French Pronouns Research Articles

L’acquisition des pronoms personnels par des apprenants de FLE hispanophones

"The acquisition of personal pronouns in French as a foreign language (FFL) is one of the key points in the learning of French grammar. In order to study this aspect, we have compiled the written production of Spanish-speaking speakers of FFL. The results show that these speakers acquire the personal pronoun system at different at different stages in the learning process in the following order: firstly, they acquire the subject pronouns, secondly the tonic pronouns, then the atonic pronouns, and lastly the pronouns en/y, these results are in line with the studies carried out on the acquisition of personal pronouns in FLE. In this order of acquisition, linguistic competence is also significant."

‘Expand’: From Sur les bouts de la langue and Traduire en féministe/s by Noémie Grunenwald

ABSTRACT The following text is an excerpted chapter from Noémie Grunenwald’s book Sur les bouts de la langue and Traduire en féministe/s, a translation memoir written in French and devoted to Grunenwald's reflections translating ‘as a feminist’ from English into French. This chapter focusses on her experience translating identity markers such as ‘blackness’, ‘butch’, ‘femme’ and others and the difficulty of translating them into a gendered language such as French. She also reflects on the use of inclusive writing in her translations: word endings and pronouns in French that seek to include both genders and avoid having to choose between two. It is followed by a translator’s coda, a mini-translation memoir that tells the story of the difficulties the translator faced translating the chapter.

Nearpod Media for the Development of Teaching Materials for the Production Écrite Débutante Course

This research aims to: (1) develop teaching materials for the Production Écrite Débutante course usingmedianearpodto improve the writing skills of students in the French Education Study Program, (2) assess the suitability of the teaching materials for the Production Écrite Débutante course usingmedianearpod.This research uses the ADDIE (Analysis, Design, Development, Implementation, Evaluation) development model. The research instruments used were questionnaires and written tests. This research is limited to research on the development of teaching materials for the Production Écrite Débutante course using nearpod learning media on teaching materials for possessive pronouns in French to improve the writing skills of UNIMED French Language Education Study Program students. The output targets of this research are publication of international journal articles with a reputation in Scopus/WoS/Copernicus, final research reports registered with copyright, textbooks with ISBN, speakers at international scientific meetings, publications in international proceedings indexed by Scopus or Web of Science.

An Accessibility hierarchy pattern for Resumptive pronouns in spoken French

On the basis of the results of a corpus study on Colloquial French, which show that the distribution of resumptive pronouns globally matches the Accessibility Hierarchy (Keenan, Comrie 1977), we argue that resumptive pronouns in French relative clauses are not intrusive and that resumptive and gapped relatives involve different syntactic derivations belonging to different registers. We explain the lack of the highest subject restriction in Colloquial French, in contrast with (other) languages displaying regular resumptive relatives, by the special nature of French subject clitics as agreement markers (Culbertson 2010). This conclusion and the distribution of subject clitics we found in the corpus reinforces the analysis of the relative complementizerquias a grammaticalized form ofque+obligatory resumptionil(Rooryck 2000; Rizzi, Shlonsky 2007).

An Accessibility hierarchy pattern for Resumptive pronouns in spoken French

On the basis of the results of a corpus study on Colloquial French, which show that the distribution of resumptive pronouns globally matches the Accessibility Hierarchy (Keenan, Comrie 1977), we argue that resumptive pronouns in French relative clauses are not intrusive and that resumptive and gapped relatives involve different syntactic derivations belonging to different registers. We explain the lack of the highest subject restriction in Colloquial French, in contrast with (other) languages displaying regular resumptive relatives, by the special nature of French subject clitics as agreement markers (Culbertson 2010). This conclusion and the distribution of subject clitics we found in the corpus reinforces the analysis of the relative complementizer qui as a grammaticalized form of que+obligatory resumption il (Rooryck 2000; Rizzi, Shlonsky 2007).

Le pronom français On dans la poésie de Iulia Haşdeu. Complexité référentielle et traduction

"The French Pronoun ON in Iulia Haşdeu's Poetry. Referential Complexity and Translation. In our paper, we intend to explain the frequency of the French pronoun ON in the poetry of Iulia Haşdeu and the variety in translating its constructions into Romanian through a comparative stylistic analysis and an enunciative analysis of its occurrences and translations. Due to its indetermination, ON can be used in a lot of contexts, or it can be suppressed in those contexts where predication is more important than reference. Keywords: On, referential complexity, poetry, translation, enunciative analysis "

Relative Clause French: An Approach to Syntactic Typology

This study aims to describe the constituent forms of the French relative clause. The data source of this research is written text, namely the Tendance book. The data analysis method uses the billing method. The result of this research shows that the basic order of clauses in French is of type , namely the verb precedes the object. the object of the preposition is included in the constituent. Nod and Np constituents in the form of pronouns are in front of the verb, the French Relative Clause is not only a delimiter in noun phrases. French has relatively simple pronouns and relatively complex pronouns. The form of the verb that is conjugated will change according to the type (feminine or masculine) or from the angle of form (singular or plural). All relative pronouns in French have their respective functions according to the noun phrase they replace. From the conclusion above, it is clear that every language has its own uniqueness, even though there are similarities or differences.

Étude des références pronominales à soi dans les témoignages d’événements traumatiques de guerre et d’attentats

Étude des références pronominales à soi dans les témoignages d’événements traumatiques de guerre et d’attentats

Avoiding gender ambiguous pronouns in French

Across many languages, pronouns are the most frequently produced referring expressions. We examined whether and how speakers avoid referential ambiguity that arises when the gender of a pronoun is compatible with more than one entity in the context in French. Experiment 1 showed that speakers use fewer pronouns when human referents have the same gender than when they had different genders, but grammatical gender congruence between inanimate referents did not result in fewer pronouns. Experiment 2 showed that semantic similarity between non-human referents can enhance the likelihood that speakers avoid grammatical-gender ambiguous pronouns. Experiment 3 pitched grammatical gender ambiguity avoidance against the referents' competition in the non-linguistic context, showing that when speakers can base their pronoun choice on non-linguistic competition, they ignore the pronoun's grammatical gender ambiguity even when the referents are semantically related. The results thus indicated that speakers preferentially produce referring expressions based on non-linguistic information; they are more likely to be affected by the referents' non-linguistic similarity than by the linguistic ambiguity of a pronoun.

A Contrastive Study of Reflexive verbs in English and French

This paper describes and compares reflexive verbs in English and French. In collecting the data, a number of books and research works related to the subject have been analysed, using the contrastive method. Results of the analysis indicate that reflexives display a great difference between the two languages. The main observed similarity occurs with the emphatic form. Indeed, the English pronouns “myself”, “himself”, “ourselves” etc, and their French counterparts moi-même, lui-même, nous-mêmes are used in the same way. Points of differences are presented as follows: while French puts the pronominal clitics me, te, se, nous, vous before the verb, English places pronouns after e.g., se blesser “to hurt oneself”. One of most important differences that several verbs take reflexive pronouns in French while their English counterparts don’t e.g., se demander “to wonder”. It has also been noted that, in English, the same pronouns are used to express both emphatic and non-emphatic forms while French distinctively uses toi-même, elles- mêmes etc. to emphasize; and the pronominal clitics in simple forms. In the reciprocal voice, the English pronouns “each other” and “one another” are less ambiguous than their French corresponding ones. For instance, Nous nous aimons means both “we love ourselves” (reflexivity) and “we love each other / one another” (reciprocity). Finally, it is shown that some English verbs do not appear with reciprocal pronouns but their French equivalents do e.g., “to meet” se rencontrer.

ON THE TRANSLATION OF THE FRENCH INDEFINITE - PERSONAL PRONOUN ON INTO ARMENIAN

ARAM BARLEZIZYAN - ON THE TRANSLATION OF THE FRENCH INDEFINITE - PERSONAL PRONOUN ON INTO ARMENIAN The system of French pronouns is distinguished by a variety of forms, among which the indefinite personal pronoun On occupies a special place. Its applications are so diverse that a number of linguists call it "the pronominal chameleon." This is confirmed by numerous translations into Armenian. The given indefinite-personal pronoun, characterized by functional and stylistic diversity, is used in different registers of the language, meanwhile there is a special regularity of its use in French colloquial speech. Therefore, the study of this pronoun should be carried out in two main directions: identifying linguistic and contextual polysemy.

Learning French from Spanish and Spanish from French eds. by Patricia V. Lunn, and Anita Jon Alkhas

Reviewed by: Learning French from Spanish and Spanish from French eds. by Patricia V. Lunn, and Anita Jon Alkhas Belén Huarte Lunn, Patricia V., and Anita Jon Alkhas. Learning French from Spanish and Spanish from French. Georgetown UP, 2017. Pp. xviii + 138. ISBN 978-1-62616-425-3. Learning French from Spanish and Spanish from French is a useful book that offers a contrastive view for English speakers who have knowledge of either of those languages and who wish to study them through similar and differing linguistic aspects of each. The use of contrasting analysis between languages as an instrument for learning new ones continues to grow in our field of research, as we can observe if we examine recent trends in language publications. The growth in this research originates from the pedagogical premise that by comparing our first language to previously acquired languages (therefore taking into account prior learning) we can facilitate, in a lot of cases, understanding and, consequently, the acquiring of the target language. It is appropriate to applaud the authors trying to improve the methodologies of teaching by studying the links between the Spanish and the French languages, considering that the body of research in these languages in the bibliography of North America is smaller than that of the English language. This is logical due to English being an "official" language in the United States and in Canada. Nevertheless, in the United States and Canada, there are over 9 million Francophones and more than 41 million Spanish speakers. The work of Lunn and Alkhas contrasts the linguistic aspects expected to be comparable: phonetic differences, genre, the structure of sentences, pronouns, verb conjugations, etc. From these, they have chosen examples or cases deemed as the most difficult for Francophones who [End Page 662] want to learn Spanish and for Spanish speakers who want to acquire French. With this focus on the challenges for these learners, the authors pay much attention to certain phonological contrasts like letters pronounced in a different way, (like b, v, and r) as well as the descriptions of French vowels or the Spanish diphthongs. Also, well-presented and developed in this book are grammatical, syntactical, and lexical concepts, like the function of different pronouns, relatives, and demonstratives, the use of ser and estar, and the structures of some types of phrases, such as the conditional. However, while there are some interesting distinctions in this book that can help the readers as they complete the exercises throughout, there is also a noted imbalance in the treatment of certain linguistic aspects. This is the case of the French pronouns en and y, which are not given much coverage, even though, in the seventh chapter, the difficulty of these pronouns for Spanish speaking students is emphasized. Various linguistics concepts are touched upon, but given the challenges they present to our students, these deserve more profound explanations. Examples of such challenges are the contrastive use between the present perfect and the preterit, which are very different in the two languages, or certain application of the subjunctive that contrast in both languages, as is the case of adverbial conjunctions of time used to express the future in Spanish and its different uses before certain elements such as with the expression of desire or doubt. Another missed opportunity is the brief explanation of the translation of the verb devenir in French. These difficulties are observed frequently in bibliographies that investigate common challenges for our language students. Learning French from Spanish and Spanish from French adopts, in general, linguistic terminology appropriate for work that is going to be used by a mainly university-level audience. However, in the chapter devoted to phonology, although quite thorough, the use of IPA symbols and a more precise terminology to explain certain contrasts of sounds might be more helpful. The book also has a series of activities at the end of each section that require the student to put that knowledge into practice, engaging in oral and written expression as well as in reading and aural comprehension. Some of these exercises, however, are presented with very generic instructions and, in most cases, the student will not be able to benefit from performing them...

L1–L2 differences in the L2 classroom: Anticipating Anglophone learners’ difficulties with French pronoun interpretation

In this article, we address the issue of targeted instruction on interpretive contrasts between native and second-language grammatical meanings. Such mismatches are predicted to create challenges for learners. We illustrate this with French and English pronouns. In French, clitic pronouns ( le, la) point to human as well as inanimate referents, while English pronouns distinguish between human ( him, her) and inanimate ( it) referents. While other grammatical differences between English and French pronouns are taught, this interpretive mismatch attracts less attention in instructional materials. We review the pedagogical literature and report the results of a study investigating this knowledge in Anglophone learners of French as a second language (L2). We document that the mismatch is indeed challenging, particularly to beginning learners, and propose ways to overcome this difficulty.

Understanding Core French Grammar by Andrew Betts

THE FRENCH REVIEW, Vol. 91, No. 1, October 2017 Printed in U.S.A. Methods and Materials edited by Frédérique Grim 195 Betts,Andrew. Understanding Core French Grammar.Wilmington, DE:Vernon, 2016. ISBN 978-1-62273-068-1. Pp. 164. Neither a textbook of French nor a reference grammar, this volume claims to bridge the gap between the two. Betts acknowledges that the book “has evolved from teaching notes over the last 25 years.”It is best seen as a wordy narrative of how French differs from English rather than what the author calls an explanation of “how the core systems of French grammar work.” Chapter 1 shows the formation of the three conjugations in the indicative tenses. The strength of this chapter lies in the abundant side-by-side translations of examples from each of the tenses. One exception is the mistranslation of the passé composé“Ils ont lu”as“They have been reading.”The same kind of mistranslation of the passé composé appears in a tense chart, part of which is regrettably reproduced on the book’s jacket. Verbs conjugated with être in the passé composé are listed according to a cryptic mnemonic (DRAPERS VAN MMT 13). Notably missing from this list of common verbs is the intransitive passer. Chapter 2 treats a miscellany of verb constructions ranging from passives to inversions. Most important in this chapter is what Betts calls a“starter pack”for the subjunctive. Despite his claim that“[t]his is all very vague,”I find consummately clear and incisive his single paragraph explaining the basic contrast between the subjunctive and the indicative and acknowledging that “you will gradually gain a feeling for it.” Chapter 3 on pronouns begins with a ponderous disquisition on English language subjects, direct objects, and indirect objects, all anchored around a classification of verbs into three types. Charts for the French pronouns are abundant. Chapter 4 presents adjectives, adverbs, and articles. Here also is included a cumbersome narrative on when to use C’est or Il est with an adjective before à or de plus the infinitive. Fortunately, many examples are given, leaving it up to the astute reader to intuit the passive or active sense of the infinitive. In the treatment of articles, des is wrongly classified as a plural partitive article rather than the plural indefinite article. The very nature of the partitive is that it cannot be plural. Chapter 5 on the“Primacy of Spoken French”positions the spoken language in the context of Ionesco’s plays characterizing language learning as meaningless rote repetition. The author acknowledges the danger that his self-test exercises in the appendix might fall into the same category as Ionesco’s characterizations . This chapter shows three differences between spoken and written French. An appendix provides exercises for translation into French with answers. They are coordinated with grammar points in the chapters. The entire volume would benefit from a scrub to eliminate a few misspellings, typos, and an inaccuracy in the translation exercises. The book is not intended for the complete beginner, but it might be useful for a beginning teacher who is looking for exact words to help explain to students “why it is like that in French.” La Salle University (PA) Leonard Marsh Billat, Astrid A., and Bénédicte M. Boisseron. La culture francophone: le monde à l’écoute. Indianapolis: Hackett, 2016. ISBN 978-1-58510-392-8. Pp. 325. Integrating culture in language learning is one of ACTFL’s goal areas to improve students’progress towards proficiency, as an emphasis on culture promotes an understanding of the relationship between a foreign language and the three Ps (Products, Practices, Perspectives) of the target culture. Since 2013, with the revisions of the World Readiness Standards for Learning Languages, the teaching of culture in the foreign language classroom has shifted from an instrumentalist approach to a focus on developing intercultural competence by understanding the three Ps and promoting meaningful cultural interactions. In such a context, La culture francophone stands out among its competitors when presenting Products (recipes, literary excerpts, or films). Furthermore, it prompts students to reflect on Perspectives and Practices through the sections entitled Personnalité phare, La vie de tous les...

Grammatical and lexical pronoun dissociation in French speakers with agrammatic aphasia: A usage-based account and REF-based hypothesis

Abstract Background Pronouns have been shown to be impaired in agrammatic production but not all types of pronouns are equally affected. For instance, clitic pronouns are more impaired than non-clitic ones. A usage-based theory of grammatical status suggests a reclassification of pronouns into grammatical and lexical and predicts that grammatical pronouns are more impaired in agrammatic production. Besides, the reorganization of elementary functions (REF) model, which describes the underlying neurocognitive processes of post-injury recovery, explores the variability across individuals with agrammatism. Aims The current study hypothesizes that those pronouns that by the usage-based theory of grammatical status are grammatical are more affected than the lexical ones in agrammatic speech. In addition to this, the REF-model predicts that individuals with agrammatism will either build up unique strategies to cope with the deficit or they will rely more on fixed expressions. Method & Procedures : Spontaneous speech data collected from six French speaking individuals with agrammatism and nine non-injured controls in three different contexts (autobiography, narrative speech and descriptive speech) was used to test the hypothesis. We categorized 137 French pronouns into lexical and grammatical and calculated a grammatical pronoun index (GPI) for the groups and the individual speakers with agrammatism. We also conducted a qualitative analysis to look for adaptive strategies. Results Four individuals with agrammatism out of six produced significantly fewer grammatical pronouns than the non-injured group in the autobiography task. The two individuals with agrammatism who did not significantly differ from the control group were more fluent than the other four. The exclusion of pronouns containing fixed expressions did not result in drastic changes. The pronoun-verb analysis showed that there is no consistent connection between subject pronoun production and verb finiteness. Conclusions Grammatical pronoun production is indeed more severely impaired in agrammatic production. Moreover, the impairment pattern varies across individuals with agrammatism. Variability is observed both across participants with agrammatism and across tasks, which may indicate the use of unique adaptive strategies, as predicted by the REF-model.

Pointing and Self-reference in French and French Sign Language

Abstract The aim of this paper is to conduct an exploratory study and compare the development of pointing and its specific use as self-reference in French sign language (LSF) with the development of pointing and self reference in French. Personal reference is expressed through nominal expressions and pronouns in French. In LSF, the signs used for personal reference have the same form as pointing gestures, which are present in children’s communication system from the age of 10-11 months (Bates et. al 1977, Clark 1978). Continuity between pointing gestures and signs is questioned by Bellugi & Klima (1981) and Petitto (1986), who indicate that signing children’s pre-linguistic pointing gestures are different from signs and correspond to two distinct categories: indexical and symbolic. We present arguments for a continuity hypothesis between pointing gestures and signs. We coded two longitudinal datasets of a French-speaking child and a French Sign Language signing child aged seven months to three years, filmed at home with their mothers once a month. Our analyses enabled us to underline the continuity between the deaf child’s pointing gestures and their incorporation as markers of personal reference into the child’s sign language system.

Pecularities of French Pronoun on Usage in Lithuanian Scientific Discourse

Scientists studying personal identifiers in French scientific discourse incorporate the personal indefinite pronoun “on” into the paradigm. The semantics of the pronoun depends on the genre of scientific discourse. The pronoun “on” can acquire four meanings denoting or including the author. The current paper, based on two databases of native French and Lithuanian authors’ articles, aims at comparing the tendencies of the pronoun “on” usage and its functions in scientific discourse. The analyses has shown that the Lithuanian authors use the personal pronoun almost twice less frequently to mark an author or authors’ denotative or inclusive meaning. In the articles of Lithuanian authors, the pronoun “on” performs fewer pragmatic functions than in scientific discourse of French authors.

DIREKTNA PARCIJALNA PITANJA IZVEDENA POMOĆU PROSTIH UPITNIH ZAMENICA U FRANCUSKOM JEZIKU I NJIHOVI EKVIVALENTI U SRPSKOM

U francuskom jeziku, direktna parcijalna pitanja izvedena pomoću prostih upitnih zamenica podrazumevaju složen sistem u okviru koga su mnogi elementi podložni varijaciji. Pre svega, odabir prostih upitnih zamenica u konkretnom upitnom iskazu zavisi od toga da li se odnosi na bića (qui) ili na stvari i pojmove (que/qu’, quoi). Kada se odnose na stvari i pojmove, proste upitne zamenice, koje spadaju u nepromenljivu vrstu reči, imaju svoj nenaglašen (que/qu’) i naglašen oblik (quoi), a njihova upotreba zavisi od pozicije proste upitne zamenice u upitnom iskazu, kao i od toga da li je ona upotrebljena samostalno ili ne, uz predlog ili bez njega. Između ostalog, u zavisnosti od funkcije upitne zamenice u rečenici, često postoje dvojni upitni oblici: neprošireni (koji zahtevaju upotrebu inverzije osim ako upitna reč ima funkciju subjekta) i prošireni pomoću upitnog izraza est-ce que, est-ce qui (koji zahtevaju isti red reči kao u izjavnoj rečenici). Najzad, u govornom jeziku, upotreba direktnih parcijalnih pitanja izvedenih pomoću prostih upitnih zamenica pokazuje strukturnu varijabilnost koja nosi različita stilska obeležja. U našem radu, oslanjajući se na relevantnu normativnu i deskriptivnu literaturu, kao i na analizu korpusa, nastojaćemo da utvrdimo koji su oblici, u srpskom jeziku, ekvivalentni navedenim direktnim parcijalnim pitanjima.

NATIVE AND NONNATIVE INTERPRETATION OF PRONOMINAL FORMS

This study investigates the influence of grammatical role and discourse-level cues on the interpretation of different pronominal forms in native speakers of French, native speakers of Turkish, and Turkish learners of French. In written questionnaires, we found that native speakers of French were influenced by discourse-level cues when interpreting ambiguous overt subject pronouns in French, whereas native speakers of Turkish were mainly influenced by a syntactic cue—subjecthood—when interpreting null subjects (pro) in Turkish translation equivalents. When interpreting implicit subjects of nonfinite dependent clauses (PRO), native speakers of both French and Turkish were influenced by subjecthood. Finally, Turkish learners of French were influenced by discourse-level cues in the interpretation of overt pronouns as well as PRO and showed no subject preference in either case. These results are in line with approaches to second language (L2) acquisition that stress the role of discourse-level principles in the processing and use of a L2 (Clahsen & Felser, 2006; Klein & Perdue, 1997).

L’emploi des pronoms personnels en polonais (par contraste avec le russe et le français)

Użycie zaimków osobowych w j. polskim (na tle j. rosyjskiego i w kontraście z francuskim) tak w języku fr. jak i w j. polskim zaimki osobowe posiadają formy ortotoniczne i enklityczne. Jednakże użycie tych fom w obu tych językach jest różne, a gramatyki nie uwzględniają tego faktu przy pomocy jasnych reguł. W rodzinie języków słowiańskich j. polski znacznie różni sie od j. rosyjskiego ; bowiem wytworzyły się w nim nowe formy enklityczne zaimka w 3-ej osobie (go i mu), podczas gdy w j. rosyjskim formy enklityczne odziedziczone z prasłowiańszczyzny zanikły w j. współczesnym. Jednakże na nowszym etapie rozwoju j. polskiego jesteśmy świadkami nieprawidłowego używania form ortotonicznych i enklitycznych zaimka w 1-ej osobie (mi zamiast mnie). By wyjaśnić użycie tych dwóch rodzajów form przedstawianych w gramatykach jako warianty pozycyjne, opieram się na Meta-informacyjnej teorii centrów Uwagi (MIc – Meta-Informative centering theory), w której wypowiedzi podstawowe odróźniane są od rozszerzonych na podstawie ich metainformacyjnego statusu (datum/ novum). Form ortotonicznych używa się w wypowiedziach rozszerzonych, to znaczy w ekspresywnych wypowiedziach z punktu widzenia kontrastu między informacjami „ starą” (datum) a „ nową” (novum). Wreszcie kontrast ten pozwala na zdefiniowanie różnicy między topikiem a fokusem. W ramach teorii MIc stało się możliwe) systematyczne zestawienie użyć polskich form enklitycznych (pośród których należy odróżniać zerowe formy mianownika od elipsy podmiotu istniejącej w j. rosyjskim) z użyciami form enklitycznych w językach francuskim oraz rosyjskim, uwzględniając przy tym zagadnienie miejsca podmiotu zaimkowego w szyku wyrazów : przed lub po czasowniku. ogólnie rzecz biorąc używanie zaimków świadczy o tym, że pragmatyczne treści znajdują również bezpośrednie wykładniki zarówno w morfologii jak i składni.