Information AboutFranglais |
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ENGLISH SENSE In English, ''Franglais'' means a mangled combination of English and French, produced either by poor knowledge of one or the other language or for humorous effect. If one tries to speak French and fills in gaps in knowledge of French with English words or False Cognate s with their incorrect meaning, the result is Franglais. Franglais may also mean a diplomatic compromise such as UTC . Example:
For the former tendency we have only to remember Chaucer 's Prioress , who (he tells us) knew nothing of the French of Paris, but only that of Stratford-atte-Bow ('Cockney French'). Similar mixtures occur in the later stages of Law French , such as the famous defendant who "ject un brickbat a le dit Justice, que narrowly mist". An early literary example of the delight in ''mélange'' occurs in Robert Surtees ' '' Jorrocks ' Jaunts and Jollities'': :"You shall manger cinque fois every day," said she; "cinque fois," she repeated.--"Humph!" said Mr. Jorrocks to himself, "what can that mean?--cank four--four times five's twenty--eat twenty times a day--not possible!" "Oui, Monsieur, cinque fois," repeated the Countess, telling the number off on her fingers--"Café at nine of the matin, déjeuner à la fourchette at onze o'clock, diner at cinque heure, café at six hour, and souper at neuf hour." The humorist Miles Kington wrote a regular column ''Parlez vous Franglais'' which, for a number of years starting in the late 1970s , appeared in the magazine '' Punch ''. Books published by Miles Kington include: ''Let's Parler Franglais'', ''Let's Parler Franglais Again!'', ''Parlez-vous Franglais?'', ''Let's Parler Franglais One More Temps'', ''The Franglais Lieutenant's Woman and Other Literary Masterpieces''. Another classic is Jean Loup Chiflet 's ''Sky My Husband! Ciel Mon Mari!'' which is a literal translation (and a correct one too, for comparison) of French into English. Perhaps the oldest and the funniest example of Franglais in English literature is found in '' Henry V '' by William Shakespeare . A French princess is trying to learn English , but unfortunately, "foot" as pronounced by her maid sounds too much like ''foutre'' and "gown" like ''con''. She decides English is too obscene a language. FRENCH SENSE In French (and sometimes in English), the term refers to the use of has suggested the use of the less popular ''mél''. Canada Franglais should not be confused with Quebec French , which has a number of longstanding borrowings from English as the result of the historical coexistence of two linguistic communities inside Quebec and especially the Montreal area. Similarly, English spoken by the anglophone minority in Quebec has borrowed certain Quebec French words such as '' Dépanneur '' for corner store, '' Autoroute '' for highway, ''PAB'' (from préposé aux bénéficiaires) for nurse's assistant, ''stage'' for internship, or ''metro'' for subway. These are permanent and longstanding features of local usage rather than the incorrect speech improvised by any given individual user with poor knowledge of the other language. They have mainly become part of a common ground tongue born out of mutual concession to one another. In fact, the substantial fluently bilingual community in and around Montreal will occasionally refer to "Franglais", usually after it is pointed out that someone has used a variety of French and English words, expressions, or propositions in a 'correct' fashion in the same sentence or point, a surprisingly common occurrence. In this sense, the term "Franglais" is used as much in a European context as in Canada (except Quebec ). However, the term Franglais is used in New Brunswick , Nova Scotia , Manitoba and some parts of Northern Ontario and northern Maine to refer to the mix of English and French spoken there, which is itself a longstanding dialect (see Chiac ). This mix uses just about as much English as French, although it is more likely to be understood by a Francophone , since it usually uses English words in French pronunciation and grammar. Other strange Franglais occurs across Canada owing to the rise of immersion programs across the country. A good example of an anglicism turned Franglais is the unintentional translation of English phrases into French by students unaware of the 'proper' ones generally used in Quebec French . One such example is mistranslating a Hot Dog as "chien chaud" (literally a dog that is hot) when in fact the correct translation is "hot dog". In some ways, confusion over which expression is more correct, and the emphasis many immersion schools place on eliminating anglicisms from students' vocabulary, has promoted the use of Franglais. Franglais can also slowly creep into use from mispronunciations and misspellings by many bilingual Canadians. Common mistakes that immersion or bilingual students propagate and tend to repeat beyond their student life include incorrect inflection and stresses on syllables, incorrect doubling of consonants, strange vowel combinations in their spelling, and using odd combinations of prefixes and suffixes opposite to the language they mean to use at a given time. Sometimes youth culture purposely uses Franglais for its comical characteristics. In recent years, especially in British Columbia and southern and eastern Ontario, Franglais has become popular with teenage culture. Teenagers will frequently replace English words with their French equivalent for comedic or euphemistic value. This occurs most often with swear words. Some Anglophone Canadians euphemistically use the Québecois " Sacres " instead of swearing in English. This is somewhat ironic because sacres (religious words such as ''sacrament'', used as expletives) are considered the worst and most offensive type of swearing by native Francophone Canadians, however. France After World War II , a backlash began in France over the increasing use of Franglais there. Corruption of the national language was perceived by some to be tantamount to an attack on the identity of the country itself. During this period imports of large amounts of United States products led to increasingly widespread use of some English phrases throughout French culture. Measures taken to slow this trend included government Censorship of Comic Strips and financial support for the French film and French language Dubbing industries. Despite public policies against the spread of English, the use of Franglais is increasing in both written and oral expression. In recent years English expression are increasingly present in French mass media:
Almost all telecommunication and '''Internet service providers''' generally use English and Franglais expressions in their product names and advertising campaigns. The leading operator ''' France Télécom ''' has dropped the accents in its corporate logo. In recent years it has changed its product names with smart sounding expressions such as "Business Talk", "Live-Zoom", "Family Talk". France Telecom's mobile telecommunications subsidiary ''' Orange ''' runs a franchise retail network called '''mobistores'''. Its Internet subsidiary, formerly known as ''' Wanadoo ''' (inspired by the American slang expression "wanna do"), provides a popular triple play service through its '''''Livebox'''''. The second largest Internet service provider in France is Free and proposes its '''freebox'''. Set-top boxes offered by many providers followed the trend (neuf-box, alice-box...) and the word '''box''' taken as is gradually ends up referring to those set-top boxes, in the Internet context. SNCF , the state-owned Railway company, has recently introduced a customer fidelity program called '''''S'Miles''''', at the same time ''' Air France ''' renamed its Frequent Flyer program ''Fréquence Plus'' as '''''Flying Blue'''''. The Paris Transportation Authority (''' RATP '''), recently introduced a Handfree pass system called '''''NaviGO'''''. The ), uncool (e.g the tchat''' attempt for '''chat''' to conform to french phonetics is often perceived as if a parent trying to use young slang and failing at it) or even ridiculous (like '''dévédé''' for DVD), which is certainly another root of their slow acceptance. The use of English expressions is very common in the youth language, which combines them with '' Verlan '' and expression of Arabic origins. The letter ''J'' is often prononced in the English way in words like ''jeunes'' (young). The word ''black'' referring to people of African descent is considered to be more Politically Correct than ''Noir''. FRENGLISH There is an English equivalence to the concept of the French word "Franglais". It is usually called "Frenglish". Many Anglo Montrealers grew up learning English in schools and living in a society dominated by French; in the media and on every outdoor sign - mandatory under Quebec Law. A person who is said "to speak a perfect Frenglish" means he/she speaks an English riddled with common French expressions. Examples: -"Open/Close the lights” instead of “Turn on/off the lights" ("Open/close" is actually a Montréalism, and incorrect in both French and English. "Allumer/éteindre la lumière" is correct, not "ouvrir/fermer la lumière". A literal translation would be "light the light/extinguish the light"). -"Pass the vacuum in the livingroom" instead of "vacuum the livingroom". In French "passer l'aspirateur". -"This story doesn’t have sense” instead of “This story doesn’t make sense". -"Let's go and drink sangria on a teRASse" instead of "Let's go and drink sangria on a '''TER'''race" (pronunciation) or "Let's go drink sangria on a patio." -"I bought two pair of pants" instead of "I bought two pairs of pants", omitting the "s" that signifies multiple items. ''Frenglish'' is a term widely used in Montréal English. CAMEROON See Also: Camfranglais Cameroon has substantial English - and French -speaking populations as a legacy of its colonial past as British Southern Cameroons and French Cameroun . Despite linguistically segregated education since independence, many younger Cameroonians in urban centres have formed a version of Franglais/Franglish from English, French and Cameroonian Pidgin English known as ''Camfranglais'' or ''Frananglais''. Many educational authorities disapprove of Frananglais in Cameroon and have banned it in their schools. Nevertheless, the language has gained in popularity and has a growing music scene.http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/6376389.stm SEE ALSO
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