated. so, would anybody please tell me how to make out the difference?

is it possible that the differnece between b & p, t & d, k & g is just the as same as it is in english? if that's the case, i think there is something wrong with my ear when i listen to french~*~
@herman   Tue Mar 09, 2010 8:37 am GMT
In English, stressed voiceless plosives (/p/, /k/, /t/) are aspirated, which means they are followed by a little puff of air that sounds like an /h/, which makes them sound obviously different from the non aspirated voiced plosives.

But compare the two P's in the word "paper". The first one is aspirated, but the second one is not, yet you still hear it as a "P" and not a "D", so you ARE able to hear the difference. "paber" would sound different because your vocal cords would vibrate during the "b".

The French P is the second P in "paper"

And to make things even easier, voiced plosives are more voiced in French than they are in English: not only do our vocal cords vibrate during the voiced plosives, but they start to vibrate BEFORE it, so "b", "d", and "g" sound like mb, nd and ŋg.

Here's an audio clip that illustrates the difference: http://rapidshare.com/files/360965408/aspiration.mp3.html

And this is what you will hear in it:
/pʰa/ /tʰa/ /kʰa/ (voiceless aspirated as in English)
/pa/ /ta/ /ka/ (voiceless non-aspirated as in French (or unstressed English))
/ba/ /da/ /ga/ (voiced as in French (more voiced than English b, d and g))

That being said, I don't know why you're not able to hear the difference between /s/ and /z/ in French even though you can in English. They're the same.
me again   Tue Mar 09, 2010 8:39 am GMT
about the word paper: I obviously meant "yet you still hear it as a "P" and not as a "B" (not D)"
greg   Tue Mar 09, 2010 9:00 am GMT
herman : félicitations pour ton expression claire, déliée et agréable. En particulier, bravo pour les voyelles nasales !



Voici quelques pistes, souvent les mêmes que précédemment. Le phonématisme auquel je me réfère est celui de la pseudonorme septentrionale de France, qui est aussi celui que tu as adopté dans cette lecture.



<les bistrots à Paris>

/a·pa·ʁi/

[a·ba·ʁi] (ce qu'on entend)

<à Bari> (Italie)



<vous brosse un portait> ?ou? <vous propose un portrait>

/vu·bʁɔ·sœ̃/ ?ou? /vu·pʁo·pɔ·zœ̃/

[vu·pʁɔ·zœ̃] (ce qu'on entend)

<vous prose un>



<au travers de ses clichés célèbres>

/o·tʁa·vɛʁ/

[o·tʁa·ve] (ce qu'on entend)

<aux travées>



<au début des années quatre-vingt-dix>

/ka·tʁə·vɛ̃·dis/

[ka·tʁə·vɛ̃·ti·zə] (ce qu'on entend)



<parce que trop chers>

/tʁo·ʃɛʁ/

[tʁo·ʃe] (ce qu'on entend)

<trop chez>



Je n'ai pas compris le passage vers 00:32 juste après <parce que trop chers>.



Comme les autre francophones, j'ai perçu le /kl/ de à l'initiale de <clef> comme étant distinctement de type germanique.



<ils ont été nombreux>

/il·zɔ̃·e·te·nɔ̃·bʁø/ (sans liaison) — /il·zɔ̃·te·te·nɔ̃·bʁø/ (avec)

[e·de·nɔ̃·bʁœ·zə] (ce qu'on entend)

<aidé nombreuse>



<après une remise en cause forcée>

/ʁə·mi·zɑ̃·kɔ·zə·fɔʁ·se/

[χə·mi·ɑ̃·kɔ·zə·fɔʁ·se] (ce qu'on entend)

1] La consonne [χ] à l'initiale fait inévitablement penser à un accent "allemand". Cette consonne existe en français : c'est un allophone de [ʁ]. C'est-à-dire que : /ʁ/ (phonème) = { [ʁ] (phone) ; [χ] (phone) ; [r] (phone) ; [ʀ] (phone) ; [w] (phone) ; etc etc etc}.
Ce qui différencie ton [χ] dans <remise> (peut-être dérivé de l'allemand /x/ de <machen> et <doch>) du [χ] "autochtone", c'est que ce-dernier (très fréquent) est placé en finale et non à l'initiale :
<huitre> /ɥi·tʁə/ → [ɥi·tʁə] ou [ɥitχ] etc
<gouffre> /gu·fʁə/ → [gu·fʁə] ou [gufχ] etc
<quatre> /ka·tʁə/ → [ka·tʁə] ou [katχ] etc.
2] D'autre part ton /z/ de la syllabe finale de <remise> est silencieux : cela signifie que tu dis <remis>.



<les bistrotiers> (dur à dire...)

/le·bis·tʁo·tje/



<ont engagé>

/ɔ̃·tɑ̃·ga·ʒe/ (avec liaison) — /ɔ̃·ɑ̃·ga·ʒe/ (sans)

[ɔ̃·ɑ̃·ga·ʒɛː] (ce qu'on entend)

Le [ɛː] en finale n'est pas possible pour un participe passé d'un verbe du premier groupe. On sent un accent "polonais" ou "anglophone" (avec répression de la diphtongue compensée par l'allongement). De plus, en français septentrional les formes sonores du type [ɑ̃·ga·ʒɛ] sont déjà réservées pour l'imparfait : <engageais>, <engageait> et <engageaient> (en méridional ces formes sont homophones avec le participe passé → [ɑ̃·ga·ʒe]).



<redynamiser>

/ʁə·di·na·mi·ze/

[ʁə·di·na·mi·se] (ce qu'on entend)

Accent étranger (germanique, roman etc).
greg   Tue Mar 09, 2010 9:37 am GMT
herman : désolé pour cette erreur orthographique



*<huitre> est erroné : lire <huître>
herman   Tue Mar 16, 2010 10:51 am GMT
a million thanks to you guys' clear instructions. it becomes so much clear and i'll surely pay more attention to my own accent.

i also think a perfect pronunciation comes with speaking fluency. that's why i didn't even notice my pronunciation problem when i was reading the passage: because i was only READING it. i did not have a comprehensive idea about the words coming out of my mouth. so when my vocabulary and grammar grow, i'm sure my accent would become more natural.

i'll sure come back.
TEAM WASP   Tue Mar 16, 2010 3:24 pm GMT
French sounds like a mix of homosexual lisps and monkey hoots.