Reading rules and phonetics of French. Speech flow word stress in French

Friends, let's talk to you about such a phonetic phenomenon as stress in French. As you know, stress is the highlighting of one of the components of speech by some acoustic means: sound, intonation. Beginners who have just started learning the French language may experience difficulties, wondering which syllable is stressed in French words?

Those who have already become familiar with the French language have noticed that the stress in French words always falls on the last syllable. In general, stress in the French language is a very curious thing, and, therefore, interesting for those who study this language. Because in this language there is not only sound, but also graphic, that is, written stress, which has its own, very important function in words. This is exactly what we will talk about today.

So, dear readers, as we have already said, in French the emphasis in words falls on the last syllable. And words with stress on the last syllable are called oxytones - lesoxytons. Pay attention to the examples of French words. We have specially highlighted the letter of the word so that you can notice which syllable the stress falls on:

parlEr – to talk, to talk
demandEr – ask
raisonnAble - reasonable
chansOn – song
rougIr – to blush

In French, entire phrases and sentences can be oxytones. This means that the stress falls on the last word in the sentence (and, of course, on the last syllable of the last word). For example:

Je vais à l'écOle. - II'm comingVschool.
TuparlesavectamÈ re. – You are talking to your mother.
Charles cherche son amI. – Charleslooking forhisfriend.

This phenomenon is very convenient for those learning French. Because you can never make a mistake in what emphasis to pronounce words with. Just stress all words on the last syllable and no problem!

We've dealt with sound stress, now let's move on to graphic stress. There are four such stresses in the French language. Don't be surprised, now you will find out everything!

Les accents en français

Graphic signs above French words are called les or accents. There are only four of them, and they are called l'accentgravel'accentaigu,l'accent circonflexe And letréma.

Now let's see how they are indicated in writing:

l'accent grave (à, è etc.) – fr è re, m è re,p è re
l'accent aigu (é )) – piti é ,charit é , enchant é
l'accent circonflexe (î, ô, â, ê etc.) – thé â tre, s'il vous pla î t
le tréma (ï etc.) – ma ï s, Citro ë n

Friends, pay attention to the table in which we present the general rules and functions of graphic accents in the French language:

Now pay attention to the use of graphic stresses with letters and basic letter combinations in French:

Beginners to French mistakenly think that these sticks, dots and caps over vowels are completely unnecessary. But if you miss such an emphasis in the word in which it should be, you will make a grave mistake. Yes, yes, friends, omitting graphic accents is a grammatical error. Because all these necessary and important in the French language.

The fact is that l'accentgrave indicates a closed syllable in a word. It needs to be pronounced with a more open mouth. L ’ accentaigu indicates an open syllable. When pronouncing, the mouth should be slightly closed. Letréma indicates that an unpronounceable vowel should be pronounced . Well and l'accentcirconflexe– this is a whole separate conversation.

Everything you want to know about l'accent circonflexe

L'accentcirconflexe can appear above any French vowel: â, ê, î, ô, û or letter combination: aî, eî, oî, eû, oû, oê = , except y, au, eau.

Here are a few rules regarding this cap over vowels:

L'accentcirconflexe never stands above a vowel that precedes two consonants (except for indivisible groups: tr,cl etc.) and letter X. Exceptions: a) before double ss in words châssis-chassis,châssis-frame, and in verb forms croître; b) in passé simple verbs venirtenir and their derivatives: nousvînmes,vousvîntes etc.
L'accentcirconflexe never appears above a vowel followed by another vowel, whether the latter is pronounced or not, for example: crû(m.r.), but: crue(f.r.). Exception: bâiller.
Combination of two vowels l'accentcirconflexe always stands above the second one: traître, theater.
It is not placed above the last letter of the word. Exception: participles dû, crû, mû, interjections ô, allô and foreign words and names ( Salammbô etc.), onomatopoeia ( mê-ê!).
L'accentcirconflexe doesn't stand above e, if this is the first letter in the word. Exception: être.
L'accentcirconflexe never placed above nasal vowels. Even when l is used in a given root ’ accentcirconflexe, it disappears if the vowel takes on a nasal timbre: traîner,entraîner, But: train,entrain;jeûner, But: à jeun. Exceptions: nous vînmes, vous vîntes and so on.
L'accentcirconflexe never breaks letter combinations, unlike l'accent aigu And le trema.

Graphic stress in French

Presence in a word l'accentcirconflexe is explained by several factors.

Etymological factor - it replaces the disappeared letter.
Phonetic factor - it denotes the duration of a vowel in combination with a change in its timbre.
Morphological factor - it is involved in some types of word formation.
Differentiating factor - it serves to distinguish homonyms.

More often l'accentcirconflexe in words, replaces a letter that has disappeared from a particular word. It all depends on the origin of the word. This suggests that once these letters were in these words, but with the development of the language, they were abolished or disappeared as unnecessary, and in their place arose l'accentcirconflexe, to remind you of the missing letter.

For example: fête -festival - festival; âme –anima – soul;sûr –seur -securum - reliable, confident.

How to deal with these graphic symbols over French words? There is no other way out - you just need to memorize and remember the words in which they are present. And to do this, you need to work with French texts as much as possible, and then stress in French will not cause difficulties. Good luck!

French belongs to the Romance group of languages (this also includes Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Latin). The common ancestor of these languages is Latin.

If you want to start learning French, it won't hurt you to know about some of its features in terms of grammar, phonetics and some other aspects.

I will give those features that, in my opinion, are the most significant and that distinguish French from Russian and other (for example, English) languages. By the way, English belongs to the Germanic group of languages (German also belongs here).

Grammatical features of the French language

The presence of an extensive system of articles. Unlike English, which has only two articles that do not change their form, French has three types of articles - definite, indefinite and partial (partitive). They all change according to gender and number. In addition, there is a fused article that merges with a preposition. I will list some articles for clarity - un, une, des, le, la, les, du, au, aux.
Availability of verb conjugations. Verbs in French are conjugated according to persons and numbers. There are three groups of verbs, where the first two are conjugated according to certain rules, and (the most extensive) does not obey general rules. However, within the third group there are certain subgroups that have their own logic of conjugation; it is easier to study them in groups.
Changing nouns and adjectives by gender and number. There are two genders - masculine and feminine (there is no neuter gender). The gender of nouns needs to be remembered, since it often does not coincide with the gender of nouns in Russian. For example, table - la table - in Russian it is masculine, in French. – female; handle – le stylo – feminine in Russian and masculine in French, respectively. Adjectives agree with nouns in gender and number.
The presence of 4 moods and a branched system of tenses(other than English). It is difficult to name the exact number of tenses in the French language, but there are approximately 20-22 of them (if we take into account all moods).

To summarize, the main feature of French grammar is that words have a high degree of variability, that is, they change according to gender, number, person, and agree in gender and number with other members of the sentence (as in Russian). Therefore, it is not so easy to master competent writing. There are no cases in French.

Phonetic and spelling features of the French language

In French the stress always falls on the last syllable. This makes learning easier. There is also phrasal stress. The sentence is divided into rhythmic groups. Words in French are pronounced in a common flow, merging with each other (the so-called phenomena of cohesion and binding), that is, each word is not separated by a pause, as, for example, in the Russian language. This is where the melody of French speech comes from.
Presence of nasal vowels and semivowels. Nasals (sonants) – 4, semivowels – 3.
Presence of diacritics. For example, in words é couter, je me l è ve, t ê te, fran ç ais, h é ro ï ne. In these examples, you see different icons above the letters and ç. Such icons are needed to distinguish sounds and affect pronunciation and reading, and some have historical roots.
Quite clear and simple reading rules. Learning to read in French, in my opinion, is easier than in English, since there is a certain set of rules for reading vowels and consonants. . There are exceptions, but not too many.

Is it easy to learn French?

Any language needs to be learned, you need to spend a lot of time doing independent work, you need to learn a lot by heart, read, listen, memorize, and most importantly, practice and repeat, and French in this regard is no exception.

If you devote enough time to your studies, you can begin to express yourself on simple topics quite soon; in six months you will be able to tell simple information about yourself, your family, your home, and ask simple questions on everyday topics.

If you speak any other European language (Italian, English), then it will be easier for you to master French as a second language, since they have some similarities.

However, in general, English and French grammar are very different, and there are some similarities in vocabulary.

In order to master all aspects of speech at a high level - this includes listening, reading, writing, speaking - it will take several years.

In general, I cannot call French difficult, but at the same time, I believe that there are no simple languages. No language can be mastered in two weeks, a month or six months, as many courses or tutorials promise.

Everything can be mastered if you study systematically and constantly. And also in learning any language, an important aspect is to study the culture of the country of the language being studied, since language and culture are inseparable concepts.

Accent in French
In French (unlike Spanish and Italian), the stress of a single word falls on the last pronounced syllable: couleur color, illusoire illusory.

A peculiarity of French stress is that in a phrase it falls not on the last syllable of each individual word, but on the last syllable of a group of words, which is called a rhythmic group. If in Russian we must pronounce each word in a phrase with its own emphasis: He is going to school, then in a French sentenceII va à l’écolethere can be only one stress on the last spoken syllable.
The minimum rhythmic group consists of:
a) A significant word with related functional words, as well as pronouns: je ne veux pas I don't want [ʒənəvøpa].
b) Groups of words expressing one concept: chemin de fer railway [ʃ(ə)mɛ̃dəfɛr].
c) A noun with an adjective in front of it or an adverb before an adjective: mauvais éleve bad student .
Defining polysyllabic words that come after the defining form a separate rhythmic group: femme mechante angry woman, and monosyllabic ones - one group with a defined word: parler haut speak loudly.
Along with the usual stress, the French language has a so-called intensifying stress (accent d’insistance).
This stress falls on the first consonant of the word that is subject to special emphasis: C'est "formidable. This is great!

Intonation
In an isolated short rhythmic group, the voice rises then falls on the last syllable of an affirmative sentence. In the rhythm group il arrive demain he arrives tomorrow. The last syllable of main is pronounced on a lower note than the others. In an interrogative sentence to which the answer is "yes" or "no", il arrive demain? the last syllable main is pronounced on a higher note than all other syllables.
Longer sentences are divided into two melodic parts: the first is the rising part, the second is the falling part. So, in the phrase quoted by P. Fouche: Ils sont venus tous les deux cet après-midi m’apporter de la musique et des livres. They both came this afternoon to bring me sheet music and books. First part: i ls sont venus tous les deux cet après-midi is pronounced with a tone constantly increasing from one rhythmic group to another, and the second m'apporter de la music et des livres pronounced on a falling tone. The pitch rises towards the center of the phrase and falls from the center to the end. The top of the highest pitch coincides with the strongest stress.

Description of the presentation by individual slides:

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Stress STRESS IN A WORD In Russian, the stress in a word can fall on any syllable and move depending on the change in the form of the word: essence (1st syllable), nationality (4th syllable), hand - hands, head - heads. The French language is characterized by constant stress: in an isolated word, the stress always falls on the last pronounced syllable: administratif.

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STRESS IN THE SPEECH STREAM Rhythmic group and rhythmic stress The distribution of stress in the speech stream in French is fundamentally different from the distribution of stress in Russian. In the Russian language, when combining words into semantic groups, each word retains its emphasis: “I chi”taya “I chi”tayu | a good book. In the French language, the stress in the speech flow is not carried by each word within a semantic group, but by the semantic group as a whole. Thus, the semantic group is at the same time a group of one stress, a rhythmic group, and the number of stresses in a phrase is determined not by the number of words (as in Russian), but by the number of rhythmic groups: Je lis. [Ĵə -"li] Je lis | un bon livre. [Ĵə-"li | ǽ-bõ-"li:vr]

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LINKING SOUND IN THE SPEECH STREAM In the French language, in the stream of speech, it is difficult to grasp the boundary between words: words are not separated from each other in any way, as is the case in Russian. This is explained by the phenomena of cohesion (enchainement), vocal linkage (liaison vocalique) and linkage (liaison) of sounds in the speech stream characteristic of the French language, thanks to which a continuous flow of syllables is achieved from pause to pause.

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Clutch. Enchaînement If a word ends with a pronounced consonant or group of indivisible consonants, and the word that follows it begins with a vowel, then the final pronounced consonant of the previous word forms a syllable with the initial vowel of the next word. Thus, in the stream of speech, syllables can consist of elements belonging to two different words: Elle^est malade. [ε-lε-ma-"lad] Cohesion is obligatory both within the rhythmic group and between rhythmic groups, within the syntagma: Elle^aime. Claire^et Michel^habitent Orleans. .

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Binding. Liaison If, within a rhythmic group, one word ends with an unpronounceable consonant and the second begins with a vowel or a silent h, this unpronounceable final consonant of the first word becomes pronounced by merging with the initial vowel of the subsequent word and forming with it one syllable. When linked, the consonants s and x are voiced and go into [z], the consonant d is deafened and goes into [t]: les__enfants deux__eleves un grand__arbre [ǽ-grã- "tarbr".

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Linking is required: 1. Between the article, possessive or demonstrative adjective and the word following them: les__eleves mes__amis cet__eleve. 2. Between the attribute expressed by an adjective or numeral and a noun: un grand__ami [ǽ-grã-ta-"mi] mes deux__amis mes vieux__amis ses elegantes__amies. 3. Between a subject pronoun and a verb or between a verb and adverb pronouns en and y vous__êtes parlez-en ils__aiment je les__aime [Ĵə-1е-"zε:m] ils__habitent allez-y.

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4. Between a verb and a subject pronoun during inversion: parlent-ils? Fait-elle? . 5. Between the 3rd person singular and plural auxiliary verb and the past participle: il est__alle ils sont__alles. 6. Between the linking verb in the 3rd person singular and plural and the nominal part of the predicate: il est__etudiant ils sont__heureux. 7. Between the prepositions dans, en, chez, sous, sans, des and the word following them: en__ete [ã-ne-"te]

Let's start with the rules of reading. I just beg you: don’t try to learn them right away! Firstly, it won’t work - after all, there are a lot of them, and secondly, it’s not necessary. Everything will settle down over time. You can just look at this page periodically. The main thing is to read them carefully (maybe more than one sitting), look at the examples, try to do the exercises and check yourself - next to the exercises there is a sound - how the French pronounce the same words.

During the first six lessons, in a separate tab you will find a cheat sheet for all French reading rules, so you will always have all the material from this page in a compressed form at your fingertips. :)

The main thing you need to remember is that the reading rules There is. This means that, knowing the rules, you can always - almost always - read an unfamiliar word. This is why French does not require transcription (only in the case of fairly rare phonetic exceptions). The beginnings of the first five lessons are also devoted to reading rules - there you will find additional exercises to consolidate skills. Starting from the third lesson, you can download the sound and listen to detailed explanations of the reading rules made by a professional phonetician.
Let's start learning :) Let's go!

In French, the stress ALWAYS falls on the last syllable... This is news to you, isn't it? ;-)

-s, -t, -d, -z, -x, -p, -g (as well as their combinations) at the end of words are NOT READABLE.

Vowels

e, è, ê, é, ё under stress and in a closed syllable it is read as “e”: fourchette [buffet] - fork. “But there is a nuance” (c) that can be neglected at the initial stage. Reading a letter e in all its guises is discussed in detail in the third lesson from the very beginning - I must say, there is a lot there.

e V unstressed syllable reads approximately like the German "ö" - like the letter "e" in the word Möbius: menu [menu], regarder [rögarde]. In order to make this sound, you need to stretch your lips forward like a bow (as in the picture below) and at the same time pronounce the letter “e”.

In the middle of words in an open syllable, this letter is dropped completely during pronunciation (e is fluent). So, for example, the word carrefour (crossroads) is read as [kar "fur] (the unstressed "e" in the middle of the word is not pronounced). It would not be a mistake to read it [karefur], but when you speak quickly, it falls out, as it turns out to be a weak sound Épicerie (grocery) is read as [epis"ri]. Madeleine- [madeleine].

Madeleine metro station in Paris

And so - in so many words. But don’t be afraid - weak “e” will fall out on their own, because this is natural :)

This phenomenon also happens in our speech, we just don’t think about it. For example, the word “head”: when we pronounce it, the first vowel is so weak that it falls out, and we practically do not pronounce it and say [glava]. I’m not even talking about the word “eleventh”, which we pronounce as [one] (I discovered this in my son’s notebook; at first I was horrified: how could so many mistakes be made in one word, and then I realized that the child simply wrote down this word by ear - we really pronounce it that way :).

e at the end of words (see exceptions below) is not read (it is sometimes pronounced in songs and poems). If there are any icons above it, it is always readable, no matter where it stands. For example: régime [mode], rosé [rose] - rose wine.

In monosyllable words e at the end of words it is read - if it is not read there, a syllable cannot be formed at all. These are articles, prepositions, pronouns, demonstrative adjectives: le [le], de [de], je [zhe], me [мё], ce [сё].

Unreadable ending -s, forming the plural of nouns (something familiar, right?) and adjectives, if it appears, does not make a letter -e at the end of the word readable: régime and régimes are read the same - [mode].

-er at the ends of words it is read as "e": conférenci er[entertainer] - speaker, ateli er[studio], dossi er[dossier], canotier, collier, croupier, portier and, finally, foyer [foyer]. You will find -er at the end of all regular verbs: parl er[parle] – talk, mang er[manzhe] - there is; -er is the standard ending for French regular verbs.

a- reads like “a”: valse [waltz].

i(including with icons) - reads like "and": vie [vi] - life (quickly remember "C" est la vie" :).

o– reads like “o”: locomotive [locomotive], compote[compote] - fruit puree.

u reads like the "yu" in the word "muesli". Example: cuvette is read [ditch] and means “ditch”, parachute [parachute] - means “parachute” :), the same happens with purée (puree), and c configuration(jam).

To make an open sound “u”, use the combination ou(this is familiar from English: you, group [group], router [router], tour [tour]). Souvenir [souvenir] - memory, fourchette [buffet] - fork, carrefour [carrefour] - crossroads; pronouns nous (we) read [well], vous (you and you) read [vu].

Consonants

Letter l read softly: étoile [etoile] - star, table [table] - table, banal [banal] - banal, canal [channel], carnaval [carnival].

g read like "g", but before e, i And y it is read as "zh". For example: général - read [general], régime [mode], agiotage [excitement]. A good example is the word garage - read [garage] - first g before a reads firmly, and the second g before e- like "w".

Letter combination gn read as [н] - for example, in the name of a city Cognac[cognac] - Cognac, in the words champi gn ons [champignon] - mushrooms, champa gn e [champagne] - champagne, lor gn ette [lorgnette] - binoculars.

c pronounced as "k", mas ca rade [masquerade], already mentioned by us co mpote and cu vette. But before three vowels e, i And y it is read as "s". For example: ce rtificat read [certificate], vélo ci pède - [bicycle], moto cy cle - [motorcycle].

If you need to change this behavior, that is, make this letter read like [s] before other vowels, attach a tail to it at the bottom: Ç And ç . Ça is read as [sa]; garçon [garson] - boy, maçon (mason), façon (style), façade (facade). The famous French greeting Comment ça va [coma~ sa va] (or more often just ça va) means “how are you”, and literally “how is it going”. In films you can see - they say hello like that. One asks: “Ça va?”, the other answers: “Ça va, Ça va!”.

At the ends of words c is rare. Unfortunately, there is no hard and fast rule about when to read it and when not to. This is simply remembered for each word - fortunately there are few of them: for example, blanc [bl "an] - white, estomac [estoma] - stomach and tobacco[taba] is not readable, but cognac and avec are readable.

h NEVER read. It's as if she doesn't exist. Except for the combination "ch". Sometimes this letter acts as a separator - if it occurs inside a word between vowels, then this indicates their separate reading: Sahara [sa "ara], cahier [ka "ye]. In any case, it itself is not readable. For this reason, by the way, the name of one of the most famous cognac houses Hennessy correctly pronounced (surprise!) as [ansi]: “h” is not readable, “e” is fluent, double ss is used to silence s and as double [s] is not readable (see below for the rule for reading the letter s); other pronunciations are categorically incorrect. I bet you didn't know that! :)

Combination ch gives the sound [w]. For example, chance [chance] - luck, luck, chantage [blackmail], cliché [cliché], cache-nez [muffler] - scarf (literally: hides the nose);

ph read as "f": photo. th read as “t”: théâtre [theater], thé [those] - tea.

p reads like a Russian "p": portrait [portrae]. In the middle of the word, the letter p before the t is not readable: sculpture [sculpture].

j- reads like a Russian "zh": bonjour [bonjour] - hello, jalousie [blinds] - envy, jealousy and blinds, sujet [plot] - plot.

s reads like Russian “s”: geste [gesture], régisseur [director], chaussée [highway]; between two vowels s is voiced and reads like “z”: fuselage [fuselage], limousine [limousine] - very intuitive. If you need to make s unvoiced between vowels, it is doubled. Compare: poison [poison] - poison, and poisson [poisson] - fish; the same Hennessy - [ansi].

The rest of the consonants (how many of them are left? :) - n, m, p, t, x, z- read more or less obviously. Some minor features of reading x and t will be described separately - rather for the sake of order. Well and n And m in combination with vowels they give rise to a whole class of sounds, which will be described in a separate, most interesting section.

Here is a list of words given above as examples - before doing the exercise, it is better to listen to how the French pronounce these words.

menu, regarder, carrefour, régime, rosé, parler, cuvette, parachute, confiture, souvenir, fourchette, nous, vous, étoile, table, banal, canal, carnaval, général, valse, garage, cognac, champignons, champagne, certificate, chance, théâtre, thé, portrait, sculpture, bonjour, sujet, geste, chaussée.