French Tense Research Articles

Time reference in French-speaking people with fluent and non-fluent aphasia (part II): a cluster analysis

ABSTRACT Background Tense production is often impaired in people with aphasia (PWA). Interestingly, the literature suggests that not all tenses are affected in the same way, although the pattern of dissociation is still debated in the literature. The heterogeneity of tense production deficits in PWA might partly explain this lack of consensus in the literature. While this heterogeneity has been demonstrated by descriptive statistics or double dissociations in several studies, no study has used cluster analyses to highlight the main patterns of tense dissociation. Furthermore, the factors underlying this heterogeneity have been little explored. Aims Our study aimed to use cluster analyses on tense production performance to (1) identify the main patterns of dissociation between tenses in PWA and (2) explore the clinical (aphasia type and severity) and cognitive (executive disorders and temporality) factors that may underlie these patterns. Methods & procedures Twenty-one French-speaking participants with fluent and non-fluent aphasia completed a verb inflection production task, as well as language and cognitive tests. Cluster analyses were performed on the differences in performance between the tenses on the verb inflection production task. Generalized linear mixed models and nonparametric statistics were used to analyze the effect of tense and its interaction with the clusters, and to compare the clusters on the clinical and cognitive variables. Outcomes & results Cluster analyses revealed two main clusters, one with worse performances in the past and future than in the present (PWA_1 – 70% of the PWA), and the other with worse performances in the past and present than in the future (PWA_2 – 30%). The type and severity of aphasia, and cognitive test performance did not differ between the two clusters. On the other hand, the PWA_2 cluster had a longer time post-onset than the PWA_1 cluster. Conclusions Our results confirm the heterogeneity of verb inflection deficits in PWA. They suggest that most PWA would have difficulties with past and future tenses, questioning the presence of discourse linking in these two tenses. However, a minority of PWA, who are clinically and cognitively indistinguishable from the others, do not follow this pattern. Adopting the strategy of producing a morphologically simple tense in French – future – could explain the high performance in the future tense and the errors in substituting other tenses with the future in this subgroup. Finally, the clinical and research implications of this heterogeneity, in relation to therapies and the lack of consensus in the literature, are discussed.

Development of Grammar Competence via Work with the Literary Text in Teaching FFL

In this paper we deal with the issue of teaching foreign language grammar using literature in secondary schools. The aim of this paper is to propose and provide teachers of French as a foreign language with effective and practical didactic recommendations for teaching the past tenses in French through authentic literary text. Working with a literary text has the potential to contribute to the learner's self-development, to the development of his/her reading and language skills, to the development of critical thinking and other important aspects of his/her personality. The literary text chosen is the Quebec short story "Le petit bonhomme de graisse", which meets the criteria for selecting a text for didactic purposes in terms of content and scope. From a linguodidactic point of view, it corresponds to the language level B1 according to the CEFR, at which the learners are confronted with the chosen grammatical phenomenon and the problem of its application in communicative practice. When developing proposals for didactic procedure for working with the selected text, we come out from Rafajlovičová's research of the assessment of grammatical competence from the year 2016, which shows that the application ability of foreign language learners is significantly lower in comparison with the mechanical formation of grammatical forms. The partial aim of this paper is to contribute to the development of grammatical competence and its application to learners' communicational practice. In proposing activities related to authentic literary text, we take into account Slovak learners in Slovak schools, but nevertheless these proposals are applicable in the educational system of other countries, where French is taught as a foreign language. The topic of past tenses in French is one of the most difficult phenomenon to learn and use in communication, as the Slovak language operates with a different grammatical system. The proposed activities serve for effective teaching and acquisition of past tenses in French, not only their formation, but also their application to common communicative situations.

Kesalahan kala bahasa Perancis mahasiswa dengan kemampuan bahasa tingkat menengah

French tenses are one of the most complex and varied aspects of the language, with different verb tenses and grammatical rules that can be challenging for learners to master. The purpose of this study is to analyze the forms of errors in the use of French tenses by learners with an intermediate level of language proficiency and also the factors of these errors. The method used in this research is descriptive qualitative with a morpho-syntax approach supported by questionnaire and questionnaire distribution techniques in the data collection process. In the process of data analysis, we performed data classification technique followed by mark reading technique. After analyzing the data, it was found that most errors were found in the past tense. The forms of errors found are divided into four types, namely omission of important elements, addition of unimportant elements, misinformation, and errors in arrangement. The factors causing the errors found are linguistic and sociolinguistic factors. One of the linguistic factors found is the adjustment of each verb in French while in Indonesian it is not. Regarding the sociolinguistic factors found, one of them is the lack of time in practicing French by the respondents.

Material Use in Collaborative Dialogue by Japanese University Students Learning Future Tenses in French as a Foreign Language: A Discourse and Interaction Analysis

This article reports on the use of an experimental material to enable discrimination between the periphrastic future (PF) and simple future (SF) intended for initial level university students in Japan studying French as a Foreign Language. A dyad was filmed using the material in a task on tense choice in short dialogues modelled on Galperin’s procedure. A discourse and interaction analysis were then performed on excerpts of the videoed session where the participants interacted with the material. It was found that the material enabled the dyad to complete the task. Moreover, if the pragmatic effect of the SF was not fully grasped, the analysis nonetheless showed that the participants transformed the linguistic knowledge from the material into metalinguistic resources of their own, and that internalization of the targeted concepts occurred to some extent.

Present tense in relative clauses as evidence for sequence of tense in French

The paper accounts for an unexpected embedded present tense, which denotes a future time in French relative clauses. The matrix displays either the periphrastic future or the simple future. In both cases, one can arguably decompose the matrix into a present tense feature and a forward shifter. This move leads to an analysis of the morphology encountered in the relative clause as an instance of Sequence of tense.

Анализ семантических характеристик грамматических временных форм английского и французского языков в пространстве будущего времени

Анализ семантических характеристик грамматических временных форм английского и французского языков в пространстве будущего времени

Learning opacity in Stratal Maximum Entropy Grammar

Opaque phonological patterns are sometimes claimed to be difficult to learn; specific hypotheses have been advanced about the relative difficulty of particular kinds of opaque processes (Kiparsky 1971, 1973), and the kind of data that is helpful in learning an opaque pattern (Kiparsky 2000). In this paper, we present a computationally implemented learning theory for one grammatical theory of opacity, a Maximum Entropy version of Stratal OT (Bermúdez-Otero 1999, Kiparsky 2000), and test it on simplified versions of opaque French tense–lax vowel alternations and the opaque interaction of diphthong raising and flapping in Canadian English. We find that the difficulty of opacity can be influenced by evidence for stratal affiliation: the Canadian English case is easier if the learner encounters application of raising outside the flapping context, or non-application of raising between words (e.g. life with [ʌɪ]; lie for with [aɪ]).

РЕПРЕЗЕНТАЦИЯ НОНКАЛЬНОЙ РЕФЕРЕНЦИАЛЬНОЙ ТОЧКИ ВРЕМЕННЫМИ ФОРМАМИ НАСТОЯЩЕГО ПЕРИОДА В АНГЛИЙСКОМ, ФРАНЦУЗСКОМ И ТАТАРСКОМ ЯЗЫКАХ

РЕПРЕЗЕНТАЦИЯ НОНКАЛЬНОЙ РЕФЕРЕНЦИАЛЬНОЙ ТОЧКИ ВРЕМЕННЫМИ ФОРМАМИ НАСТОЯЩЕГО ПЕРИОДА В АНГЛИЙСКОМ, ФРАНЦУЗСКОМ И ТАТАРСКОМ ЯЗЫКАХ

Bilingual Acquisition: Pedagogical implications for teaching present indicative tense in French

To analyze bilingual acquisition, links are made between contributions of studies on bilingualism and those of error analysis and interlanguage studies, which consider language acquisition as the development of a transitional competence. This evolution is apparent in the development of particular linguistic structures, such as present indicative morphology in written French. It can be seen that discourse of 30 Mexican university students who completed 140 hours of learning contains both inter- and intralingual features, but the proportions of these in our sample suggest that the student’s interlanguage is no longer characteristic of subtractive and compound bilingualism, both relying on the mother tongue, but rather of incipient coordinate bilingualism

Regrammation and paradigmatization: Diachronic analysis of a number of progressive periphrases in French

ABSTRACTIn the present article, our purpose is to characterize each of the periphrases expressing progressivityPierre est / va / s’en va / vient / s’en vient chantant, Pierre est à / après chanter, Pierre est en train de chanteras members of a progressive paradigm, and to provide arguments in favour of including the so-called deictic relative construction (Je vois) Pierre qui chantein this paradigm. Our arguments comprise diachronic, diastratic, Francophone, and Creole evidence. In Kragh and Schøsler (2014), we have examined in detail this construction, focusing on the grammaticalization process and, in particular, on the reanalysis and actualization process. We here propose an analysis of the deictic relative as yet another way of expressing progressivity. If our analysis is correct, the deictic relative should be considered as a member of the French tense, aspect, and mode (TAM) paradigm.

A Comparative Study of English TENSE and French TENSE

Since English and French, under Indo-European family, are subject to different branches, these two languages have similarities and differences which are quite essential for Chinese students either majoring in English with French as their second foreign language or in French with English as their second foreign language. The similarities between English and French make it easier for students to learn French or English, while the differences usually confuse the students’ French-learning or English-learning. And above all, when students learn French TENSE, they often compare it with English TENSE, trying finding the similarities and differences between these two languages. The present paper aims at conducting a comparative study of English and French TENSES to find out the similarities and differences in their usages and structures, which is significant to enhance the students’ impression of two languages’ TENSES and clarify some misunderstandings in both English TENSE and French TENSE learning.

Dalila Ayoun, The Second Language Acquisition of French Tense, Aspect, Mood and Modality. (AILA Applied Linguistics Series, 10.) Amsterdam / Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 2013, xiii + 252 pp. 978 90 272 0526 1 (hardback), 978 90 272 7178 5 (e-Book)

Dalila Ayoun, The Second Language Acquisition of French Tense, Aspect, Mood and Modality. (AILA Applied Linguistics Series, 10.) Amsterdam / Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 2013, xiii + 252 pp. 978 90 272 0526 1 (hardback), 978 90 272 7178 5 (e-Book) - Volume 24 Issue 3

Book and Software Reviews / Critiques de livres et de logiciels

D. Ayoun (2013), The Second Language Acquisition of French Tense, Aspect, Mood and Modality. reviewed by Anita Thomas. J. W. Schwieter (Ed.). (2013), Innovative Research and Practices in Second Language Acquisition and Bilingualism. reviewed by Larissa Buss. S. Galligani, S. Wachs et C. Weber, dirs. (2013), École et langues. Des difficultés en contextes. reviewed by James Archibald. S. Jarvis & M. Daller (Eds.). (2013), Vocabulary Knowledge: Human Ratings and Automated Measures. reviewed by Michael P.H. Rodgers.

The Second Language Acquisition of French Tense, Aspect, Mood, and Modality par Dalila Ayoun

Reviews 285 techniques ou trop détaillées semblent un peu longues, et la dernière partie du roman, qui décrit la création de la confrérie, est souvent invraisemblable (on a du mal à imaginer une trentaine de SDF qui entrent chez des dormeurs sans les réveiller). Pourtant, le roman invite le lecteur à entrer dans le jeu, à s’aventurer hors des confins du texte pour consulter une carte de l’Institut géographique national dont se sert le narrateur, y repérant des “zones blanches”, ou pour examiner les images satellites sur . Le jeu entre vérité et fiction chez Vasset, et ses projets sur les zones blanches (Un livre blanc, récit de 2007 qui décrit des explorations de l’Île-deFrance , et l’Atelier de géographie parallèle, collectif fondé par l’auteur, qui a pour objectif d’établir la géographie de ces zones) font en sorte que le lecteur se demande s’il n’y a pas parmi nous, dans les grandes villes, des promeneurs qui explorent les interstices urbaines, nous observant tout en restant invisibles. Eastern Illinois University Kathryn M. Bulver Linguistics edited by Stacey Katz Bourns Ayoun, Dalila. The Second Language Acquisition of French Tense, Aspect, Mood, and Modality. Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 2013. ISBN 978-90-272-0526-1. Pp. 252. $143. The intertwined concepts of tense, aspect, and modality (TAM) are perennial topics of investigation in the fields of linguistics and second language acquisition. These ways of communicating the timing of an event and its internal and external structure can differ substantially among languages,and such cross-linguistic differences are likely causes for difficulties in second language (L2) acquisition. The language learning pairing of French and English—the focus of this volume’s investigation—is notorious for confusion stemming from the fact that English tends to contrast perfective and progressive aspect, whereas the key contrast in French is perfective versus imperfective. The volume’s first three chapters introduce and catalog these and other features of TAM in the two languages, providing a background that is both descriptive from a theory-neutral perspective and explanatory within the Minimalist framework. A review of the extant research on L2 TAM acquisition takes a similar tack, first presenting an overview of less theory-dependent work and then shifting to a discussion of the generative research on French and other languages. The main contribution of the volume reports a large-scale study on L2 French, in which a series of elicitation tasks, cloze tests, and grammaticality judgment tasks were used to examine TAM in L2 learners. These tasks revealed that performance improved with increasing proficiency and that learners were capable of acquiring TAM features but did not use them systematically. Following a Minimalist account of TAM in the L2, Ayoun concludes that successful Anglophone learners of L2 French acquire several functional categories (Agreement Phrase, Tense Phrase, Mood Phrase), the appropriate mapping of the [perfective] feature on verbal morphology, the indicative-subjunctive distinction, and other features. The volume concludes with a section on “pedagogical implications” that, unexpectedly, is actually devoted more toward giving a general overview of SLA and pedagogical theories, rather than making specific suggestions for improving learners’ intake with respect to TAM issues. The suggestions that are made, on the other hand, offer common-sense advice to educators: TAM is best taught, Ayoun argues, by giving clear, explicit instruction using appropriate terminology; by relating TAM to universal concepts of time, temporality, and discourse; by relating new content to learners’ existing knowledge of TAM in their L1; and by appealing to metalinguistic knowledge. The volume is of great use on three levels. First, it provides a straightforward, thorough, and systematic rundown of the differences and similarities in TAM between English and French, thereby offering value to educators and linguists interested in reviewing or deepening their familiarity with this area. Second, the original study reported in the volume is impressive in its scope, and the volume handily sidesteps the long-term limitations of chaining itself to a current theoretical model of generative syntax by providing large amounts of descriptive data that are relevant to any syntactic-theory-neutral approach to second language acquisition . Finally...

Modales ambiguos

This article explores the interaction of Tense, Aspect and Modality in French, Italian and Spanish, languages in which Modals are inflected as main verbs. Imperfective modals are a-averidical, as modals are expected to be, but when they appear in a perfective tense, unexpected entailments and implicatures appear. For example, the following example is three-way ambiguous in Spanish; the corresponding example is two way-ambiguous in Italian and French: P. may have won, could have won, managed to win the race The three readings, epistemic, counterfactual and implicative, are derived from the alternative orderings of three heads, Tense, Aspect and Modal; any ordering in which Modal scopes over Tense is out on semantic grounds; these leaves three possible orderings which result in the three readings. In the epistemic construal, Modal has scope over Tense and Aspect, which are read on the infinitive. As a result, Modal Evaluation Time is at Utterance Time and the lower infinitive is Past and Perfective. There is no interaction between Modal and the other two heads and averidicality is the result. In the counterfactual reading,Tense scopes over Modal, which in turn scopes over Aspect: the result is a past Modal Evaluation; Perfective Aspect makes the interval in which verifying instances of the lower event are sought bounded, which contributes settledness. These are the crucial ingredients for counterfactuality. When Tense and Aspect are both read on the modal, the lower event is entailed and an implicative reading ensues. Italian and French do not have the counterfactual reading because their only surviving perfective past is a morphological perfect which, since it involves a resulting state, is incompatible with counterfactuality. Spanish perfecto also lacks this reading.

Students' Gender and Ability Levels Impact on the Acquisition of Two French Verb Tenses

The usage of passé composé and imparfait is one of the most challenging topics in French grammar for anglophone learners. Based on the aspect hypothesis formulated by Andersen and Shirai (1994), this study explored the patterns of errors made by higher-ability as opposed to average-ability students and male vs. female students with different abilities in the acquisition of the two French tenses. A model for predicting the difficulty of test items related to passé composé and imparfait was previously devised by Nikolova (2009). The current article further develops the ideas in the above-mentioned study and examines similar data from a more pedagogical point of view. It brings forth evidence that female students scored better than males on prototypical usage of the tenses and females of high ability outperformed all other groups on instances of their nonprototypical usage. The study discusses these results in light of findings on giftedness, gender, and second-language acquisition. It suggests ideas for differentiating instruction for various groups of students attempting to master this grammatical topic.

Bilingual children's acquisition of the past tense: a usage-based approach

Bilingual and monolingual children's (mean age=4;10) elicited production of the past tense in both English and French was examined in order to test predictions from Usage-Based theory regarding the sensitivity of children's acquisition rates to input factors such as variation in exposure time and the type/token frequency of morphosyntactic structures. Both bilingual and monolingual children were less accurate with irregular than regular past tense forms in both languages. Bilingual children, as a group, were less accurate than monolinguals with the English regular and irregular past tense, and with the French irregular past tense, but not with the French regular past tense. However, bilingual children were as accurate as monolinguals with the past tense in their language of greater exposure, except for English irregular verbs. It is argued that these results support the view that children's acquisition rates are sensitive to input factors, but with some qualifications.

Sequence of tense in (French) child language

We discuss the results of an L1 French comprehension study of the construal of present and imperfective past in (non) subordinate contexts. Our findings reveal that children accept (sometimes enforce) non-indexical simultaneous construals of both present and past under a matrix past — though present is utterance-indexical in adult French. Extending Kratzer’s (1998) zero-tense analysis of English past under past simultaneous construals to Japanese present under past simultaneous construals, we argue that zero-tenses in L1 French surface either as past (adult French) or as present (adult Japanese). That children allow multi-valued parameter settings is expected on the Multiple Grammars hypothesis where language acquisition involves grammar competition. We extend our zero-tense analysis of non-adult tense construals in subordinate contexts to non-subordinate contexts, by arguing that the binder of a zero-tense in child grammar can be a temporal adverb denoting the ‘now’ of the speaker or some salient time implicit in the context.

Ecriture romanesque burkinabè: une écriture hétérogène, des textesentre écrit et oral

A French person perusing some Burkinabè novels would undoubtedly be surprised or even baffled by tense transitions. These are often not typical, and the purists of the French language would unquestionably condemn them. Yet, these transitions express the potentials inherent in the French tense system. Some linguistic theories, like Benveniste’s, if not used mechanically and sketchily, may help account for these “turbulence zones,” as some people have labelled them. My paper aims to show how, in most Burkinabè novels, this tense transition game allows for switching from one tense to another: from the Past Perfect (PP) to the Simple Past (SP) and Pluperfect (PLP), from the Present PRES to the Imperfect (IMP), and from the Future (FUT) to the Conditional (COND). This takes place in all narrative spaces, in a perfect linguistic legality. Some have explained these often unpredictable transitions as being the result of a switch between, a telescoping, of two different types of narration, two enunciation points of view of the narrator (linked diegesis and autonomous diegesis). However, this switching-telescoping may also be interpreted as the narrator oscillating between a written narration and an oral narration. We see this phenomenon as a form of intrusion or irruption, not necessarily a conscious one, of orality into writing. Hence, Burkinabè novels are heterogeneous in nature, evolving between writing and orality, and this is one of the manifest trends of novel writing in Burkina Faso.&nbsp

The Burkinabè novel: heterogeneous writing, texts located between written and oral forms

A French person perusing some Burkinabe novels would undoubtedly be surprised or even baffled by tense transitions. These are often not typical, and the purists of the French language would unquestionably condemn them. Yet, these transitions express the potentials inherent in the French tense system. Some linguistic theories, like Benveniste's, if not used mechanically and sketchily, may help account for these “turbulence zones,” as some people have labelled them. My paper aims to show how, in most Burkinabe novels, this tense transition game allows for switching from one tense to another: from the Past Perfect (PP) to the Simple Past (SP) and Pluperfect (PLP), from the Present PRES to the Imperfect (IMP), and from the Future (FUT) to the Conditional (COND). This takes place in all narrative spaces, in a perfect linguistic legality. Some have explained these often unpredictable transitions as being the result of a switch between, a telescoping, of two different types of narration, two enunciation points of view of the narrator (linked diegesis and autonomous diegesis). However, this switching-telescoping may also be interpreted as the narrator oscillating between a written narration and an oral narration. We see this phenomenon as a form of intrusion or irruption, not necessarily a conscious one, of orality into writing. Hence, Burkinabe novels are heterogeneous in nature, evolving between writing and orality, and this is one of the manifest trends of novel writing in Burkina Faso. Keywords : Verbal temporality, semantics, discourse analysis, francophone literature. > Tydskrif vir Letterkunde Vol. 44 (1) 2007 pp. 51-69