Talk:French/Lessons/Communication

IPA confusion
In connais we see: /kɔ.nɛ/ and then we see (cohnay). This does really sound like how the French say it, but the IPA "ɛ" states that it should sound like the "e" in "ette" or the word "tent".

Whereas, the IPA "e" is used for the "ay" sound.

Can someone explain why IPA "ɛ" sounds like "ay" ? 184.219.72.76 (talk) 18:06, 31 October 2010 (UTC)


 * The IPA given here is consistent with standard pronunciation from sources like Wiktionary and the Centre National de Ressources Textuelles et Lexicales (CNRTL) (note: E is used for "ɛ" in X-SAMPA), so I can't really explain the discrepancy with the approximate pronunciation "cohnay". You might expect to see "cohneh" instead, but this kind of "discrepancy" appears widely throughout the book, so we really need the author (Hagindaz) to explain the sources used. Recent Runes (talk) 20:18, 31 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Thank you for commenting! As a new student, these things really trip me up, but maybe it will make me understand better as I go to various references for pronunciation.  When I first saw "connais" I wanted to pronounce it like all the other "ai" words, but then saw the "ɛ" and started pronouncing it like the "e" "merci" because of this.  Of course people then wrinkled their nose and plugged their ears (smile). 68.241.76.65 (talk) 23:12, 31 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I gave it the standard IPA pronunciation for "ɛ" as "eh" and will do this across the board. Also I will be using (n) for nasal. 132.3.49.68 (talk) 19:31, 3 November 2010 (UTC)


 * I would be interested to know how you are mapping the IPA onto approximate pronunciations. Although I don't have a copy to hand, I believe Berlitz use something like this, but is your scheme the same as theirs? A couple of examples - would you write sa -> sah/sa or pâte  -> paht/pat ? Recent Runes (talk) 19:49, 3 November 2010 (UTC)


 * These were from a course I took once, where the teacher liked 'oh', 'ah', 'ay', 'eh', 'ew', 'uh', 'ee', 'zh', superscript nasal notation, etc. She had "en" as 'ah(n)' and "bien" as 'bya(n)', which was the difference between IPA's 'ɑ̃' and 'ɛ̃'. Seems pretty simple to me, I don't know if others hate it allready :-)  Coupe (talk) 22:06, 3 November 2010 (UTC)


 * I would do "sa" as 'sah' (ah) and "pâte" as 'paht' (ah) as they both have the same IPA 'a'. Coupe (talk) 22:16, 3 November 2010 (UTC)


 * OK, except that "sa" contains the sound [a] and "pâte" contains the sound [ɑ] (or [ɑː], if you take account of the vowel length). Although, from the Wikipedia article on pronunciation it seems like the distinction between [a] and [ɑ] does not occur in some accents. Recent Runes (talk) 23:16, 3 November 2010 (UTC)


 * I'm still a 101 level with flash-cards (smile), but I'll read the article. My dictionary right now, is "Collins" and they have an IPA page with both [a] and [a:] on the same line, with a hint of [after, car, calm] or (ah) basically. Coupe (talk) 23:25, 3 November 2010 (UTC)


 * I have copied some tables from the Wikipedia article into an appendix page for this book, so we have somewhere to record the scheme we are using. Recent Runes (talk) 23:34, 3 November 2010 (UTC)


 * Oh I see now, yes [a] versus [ɑ]. hmm. I look in my notes. Coupe (talk) 23:38, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Well, no help, but Théâtre which has an IPA of [ɑ] shows (ah) also in my teachers notes, so both seem to be kept simple for the level. Coupe (talk) 00:19, 4 November 2010 (UTC)


 * Interesting IPA stuff: ielanguages.com It meantions that [ɑ] is fading from French. 132.3.49.68 (talk) 15:37, 4 November 2010 (UTC)