Tutorials Paper V: Modern French
|
Reading list: Ayres-Bennett, W.
and J. Carruthers with R. Temple. 2001. Studies
in the Modern French Language: Problems and Perspectives. Longman. London.** Ager, Dennis. 1990.
Sociolinguistics and Contemporary French. CUP. Cambridge. Battye, Adrian; Hintze,
Marie-Anne & Rowlett, Paul. 2000. The French Language Today. Routledge. London. (second
edition).** Harris, Martin.
'French', in Harris, Martin & Vincent, Nigel (eds.). 1997. The Romance
Languages .
Routledge. London. [Reprint]. chapter
6, pp. 209-245.** Jones, Michael
Allan. 1996. Foundations of French Syntax. Cambridge University Press.
Cambridge. Lodge, R. Anthony
et al. 1997. Exploring the French Language. Arnold. London.** Sanders, Carol
(ed.). 1993. French Today: language in its social context. Cambridge
University Press. Cambridge. Tranel, Bernard. 1987. The Sounds of French: an
introduction. Cambridge University Press. Cambridge.** Wise, Hilary. 1997.
The Vocabulary of Modern French: origins, structure and function. Routledge. London. Items
marked with •• must be read; it is advised to read at least a few of the
others. |
A. Past Tenses
The relationship between the past tenses of French is not
determined purely semantically; questions of style and discourse structure play
a major role. Discuss.
References:
Ayres-Bennett and others.
2001. Chapters 5 & 6
Benveniste, E. 1966. Problèmes
de linguistique générale,
Paris: Gallimard. (see
chapters on tenses)
Borillo,
Vetters and Vuillaume (eds) 1998. Variation sur la référence verbale,
Amsterdam-Atlanta: Rodopi.
Bres,
J. 1997. 'Habiter le temps: le couple imparfait/ passé simple en français',
Langages, 127:77-95.
Engel, D. M. 1990.
Tense and Text: A Study of French Past Tenses, London: Routledge.
Fleischman, S. 1990. Tense and Narrativity: From Medieval Performance to Modem Fiction,
London: Routledge.
Langages.
112. 1993.
Molendijk,
A. (1990). Le Passé simple et l'imparfait:
Une approche reichenbachienne, Amsterdam: Rodopi.
Pottier, B. (1995). 'Le Temps du monde, le
temps de l'énonciation et le
temps de l'événement', Modèles
linguistiques. 16(1):9-26.
Van Vliet, E. 1983.
'The Disappearance of the French passé simple: A Morphological and
Sociolinguistic Study', Word 34(2):89-113.
Vet, C. and A. Molendijk (1986). 'The
Discourse Functions of the Past Tenses of French', in Lo Cascio,
V. and C. Vet (eds). Temporal Structure in
Sentence and Discourse, Dordrecht: Foris,
pp.133-59.
Vet, C. and C. Vetters (eds).
1994. Tense and Aspect in Discourse,
Berlin-New York: Mouton de Gruyter.
Vogeleer, S. and others (eds).
1998. Temps et discours.
Louvain-la-Neuve: Peeters.
Waugh, L.R. 1987. 'Marking Time with the passé
composé: Toward a Theory of the Perfect', Linguisticae Investigationes
11(1):1-47.
Weinrich,
H. 1973. Le Temps, Paris: Seuil.
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B. Subjunctive
Discuss the view that the use of the French subjunctive is
'inherently variable'.
References:
Abouda,
Lotfi. 2002. ‘Négation,
Interrogation et alternance Indicatif-subjonctif’. Journal of
French Language Studies. 12. 1. p 1-22.
Ayres-Bennett and others.
2001. Chapter 7.
Blanche-Benveniste, C. and others.
1990. Le Français parlé;
études grammaticales,
Paris: éditions du CNRS.
Laurier, M. 1989.
'Le Subjonctif dans le parler franco-ontarien: un mode
en voie de disparition?', in Mougeon, R. and E. Beniak (eds). Le Français canadien parlé hors du Québec: Aperçu sociolinguistique, Quebec: Presses de l'Université Laval, pp. 105-26.
Poplack, S. (1992). 'The Inherent
Variability of the French Subjunctive', in Laeufer,
C. and T.A. Morgan (eds). Theoretical Analyses in
Romance Linguistics: Selected Papers from the Nineteenth Linguistic Symposium
on Romance Languages (LSRL XIX), 21-23 April 1989, The Ohio State
University, Amsterdam-Philadelphia: Benjamins,
pp.235-63. (Photocopies available with Dr. Marnette).
Sand, J.U. (1983). 'Le Subjonctif
en français oral', in Spore, J. and others (eds). Actes du VIIIe congrès des romanistes scandinaves, 17-21 August
1981, Odense, Odense: Odense University Press, pp.303-13.
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C. Word Order
How much sense does it make to say that French is an SVO
language?
References:
Ashby, W. J. 1988.
'The Syntax, Pragmatics, and Sociolinguistics of Left- and Right-Dislocations
in French'. Lingua. 75, p 203-29.
Ayres-Bennett and others.
2001. Chapter 9.
Barnes, Betsy K. 1985. The
pragmatics of left detachment in spoken standard French. Amsterdam ; Philadelphia, PA : J. Benjamins
Pub. Co.
Harris, M. 1985 'Word Order in Contemporary
French: A Functional View', Working Papers in Functional Gramar,
1:1-16.
Jones, M.A. 1996. Foundations of French
Syntax, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Lambrecht,
K. 1987. 'On the Status of SVO Sentences in French Discourse', in Tomlin, R.S.
(ed.). Coherence and Grounding in Discourse: Typological Studies in
Language, Amsterdam: Benjamins, vol II. p. 217-61.
Lambrecht,
Knud. 1984. 'A pragmatic constraint on lexical
subjects in spoken French.' Papers from the regional
meeting, Chicago Linguistic Society. 20:239-56.
Lambrecht,
Knud. 1981. Topic, antitopic,
and verb agreement in non-standard French. Amsterdam :
Philadelphia, Pa : J. Benjamins.
Travaux
de Linguistique 14/15. 1987.
Langue française 111.
1996.
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D. Negation
Discuss the relative importance of the different factors -
syntactic, phonetic, lexical, semantic, stylistic or demographic - which favour the use or non-use of ne in
contemporary French.
References:
Armstrong, Nigel &
Alan Smith. 2002. ‘The influence of
linguistic and social factors on the recent decline of French ne’.
Journal of French Language Studies. 12.1. p 23-42. (recommended available on
internet from Oxford network)
Ashby, W.J. 2001. ‘Un nouveau regard sur la chute du ne en français
parlé tourangeau: s'agit-il d'un changement en cours?’. Journal
of French Language Studies. 11:1-22. (recommended,
available on internet from Oxford network)
Ashby, W.J. 1991. 'When Does
Variation Indicate Linguistic Change in Progress', Journal of French
Language Studies. 1:1-19. (recommended)
Ashby, W.J. 1981. 'The Loss of the Negative
Particle ne in French: A Syntactic Change in Progress', Language.
57:674-87.
Ashby, W.J. 1976. 'The Loss
of the Negative Morpheme, ne in Parisian French', Lingua 39:119-37.
Ayres-Bennett and others.
2001. Chapter 11. (recommended).
Ayres-Bennett, W. 1994.
'Negative Evidence: Or Another Look at the Non-Use of Negative ne in
Seventeenth-Century French', French Studies. 48:63-85.
Coveney,
A. (1996). Variability in Spoken French: A Sociolinguistic Study of
interrogation and Negation, Exeter: Elm Bank.
Coveney, A. (1998) 'Awareness of Linguistic Constraints on Variable ne
Omission', Journal of French Language Studies.
8:159-87. (available on internet from Oxford network)
Diller, A.-M. [1983].
'Subject NP Structure and Variable Constraints: The Case of ne
Deletion', in Fasold, R.W. (ed).
Variation in the Form and Use of Language, Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, pp.167-74.
Moreau, M.-L. (1986).
'Les Séquences préformées:
entre les combinaisons libres
et les idiomatismes: le cas de négation avec ou sans ne', Le Français
moderne. 53:137-60.
Pohl, J. 1968. 'Ne dans
le français parlé contemporain: les modalités de
son abandon', in Quilis, A. (ed).
Actas del XI Congreso
Internacional de Linguistica
y filologia románicas,
vol. 3, Madrid: n.p.,
pp.1343-58.
Pohl, J. 1972. 'Ne et
les enfants', in L'Homme
et le significant, Paris: Nathan; Brussels: Labor,
pp. 107-11.
Pohl, J. 1975. 'L'Omission de ne dans le français contemporain', Le Français dans le monde
111:17-23.
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E. Spelling
Describe the discussion on the 'Réforme
de l'orthographe' in the 20th c.
(problematic, traditionalists versus 'reformists', types of reforms proposed, sociolinguistic
factors at stakes).
Your discussion should include references to the
'rectifications' of 1990 and their most recent discussion (2016). See, for
example, website: http://www.academie-francaise.fr/sites/academie-francaise.fr/files/rectifications_1990.pdf
References:
Arrivé, M. 1993. Réformer l'orthographe? Paris: Presses Universitaires de France.
Blanche-Benveniste, C. and A. Chervel.
1969. L'Orthographe. Paris: Maspero.
Catach, N. 1993. 'Reform
of the Writing System'. In Sanders, C. (ed.) 1993.
French Today: Language in its Social Contex.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp
139-54.
Catach, N. 1991. L'Orthographe en débat. Paris: Nathan.
Catach, N. 1978. L'orthographe.
Paris: PUF (Que Sais-je?), 6th edition revised : 1995.
Desirat & Horde. La langue française au vingtième siècle
(Chapter 7).
Goosse, A. 1991. La 'nouvelle' orthographe. Exposés et commentaires. Paris et
Louvain-la-Neuve: Duculot.
Martinet. Le français sans fard - (Chapter
5).
Masson, M.1991. L'orthographe : guide pratique de
la réforme. Paris: Le Seuil.
Picoche & Marchello-Nizia, Histoire de
la langue française.
Paris: Nathan. Chapter VII.
Rey-Debove, Josette et Béatrice
Le Beau-Beusa. 1991. La réforme
de l'orthographe au banc d'essai
du Robert. Paris: Dictionnaire Le Robert.
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F. Lexicon
Discuss the different mechanisms involved in borrowing
and describe its impact on French lexicon, underlining the interaction between internal
and external factors.
References:
Ayres-Bennett and others.
2001. Chapter 12.
Hagège, C. 1987. Le Français et les siècles,
Paris: Jacob.
Guilford, J. 1997. 'Les
attitudes des jeunes Français
à propos des emprunts à l'anglais'.
La Linguistique. 32. 2:117-35.
Guilford, J. 1999. 'Attribution
du genre aux emprunts à l'anglais'.
La Linguistique. 35. 1:65-85.
Pergnier, M. 1989. Les Anglicismes: danger ou enrichissement pour la langue française,
Paris: PUF.
Pergnier,
M. (ed). 1988. Le Français
en contact avec l'anglais, Paris: Didier.
Picone, M. 1996. Anglicisms,
Neologisms and Dynamic French, Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Poplack,
S. , D. Sankoff and C.
Miller. 1988. The Social Correlates and Linguistic Processes of Lexical
Borrowing and Assimilation', Linguistics 26(1):47-104.
Walter, H. 1997. L'Aventure des mots français venus d'ailleurs, Paris: Laffont.
Walter, H. and C. Walter. 1991. Dictionnaire des mots d'origine
étrangère, Paris: Larousse.
Wise, H. 1997. The Vocabulary of Modern
French: Origins, Structure and Function, London-New York: Routledge.
Zanola,
M-T. 1991. L 'Emprunt lexical anglais
dans le français contemporain: analyse d'un corpus de presse
(1982-1989), Brescia: La Scuola.
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G. Sociolinguistics
In the tension between standard and non-standard modern French
is heading towards a situation describable as 'diglossic'.
Discuss.
Required reading: Fasold 1984. pp 34-60.
References:
Ager, D. 1990.
Sociolinguistics and Contemporary French.
Cambridge: CUP.
Battye,
Adrian and Marie-Anne Hintze and Paul Rowlett. The
French language today: a linguistic introduction. 2nd ed. London: Routledge, 2000. Previous ed.: 1992
Blanche-Benveniste, C. 1997. Approches de la langtue
parlée, Paris: Ophrys.
Blanche-Benveniste, C. and others (1990).
Le Français parlé; études grammaticales, Paris: éditions du CNRS.
Fasold
1984. The Sociolinguistics of society. Oxford:
Blackwell. See pp 34-60 for the definition of diglossia.
Gadet, F. 1989. Le Français ordinaire, Paris:
Colin.
Gadet, F. 1993. Le Français populaire, Paris:
PUF.
Lodge, R. A. French from Dialect to
Standard. London: Routledge. Chapter 8.
Lodge, R. A. and others.
1997. Exploring the French Language. London: Arnold. See pp 22-29.
Martinet, A. 1974.
Le Français sans fard,
2'd edn, Paris: PUF. Paris
Müller, B. 1985.
Le français d'aujourd'hui.
Paris: Klincksieck.
Lambrecht,
Knud. 1981. Topic, antitopic,
and verb agreement in non-standard French. Amsterdam :
Philadelphia, Pa : J. Benjamins. See Introduction.
Rowlett, Paul. “Do French speakers really
have two grammars?” French Language Studies 23 (2013),
37–57. (recommended, available on internet
from Oxford network))
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H. Schwa
'The vowel schwa should not, properly speaking, be viewed as a
vowel in the normal sense at all.' Discuss.
References:
Ayres-Bennett and others.
2001. Chapter 3.
Delattre,
P. 1966. Studies in French and Comparative Phonetics, The Hague: Mouton.
Durand, J., C. Slater and H. Wise (1988).
'Observations on schwa in Southern French', in Slater, C., J. Durand and M.
Bate (eds). French Sound
Patterns. Changing Perspectives, Colchester: Association of
French Language Studies and Department of Language and Linguistics, University
of Essex, pp.71-103.
Fonagy,
I. 1989.'Le Français change de visage', Revue Romane 24:225-54.
Hansen, A.B. 1994. 'Étude
du E caduc: stabilisation en cours
et variations lexicales', Journal
of French Language Studies, 4:25-54.
Lefebvre, A. 1988.'La Prononciation
du 'e-muet' dans la région lilloise est-elle un marqueur social', in
Slater, C., J. Durand and M. Bate (eds). French Sound Patterns. Changing Perspectives,
Colchester: Association of French Language Studies and Department of Language
and Linguistics, University of Essex, pp.71-103.
Léon, P.R. 1978. Prononciation du français standard. Paris: Didier.
Martinet, A. 1972.'La Nature phonologique d'e caduc', in Valdman, A. (ed). Papers in Linguistics and Phonetics to the Memory
of Pierre Delattre, The Hague: Mouton, pp.393-99.
Tranel, B. 1987a. The
Sounds of French. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Tranel, B. 1987b. 'French schwa and
Non-Linear Phonology.' Linguistics. 25:845-66.
Walker, D. C. 1993.
'Schwa and /œ/ in French', Canadian Journal of Linguistics. 38. 43-64.
Walter, H. 1990. 'Une
voyelle qui ne veut pas mourir', in Green, J.N. and W. Ayres-Bennett (eds). Variation and Change in French. Essays Presented
to Rebecca Posner on the Occasion of her Sixtieth Birthday, London: Routledge. pp.27-36.
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I. Text commentaries
Texts will be provided directly by Dr.
Marnette. To learn what a linguistic commentary is, click here.
J. Language and Gender (1)
'La question de la féminisation des
titres est symbolique et non linguistique.'
(Lionel Jospin, Préface
Femme, j'écris ton nom…). Discuss.
Required reading: Femme, j'écris
ton nom...
References:
Armstrong, Nigel [et al.] (éditeurs). 2001. La langue française
au féminin
: le sexe et le genre affectent-ils
la variation linguistique? avec
la collaboration de Marielle Bruyninckx
; préface de Françoise Gadet.
Paris : L'Harmattan, 2001.
Femme, j'écris ton
nom... , Guide d'aide
à la féminisation des noms
de métiers, titres, grades et
fonctions, online: http://web.atilf.fr/FEMININ-Femme-j-ecris-ton-nom,209.html
Brick, Noelle &
Clarissa Wilks. 1994. ‘Et Dieu nomma
la femme: Observation sur la question de la féminisation des noms d'agent et sur les désignations d'Edith Cresson dans la presse.’ Journal of French Studies. 4:
235-9. (available via Solo)
Brick, Noelle &
Clarissa Wilks. 2002. ‘Les partis politiques et la féminisation des noms de métier’. Journal of French Language Studies. 12. 1. p 43-54. (available via Solo)
Fleischman, Suzanne. 1997. ‘The Battle of
Feminism and Bon Usage: Instituting Nonsexist Usage
in French.’ French Review. 70.6: 834-844.
Houdebine,
Anne-Marie. 1987. ‘Le Français au féminin.’
La Linguistique. 23: 13-34.
Trudeau, Danielle. 1988. ‘Changement
social et changement linguistique: la question du féminin.’
French Review. 62.1:77-87.
Yaguello,
Marina. 1978. Les mots et les femmes: Essai d'approche socio-linguistique de la condition féminine.
Paris: Payot.
Also for a broader view on women and language,
you can check out :
Armstrong,
Nigel [et al.] (éditeurs).
2001. La langue française
au féminin
: le sexe et le genre affectent-ils
la variation linguistique? avec la collaboration de Marielle Bruyninckx ; préface de
Françoise Gadet. Paris :
L'Harmattan, 2001.
Aebischer,
Verena. 1985. Les femmes et
le langage. Paris: PUF.
Bailly Sophie, ‘La différence sexuelle
dans la langue : imaginaire ou vérité
?’ in L. Guittienne et M. Prost (eds) Homme - Femme : de quel sexe êtes-vous
? Presses Universitaires de
Nancy, 2009, p. 99-109 http://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/52/03/32/PDF/Bailly_2009_Difference_sexuelle_dans_la_langue_imaginaire_ou_verite.pdf
Bailly,
Sophie, Les Hommes,
Les Femmes Et La Communication. Mais que vient faire le sexe dans la langue? L'Harmattan. 2009.
Coates, Jennifer (éd).
1998. Language and gender: a reader. Oxford: Blackwell.
Coates, Jennifer. 1993. Women, men and
language: a sociolinguistic account of gender differences in language. 2nd
ed. London: Longman.
Crawford, Mary. 1995. Talking difference:
on gender and language. London: SAGE.
Graddol,
David et Joan Swann. 1989. Gender Voices.
Oxford - New York: Blackwell.
Tannen,
Deborah. 1990. You Just Don't Understand: Women and Men in Conversation.
New York: Morrow.
Tannen,
Deborah. 1994. Gender and discourse. New York - Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1994.
Wodak,
Ruth. 1997. Gender and discourse. London: Sage.
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K. Language and Gender (2)
Give a detailed explanation, with reference to studies of modern
French, of what Labov (and others) means by ‘the
Gender Paradox’.
OR
‘There can be no doubt that the social category of gender is
part and parcel of the class system […] and that women’s behaviour is related
to their social status.’ Discuss and illustrate you answer with examples from
French.
References
Ashby, W. (1991). ‘When does variation
indicate linguistic change in progress?’. Journal of French Language
Studies 1: 1-19.
Cheshire, J. (2002). ‘Sex and gender in variationist research.’ In Chambers, J., Trudgill, P. & N. Schilling-Estes (eds).
The Handbook of
Language Variation & Change. Oxford: Blackwell. Pp. 423-443.
King, R. & Nadasdi,
T. (1996). ‘Sorting out morphosyntactic variation in
Acadian French: the importance of the linguistic marketplace.’ In Sociolinguistic Variation: Data, Theory and
Method. Selected Papers from NWAV 23 at Stanford. Stanford, CA: CSLI
Publications. pp. 113-128.
Labov,
W. (1990). ‘The intersection of sex and social class in the course of
linguistic change.’ Language Variation
& Change 2: 205-254.
**Labov, W. (2001). Principles of Linguistic
Change (Oxford, Blackwell). Chapters 8 & 11.
Pooley,
T. (1994). ‘Word-final consonant devoicing in a variety of working class French
– a case of language contact?’ Journal
of French Language Studies 4: 215-234.
--------(1996). Chtimi: the urban vernaculars of northern France. Clevedon:
Multilingual Matters.
-------- (2000). ‘Sociolinguistics, regional
varieties of French and regional languages in France.’ Journal of French Language Studies 10: 117-157.
Price, G. (1993). ‘Pas (point) without ne in
interrogative clauses.’ Journal of French
Language Studies 3: 191-195.
Sankoff, D. & S. Laberge (1978).
‘The linguistic market and the statistical explanation of variability.’ In Sankoff, D. (ed.) Linguistic
Variation: Models and Methods.
Sankoff, G. & D. Vincent (1977).
‘L’emploi productif du ne dans le français parlé à Montréal.’ Le français
moderne 45: 243-256.
Straka,
G. (1952). ‘Le Langage des femmes: enquête linguistique à l’échelle mondiale.’ Orbis 1: 335-357.
Temple, R. A. M. (2000). ‘Now and then: the
evolution of male-female differences in the voicing of consonants in two
varieties of French.’ Leeds Working
Papers in Linguistics and Phonetics 8:
193-204.
Trudgill,
P. (1972). ‘Sex, covert prestige and linguistic change in the urban British
English of Norwich.’ Language in Society
1: 179-195.
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L. Forms of Address
‘Address pronouns tu and vous in French demonstrate different degrees of closeness
and intimacy between the speaker and the hearer/addresses.’ Discuss.
OR
‘It is impossible to give hard and fast rules for the use of tu and vous as pronouns of
address.’ Discuss.
References
Bates, E. & L. Begnini (1975). ‘Rules of address in
Italy: a sociological survey.’ Language
in Society 4: 271-288.
Brown, P. & S.
Levinson (1987). Politeness:
some Universals in Language Usage. Cambridge: CUP.
**Brown, R. & A. Gilman (1976). ‘Pronouns
of power and solidarity.’ In Fishman, J. (ed.) Readings in the Sociology of Language.
Harmondsworth: Penguin. pp.
225-40.
Fasold,
R. (1991). The
Sociolinguistics of Language. Oxford: Blackwell. Chapter 1.
Gardner-Chloros, P. (1991). ‘Ni tu ni vous: principes et paradoxes dans l’emploi des pronoms d’allocution en français contemporain.’ Journal of French Language Studies 1:
139-155.
Head, B. F. (1978). ‘Respect degrees in
pronominal reference.’ In Greenberg, J. H. (ed.) Universals of Human Language.
Vol. 3. Stanford: Stanford University Press. pp.
151-211.
Joseph, J. E. (1987). ‘Subject relevance and
deferential address in the Indo-European languages.’ Lingua 73: 259-277.
Lambert, W. E. & G.
R. Tucker (1976). Tu, vous Usted: a Socio-Psychological
Study of Address Patterns. Rowley MA: Newbury House.
Maley,
C. (1974) The Pronouns of Address in
Modern Standard French. University of Mississippi Romance
Monographs.
Mühlhusler,
P. (1989). Pronouns and People: the
Linguistic Construction of Social and Personal Identity. Oxford: Blackwell.
Schoch,
M. (1978). ‘Problème sociolinguistique
des pronoms d’allocution: ‘tu’ et ‘vous’;
enquête à Lausanne.’ La linguistique 14: 55-73.
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This page was last updated on 1 April 2016.