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Frenglish in Montréal, bien sûr! | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| Spanky Senior Member Canada Joined 5958 days ago 1021 posts - 1714 votes  Studies: French | Message 1 of 9 23 November 2012 at 6:50pm | IP Logged | ||
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Attach is a link to some fun articles that some of you may enjoy concerning the French/English/Frenglish linguistic soup in Montréal, Québec, Canada. Soup is always so much more interesting than just its individual component ingredients!
Montreal Gazette - Frenglish index Edited by Spanky on 23 November 2012 at 7:51pm 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Nature Diglot Groupie Canada Joined 5239 days ago 63 posts - 80 votes Speaks: English*, French | Message 2 of 9 23 November 2012 at 8:49pm | IP Logged | ||
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living in Montreal, honestly, this is a little exaggerated. English and French is not as mixed as one would like to think. English speakers in Montreal tend to speak French when they have to while French speakers I notice, just tend to think it's cool to use English words rather than French ones in their sentences, and they think that makes them bilingual. I've never once heard anyone say "I'm going to the commerce". Never.
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| mahasiswa Pentaglot Groupie Canada Joined 4434 days ago 91 posts - 142 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish, German, Malay Studies: Arabic (Egyptian), Persian, Russian, Turkish, Mandarin, Hindi | Message 3 of 9 23 November 2012 at 8:51pm | IP Logged | ||
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You're right Nature, we say "We're going to the dép, esk vous voulez quek chose?" :)
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| Spanky Senior Member Canada Joined 5958 days ago 1021 posts - 1714 votes Studies: French | Message 4 of 9 26 November 2012 at 6:05am | IP Logged | ||
I can't speak at all to the issue of vocabulary choices in Montreal. My experience with Montreal is limited to weekend visits approximately once a month when we would drive out from Toronto to visit with my wife's friends and family during the late nineties. My experience with that group, which might possibly be more idiosyncratic than representative (I really couldn't say), is that language switching was a really common feature of casual conversation. Most of all of them were comfortably bilingual and conversation would change, seemingly effortlessly, between English and French in a situational fashion - it was kinda fun to watch during the course for example of a party where the language dynamic would change depending on who arrived or was involved in conversations. The video in the link originally attached concerning Sugar Sammy reminded me very much of my experiences in Montreal (although I am not able to follow most of his French comments), in terms of what he says in English toward the end of the video, along the lines of Montrealers liking to meet in the middle, finding that comfortable space where everyone can meet and speak: The video concerning swearing made me really nostalgic for Montreal (not the swearing per se but the background shots and the general positive engagement with life. Edited by Spanky on 26 November 2012 at 6:22am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6705 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 5 of 9 26 November 2012 at 10:02am | IP Logged | ||
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I have a photo at home with the text "Hotdogs steamé"
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| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5383 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 6 of 9 05 December 2012 at 4:17pm | IP Logged | ||
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I think the kind of switching you all seem to be referring to is only common among true bilinguals, and Montréal English speakers are more likely to be comfortable in both languages. None of the francophones I knew when I lived in Montréal would switch between languages beyond using English words occasionally -- and the reason is simple: they weren't comfortable enough in English to do so. Furthermore, most francophones find it an affront to be using English with another francophone, unless they are fully immersed in the English culture and are truly bilingual. It's certainly not something I've ever done. However, there are people who grow up fully bilingual without feeling that they belong to either group (especially among children of immigrant parents) and I have heard examples of extreme code-switching.
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| lecavaleur Diglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4779 days ago 146 posts - 295 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: German, Spanish | Message 7 of 9 08 December 2012 at 6:02am | IP Logged | ||
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I'm a bilingual immigrant to Québec whose mother tongue happens to be English, but I'm
not an "Anglo-Quebecker" per se since I did not come from that community. I don't live in Montréal but I'm there twice a week, in the West Island (a particularly Anglo stronghold). I have learned a few things during my years here. First, the English spoken in Montréal is remarkably pure and almost untouched by its proximity to French. There are a few famous exceptions like the "dep" and for certain place names, but other than that, Montréal English is like 99.999% the same as standard NAE. Second, I know tons of Montréal Anglos and to tell you the truth, very few of them speak French very well. Maybe I'm just not running in the right circles, but seriously, I can count the truly bilingual Anglos I know on one hand. These Gazette articles are exercises in undeserved self-flattery, if you ask me. Anglo-Montrealers like the idea of living in a bilingual-ish city with a European flair, but when it comes to actually speaking French, most don't live up to that good reputation. I know the stats would have you think differently, but remember that they are based on unverified self-reporting, and what passses for "bilingual" around here sometimes is highly questionable. Most Anglo-Montrealers that I have met (in the low hundreds, by now) live in a sort of Anglo bubble where they don't really have to speak French... ever. They can do all of their shopping, interact with all public and private services and even work exclusively in English. So if they studied French at school, they aren't ever forced to practise it as long as they never leave Montréal to venture out into the regions. Most people I know who are perfectly bilingual in French and English are actually also trilingual, since they are children of immigrants who learned French in school and English on the sreet. I also know basically no Francophones under 30 who do not speak English at least at an intermediate level, and a great many of them actually speak it well. However, I frequent University crowds, so the numbers are probably a bit skewed for that reason. Edited by lecavaleur on 08 December 2012 at 6:21am 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Tsopivo Diglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4473 days ago 258 posts - 411 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: Esperanto | Message 8 of 9 09 December 2012 at 11:35am | IP Logged | ||
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I do not know lots of people in the English speaking community of Montreal so I could not really tell if that article is true or wildly exagerated. I was under the impression that they spoke regular English but I have not talked enough with themm to really know.
For French speakers though, it is extremely common. I would barely exagerate to sayy that I am more suprised hearing a French Quebec speaker of Montreal utter a full sentence without at least one word borrowed from English than the contrary. It's not randomly switching a French word for an English word in the middle of a sentence though; it's always the same word. For instance, in Montreal, French speakers will pretty much always use "anyway" rather than "de toute façon". I completely disagree with Nature though when he says that people do so to be "cool" and think it makes them bilingual. This is just the way every body talks here; it is part of what Quebec French is. People do not see it as "cool" but only as normal. Lots of people do not even realise how many words they borrow from English so they certainly do not do it on purpose to sound cool. In Montreal, I also find it relatively common to hear people switch languages during a conversation more or less at random and without much effort or event thought as described by Spanky. I am quite amazed at this ability and I am not really confortable at doing so myself. Of course, this only happens when at least - and most often both - parties have a high level of fluency. I have never gotten the impression that this was frowned upon. ""bilingual" around here sometimes is highly questionable. " I don't know if it is the same in English but in Quebec, the meaning of the word "bilingue" or "bilinguisme" is certainly different from it's common use in France which can create some confusion. Basically, it is understood as simply meaning the capacity to use two languages or commonly using two languages or using two languages fluently whereas in France, most people consider you can't claim to be a "bilingue" if both language are not your native languages or if you have not at the very least achieve native-like fluency. The Quebec acception of the word is actually the "proper" one though. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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