French phonology

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This article mainly discusses the phonological system of standard French based on the Parisian dialect. French is notable for its uvular r, nasal vowels, and two processes affecting word-final sounds: liaison, a certain type of sandhi, wherein word-final consonants are not pronounced unless followed by a word beginning with a vowel; and elision, wherein a final vowel is elided before vowel initial words.

[edit] Vowels

Standard French contrasts up to thirteen oral vowels and up to four nasal vowels.

Some speakers contrast a front /a/ vs a back /ɑ/ but there are wide differences amongst such speakers as to which words have which vowel.^[1] Similarly, some speakers distinguish between long and short /ɛː/ and /ɛ/; maître [mɛːtʁ] ('teacher') vs mettre [mɛtʁ] ('to put'). Such minimal pairs are rare.^[2]

The phonetic qualities of the back nasal vowels are not very similar to those of the corresponding oral vowels, and the contrasting factor that distinguishes /ɑ̃/ and /ɔ̃/ is the extra lip rounding of the latter. Many speakers have merged /œ̃/ with /ɛ̃/.^[3]

While the mid vowels contrast in certain environments, there is some distributional overlap. Generally speaking, close-mid vowels are found in open syllables while open-mid vowels are found in closed ones. /ɛ/ and /e/ contrast in final-position open syllables (e.g. poignée [pwa.ɲe] 'handful' vs poignet [pwa.ɲɛ] 'wrist'). Likewise, open-mid /ɔ/ and /œ/ contrast with close-mid /o/ and /ø/ mostly in closed monosyllables.^[4] Beyond this general rule, there are some complications. For instance, [o] and [ø] are found in closed syllables ending in [z] while only [ɔ] is found in closed monosyllables before [ʁ], [ɲ], and [g]^[5]

In verb conjugations of the first singular person (in present and future tense), the final mid-closed /e/ is frequently pronounced [ɛ], e.g. j’ai /ˈʒe/ ('I have') may be [ˈʒe] or [ˈʒɛ], je ferai /ʒə fə.ˈʁe/ ('I'll do') may be [ʒəfəˈʁe] or [ʒəfəˈʁɛ].^{[citation needed]}

Schwa (/ə/ also called "e caduc" ('decrepit e') and "e muet" ('mute e') is a mid central vowel with some rounding.^[6] It is always dropped ("muet") before another vowel (un(e) âme [yn.ɑːm] 'a soul'), and usually when following a single consonant (rapp(e)ler [ʁa.ple] 'to recall'). On the other hand, it is usually pronounced when its omission would create a cluster of three consonants or more (gredin [gʁə.dɛ̃], une porte [yn pɔʁt], une porte fermée [yn pɔʁ.tə.fɛʁ.me]).^[7] This vowel is phonologically distinct from [œ], but for most native speakers of French, they may be pronounced identically. For example, in le bœuf /lə bœf/ or demi-heure /dəmjœʁ/, most French native speakers won't make any phonetic difference between the two vowels, pronounced identically most of the time (or even swapped).^{[citation needed]}

While /wa/ and /ɥi/ may be considered diphthongs (that is, fully contained in the syllable nucleus), other sequences of a glide and vowel are considered part of a glide formation process that turns a high vowel into a glide (and part of the syllable onset) when followed by another vowel. While this process does not apply if the syllable onset contains more than one segment, the two diphthongs may appear after consonant clusters as in trois /tʁwa/ ('three') and pluie ('rain').^[8]

Oral vowels of French. from Fougeron & Smith (1993:73)

Stress falls on the final syllable of a phrase unless that syllable has schwa as its vowel, in which case the penultimate vowel is stressed.^{[9][dubious – discuss]}

With the exception of the distinction made by some speakers between /ɛː/ and /ɛ/, variation in vowel length is entirely allophonic. /o/, /ø/, /ɑ/, and the nasal vowels are lengthened in closed, stressed syllables:^[10]

Also, any vowel followed by (/v/, /z/, /ʒ/), /ʁ/, or the consonant cluster /vʁ/ is lengthened; e.g. sœur, [sœːʁ] ('sister'); brave, [bʁaːv] ('nice'), juge [ʒyːʒ] ('judge'), topaze [tɔpaːz] ('topaz'), lèvre [lɛːvʁ] ('lip'), but not other consonants or clusters, e.g. porte [pɔʁt] ('door'), larve [laʁv] ('larva').^[11]

When syllables otherwise satisfying these conditions are not stressed, they may not be long. The vowel [o] of saute is long in Regarde comme elle saute!, but may not be in Qu'est-ce qu'elle saute bien!.^[12] In this case, the vowel is unstressed because it is not phrase-final. An exception occurs however with the phoneme /ɛː/ because of its distinctive nature, provided it is word-final, as in C'est une fête importante, where fête is pronounced with long /ɛː/.^[13]

The following table examines only the case of phrase-final vowels.

[edit] Consonants

Where symbols for consonants occur in pairs, the left represents the voiceless consonant and the right represents the voiced consonant. The "rounded" consonnants are in fact mildly coarticulated with lips (like bilabials but without touching them).

Phonetic notes:

1. The velar nasal /ŋ/ is not a native phoneme of French, but occurs in loan words in final position such as parking or camping.^[14] Many speakers (mostly old people and those who are not accustomed to this foreign sound) replace it with a prenasalized [ŋɡ] sequence instead of a single consonant [ŋ]. This sequence also appears almost systematically where there is a possible liaison with the initial vowel of a word pronounced just after it.^{[citation needed]} The velar nasal is also heard in the accent of the city of Marseille after final nasal vowels, e.g. malin [malɛ̃] may be realized as /malɛ̃ŋ/.^{[citation needed]}
2. The French rhotic has a wide range of realizations. [ʀ], [ʁ] (both the fricative and the approximant), [r], [ɾ], and [χ] will all be recognized as "r",^[15] but most of them will be considered dialectal. For example, [ʁ] is considered typical of a Parisian accent, while [r] is sometimes found in southern France, less and less in the Montreal area and in Cajun French.^{[citation needed]}
3. The approximants [j], [ɥ] and [w] correspond to [i], [y] and [u] respectively. While there are a few minimal pairs (such as loua [lu.a] 'he rented' and loi [lwa] 'law'), there are many cases where there is free variation.^[16]
4. /ʎ/ has merged with /j/ in a number of dialects (including the standard). This accounts for the appearance of [j] in the syllable coda and minimal pairs like ail [aj] ('garlic') vs haï [ai] ('hated').^[17]

[edit] Notes

[edit] See also

• History of the French language
• Reforms of French orthography
• Dialects of the French language
• French orthography

[edit] References

• Chitoran, Ioana (2002), A perception-production study of Romanian diphthongs and glide-vowel sequences, 32, pp. 203-222 
• Fougeron, Cecile & Smith, Caroline L (1993), "Illustrations of the IPA:French", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 23(2): 73-76 
• Léon, P. (1992), Phonétisme et prononciations du français, Paris: Nathan 
• Schane, Sanford A (1968), French Phonology and Morphology, M.I.T. Press 
• Walker, Douglas (1984), The Pronunciation of Canadian French, Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press, ISBN 0-7766-4500-5 
• Walker, Douglas (2001), French Sound Structure, University of Calgary Press, ISBN 1552380335 
• Wells, J.C. (1989), "Computer-Coded Phonemic Notation of Individual Languages of the European Community", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 19(1): 31-54 

[edit] External links

• Large collection of recordings of French words
• mp3 Audio Pronunciation of French vowels, consonnants and alphabet