Call Me Mr. Samsa

Bonne journée, mes copains.  Finalment, il est mars--le printemps arrivera bientôt.  

Call me Monsieur Gregor Samsa, aujourd'hui.  No, I didn't wake up as a cockroach, but as a yo-yo.  Yesterday I was italiano, but today I'm distinctly français .  At first I tried to control these spontaneous metamorphoses, but I've decided that it's useless to resist.  My affection for French, Spanish, and Italian are equal--with a slight bias towards the latter.  But I don't think I can completely abandon any of them.



The disadvantages of this infidelity are two-fold:  1) the hours I'm putting in for one language take away those I could be immersing myself in another and 2) since all three tongues are Latin-based and therefore somewhat similar, there's a danger of getting them confused.  I've already experienced that with Italian and Spanish, languages in which many words only slightly differ.  

I think what rolled me over to my French personality recently is that I'm finally beginning to feel a little better at comprehending more oral French.  Watching Inspecteur Barnaby (the French dubbed version of 'Midsomer Murders,' one of my favorite British detective shows) recently, I was delighted to find that I was capturing more and more of the dialogue, instead of hearing only a word or two here and there.  Since one of my main objectives for studying language has been to be capable of watching foreign films and TV shows in the original language without subtitles, this is a major breakthrough.  

So, how did this step-up in fluency transpire?  One thing that has contributed, I think, is that I've placed more emphasis on speaking.  Ironically, speaking French somehow helps in recognizing the sounds of spoken French.  And since I don't have access to any natives, my primary venue for speaking has been my library copy of Pimsleur's French instruction CD, which put a great deal of emphasis on speaking.  That, coupled with reading French aloud, has made some inroads.  This progress is very important, because if I have less difficulty with comprehension, this new-found skill will most definitely make me more confident to approach the next stage:  speaking face-to-face with a native speaker on Sykpe or some equivalent audio-video platform.

So today I have on my chapeau.  Tomorrow don't be surprised if I show up in a sombrero.  I'm a man of many hats.

A la prochaine...

Rude Awakening

Bonjour, mesdames et messieurs.  Comment allez-vous, cette matin? 

Today's ramblings (divagations, according to Google Translate) are on the controversial question 'Are Parisians unfriendly and rude?  I've heard resounding oui's on this topic and just as many vehement non's.  

I've heard that they are rude to you in Paris only if you make no effort at all to speak their language.  Some say that if you bonjour them a little, they are like putty in your hands.  There is probably at least a partial truth in that.  English speakers, especially Americans, are notorious for thinking everybody is born speaking English, so I can see why such an attitude might come across as arrogant and disrespectful.  And yet, I was surprised to see a short film clip in which the interviewer was going about the city asking various people (permanent residents as well as passing tourists) what they thought of the city.  A few said it was merveilleux, others sort of noncommittally noted the culture and lovely sights, but quite a few said Parisians were bitter, angry, and impolite people.  Here's a very funny CNN video about what Paris is trying to do to be more 'user friendly:

 

Here's a video about what Paris is trying to do to improve its public relations

I'd say, to be fair, that it's all about the hustle and bustle and diversity of living in a big city.  I lived in New York for decades and know that it was not always easy to make an effort to be polite to the tourists, who were there on vacation, while I was still in the day-to-day rat-race.   And perhaps there are some people who provoke rudeness.  And when you're trying to squeeze into a subway car packed like sardines, it's quite easy to accidentally poke one's elbow into someone's face.  And if you went around all day begging their pardon, you'd be apologizing all day.  

But still, we need to be civilized to each other.  Tourists are spending euros and dollars, so they need to know that they can be safe and comfortable, whether in Paris, Rome, or Boise, Idaho.  

À plus tard...

French Lit

Parlons de literature au'jourd'hui, d'accord?  I wish I liked French poetry more.  Perhaps I just haven't been introduced to the right author.  Yes, Baudelaire can be good, and Rimbaud and his side-kick, Verlaine (actually I like V. better), but I've just never found specific poets that I admire enough to learn to read well in French.  I have plenty of favorite Spanish and Italian poets, but French poetry sometimes leaves me cold.  That's in no way saying that I'm denying its importance or it popularity with other people.  I just haven't found a poet who keeps me coming back.

I do a little better with prose fiction.  I've enjoyed reading Flaubert and Zola in their original tongue and have almost navigated the whole of Proust's gargantuan series of novels.  There is certainly a wider selection of novels and short stories available in French, the list of famous novelists is striking:  Balzac, Stendhal, Hugo, Camus, Gide....  To be truthful, though I do like Gide quite a bit, I find that it is the fluffier stuff that I return to, e.g., Jules Verne. 

Just as when I'm practicing reading Spanish or Italian fiction, in French I often find myself reading French translations of English novels--most because the stories are already familiar and the French seems a bit easier and less idiomatic.  Naturally, this is really just cheating.  One eventually needs to read French unfiltered and get used to the unique 'flavor' of the prose.

One nice thing about having an i-Pad or Kindle, or some other type of hand-held, is that there are a lot of absolutely free public domain works in every major language.  There are many sites that offer not only ebooks, but also audio-book renditions of many classic French novels and stories and poems.  Just Google 'free ebooks' or 'free audiobooks.'  Happy reading.

A la prochaine...

Le rêve impossible

 I've decided to add a second post today, because I've come to some tentative conclusions about my language learning and wanted to roll it around in my mind for awhile.  The best way to do that, I find, is to write about it.

   

The last several months of juggling French and Italian have forced me to make certain assumptions about learning either of these languages with at least a moderate fluency.

French, Italian, or none of the above?

I've concluded that it is impossible (and I'm not exaggerating) to learn to comprehend spoken French without living in France or at least living with a native speaker for many years.  Speaking French is not the issue here.  My pronunciation is passable, if not good, and I can form most of the basic structures one needs to carry on a simple conversation. It's understanding a native Frenchperson speaking it that is so discouraging.

When I watch an Italian TV show, even if it's original Italian and not dubbed English, I find that even though my Italian vocabulary is much more limited than my French one, I can understand so many more of the words and sentences I'm hearing than I can when watching a similar show in French.   Conversational French, when spoken at a typical pace, is just almost a whole different language than written or very formal French.  For example, when I hear 'Qu'est-ce que se passe?' it sounds like 'Skuh-spahce?'  Of course, English speakers do exactly the same thing:  'Wasappnin? for What's happening?'.  But I don't think I'd ever get the hang of it, without being exposed to it every day and having someone around to do a little patient translating and explaining.  The other day I heard it's common in France to call a week-end le wee.

In some ways, I guess this may be a good thing, because I can continue to improve my French reading and speaking skills, but zero in on Italian vocabulary and comprehension.  Not to offend any French readers out there--I do appreciate French, but Italian has always been more attractive to me.  I think I'd be able to get to a level where I can understand spoken Italian even without too much face-to-face interaction.

But experience has shown that I may feel exactly the opposite tomorrow or the next day.  I guess I'm easily distracted.  :)

Pourquoi? Pourquoi? Pourquoi?

I found the 'My 7 Top...' picture on Google Images and decided I'd try to build today's post around it.  I approach this endeavor cautiously, because I'm not sure I can come up with 7; on the other hand, who knows, once I get warmed up maybe 7 won't be enough.

I suppose I have what has been traditionally described as a love/hate relationship to French.  There are some things I like about it, many of which I'll mention in my list, but other things which I'm either tepid toward or just plain don't care for.  A lot of those puckered up 'pew' sounds sort of grate on my ears at times, as do so many guttural or throaty sounds that sound like one is clearing her throat or has something lodged under his adam's apple and is trying to eject it.  But this is supposed to be about the things I like about it and why I choose to try to learn, if not master, French.  So, here goes:

********************************************************************************

1. For the most part, in spite of the negatives about its distinct audio peculiarities mentioned above, it's a pretty tongue.  French differs from most of the other Romance languages in its paucity of words ending with vowels.  This is somewhat deceptive, though, in the fact that so many final letters are not pronounced that often words end with vowel-like sounds, especially those nasal and guttural sounds.  There are also some very pleasant sounding words--papillon (butterfly) comes to mind.
2. In spite of its habitual use of the subjunctive mood and its unpredictable use of prepositions, I think French is a fairly easy language for English speakers to pick up.  Since modern English owes a great deal of its development to Normal French, there are thousands of English words that either look exactly like French words or a bear an easily recognized resemblance.  Practically all of the words ending in 'tion,' for example, derive from French.  Also the sentence structure, though bearing some significant differences, follows English pretty closely. 
3. French was the first foreign language I was introduced to.  I grew up in a small, rural Mississippi town and it happened to be the only language class offered.  Had I had a choice, I might just as easily have chosen Spanish (at that time not as proliferate in the U.S. as it is now), German, or Italian.  Because the idea of being able to speak in a second language always seemed glamorous and special for me, I transported my enthusiasm to college and majored in French, even getting a B.A. in it.  Thus, I have the advantage of experience (I've studied French off and on informally for decades since then) and trying to master something other than French at this point would be starting back at square one.  In other words, I guess my third reason for learning French is convenience.
4. Wow, I've already made it to four.  Definitely on a roll (en français: dans une bonne passe).  Though not as practical (at least in America) as learning Spanish, French is still widely spoken in various parts of the world.  Quebec is to our north; Haiti's not that far away; and there's French Guyana in South America.  And a dialect 'Cajun' French is spoken in a city I've loved and lived in for several years, New Orleans (Nouvelle-Orléans) and other parts of the state of Louisiana.  I'd find it much easier to locate a French speaker without going to Europe (expensive) than I would be able to conjure up an Italian speaker.
5. Because of its universal popularity as a second language, there is a bounty of learning materials for French.  When I was dabbling in Italian, one problem was that in the U. S. the pickings are slim for books, CDs, online sites, etc., for that language.  And novels and other fiction in Italian?  For get about it; most of them have to be directly imported from Italy, so the shipping costs are astronomical. 
6. French makes you popular.  I'm not completely sure why, but most English speakers swoon over someone of the opposite sex (and sometimes the same sex) chatting away in French.  I suppose it has something to do with English being so akin to French, from the Norman invasion and all.  And it does have some very beautiful rhythms and tones.
7. And finally, there's literature and culture.  French literature has a long and distinguished history.  Some of what are considered the greatest novelists of all time, Proust comes to mind, are French.  And there's philosophy, music, and those zany impressionists painters :).  

Voilà.  Now that wasn't so hard after all.  I'm reasonably confident that I could come up with more, but that will do for now.  French is thriving with no signs of letting up.  What are your reasons for learning French?

A la prochaine...

Fast-Talking Dudes from Provence

Bien.  Today I feel much more French than yesterday, when Italian was rolling around in my head.

I sometimes worry about dialects.  When I read about how, for example, people in Provence speak French so fast and with so many non-standard variations that it's practically indecipherable for someone trained to speak textbook French, I get nervous.  I find that a bit discouraging.  I think one of the best things a language learner can do is avoid such thinking.  I'm not on my way to Provence (and could very well never be), so why fret over something that may never happen?

Lavender Field of Provence, France

I wonder if it works the other way around; if  Provençals understand people who are using standard French.  As for the fast talking, that seems to be a problem no matter what language you're learning.  One must always learn the phrases 'Répétez, s'il vous plaît' and 'Parlez plus lentement' right off the bat.  

One thing that, I think, helps is to practice speaking faster.  That seems to get you used to conditions in which you have to think quickly and to get the main gist of the conversation without concentrating on individual words.  Also, it goes the other way.  Though it's comforting to listen to French spoken at a pace slower than normal conversation, it's not going to help much when you run into a Frenchwoman speaking a mile-a-minute.  

A prochaine...

OK. Remind Me Again, What Language Do I Speak?

 

Eh bien, it's Wednesday, so I must be French today.  Je suis un homme français aujourd'hui.  I know because I rushed to update this blog first as opposed to my Italian one, http://dailyitalian123.blogspot.com/.  As all my thousands of followers (dream-on, Guillaume :)) know, I have a severe case of multiple language personalities and I could wake up on any give day a vieux chevalier, vaquero, o un cavaliere disinvolto.  Pour maintenant, j'suis un gentilhomme français.  No, I'm not a lunatic; I'm only exaggerating (a little).

I think I'm vulnerable to this disorder (dis-ORDER)  

1. because I'm not a very orderly person, and
2. because I'm eager to get to the point where I can carry on a reasonably complex conversation and understand responses in that conversation in at least one language besides English.  

For some reason, it's hard to pinpoint, I'm finding Italian slow-going and that getting even a tiny bit fluent in it would take much, much longer than French or Spanish.  Besides, I'm way ahead of the game in French, because I had four years of formal in-class training in it and have at least partially maintained my skills with it over the years.  As for Spanish, its pronunciation and its compact grammar just seem to make it easier for English speakers to absorb.  When I carry on made-up conversations with myself (Watch it, now!  Je ne suis pas un lunatique) in French, I don't have to struggle to get something out, even if it's not perfect.  When I attempt to do that in Italian, it seems much harder.  Some of that has to do with Italian's quirky rhythm and tones, the very thing that makes it so beautiful.  Syllables in specific Italian words can be stressed just about anywhere, and if you learn the incorrect stress, then it's hard to undo that habit.  French, for the most part has very consistent stress on every syllabe equally, though with a slight emphasis on the last syllable.  I could, I suppose, just learn to read Italian and set French as my 'working' language.  

But I know that though I feel this way today, tomorrow is Thursday and I may wake up Italian, or Spanish, or maybe even German.  Guten Tag!

A la prochaine...