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French orthography encompasses the spelling and punctuation of the French language. It is based on a combination of phonemic and historical principles. The spellings of many words are derived from Latin etymologies, which has resulted in a multitude of silent letters. Nevertheless, there are rules governing French orthography which allow for a reasonable degree of accuracy when producing French words from their written forms.

Contents

History of French orthography

 Please help improve this section by expanding it. Further information might be found on the talk page. (June 2008)

The oldest known French text, the Oaths of Strasbourg, dates back to 842 though there is a debate and some prefer the name "Roman" for this period1.

Roman

Old French

Middle French

Classical French

Modern French

Alphabet

French is written using the 26 letters of the Latin alphabet and five accents (diacritical marks). See French alphabet for details.

Accents

French makes use of five accents that can modify certain letters. Unlike in some languages, letters with accents are not considered to be separate letters; for example, the accents are ignored when alphabetizing a list of words. Further, the accents are often omitted from capital letters (with É being written as E, and so on), though strictly speaking, this is not considered correct, as it is merely a remnant of non-computerized printing that could not accommodate accented capital letters.

There are no letters that always require a accent to produce a given sound; rather, where a given letter has multiple possible sounds, a accent indicates that the sound that might be expected from the context is not the one that is used.

The acute accent (l'accent aigu) "´" is used only on the letter e. It normally indicates that the vowel is pronounced [e], as in épaule (shoulder) and détail (detail), when it might otherwise be read [ɛ] or [ə]. In certain syllables, however, é is written while the pronunciation in most dialects is [ɛ], as in céderai (I will give up) and réglementaire (regulatory); the 1990 spelling reform (see below) declared that in these cases, è should be used instead, but this spelling reform was not widely adopted.

The grave accent (l'accent grave) "`" is used on the letter e to indicate that it is pronounced [ɛ], as in manière (way) and après (after), when it is followed by a single consonant. It is also used on the letters a and u to distinguish certain homophones, such as ou (or) and où (where), and la (the) and là (there).

The cedilla (la cédille) "¸" is used only on the letter c, and only when the c is followed by a, o, or u (possibly with a accent); it indicates that the c is pronounced [s] (its "soft" pronunciation, that it ordinarily has only before e and i) rather than [k] (its "hard" pronunciation, that it ordinarily has elsewhere).

The circumflex (l'accent circonflexe) "^" can be used on any of the letters a, e, i, o, and u. It does not affect the pronunciation of i or u (except to lengthen them in dialects that retain the distinction between long and short vowels), and does not affect the pronunciation of a in most dialects (though in some, it changes [a] to [ɑ]). On o, it changes [ɔ] to [o], and on e, it produces [ɛ] (duplicating the function of the grave accent). The circumflex is chiefly a historical accent; it was added in the 19th century to certain words with an unpronounced s (e.g. forest → forêt) or another unpronounced letter (e.g. aage → âge).

The diaeresis (le tréma) shows that two vowels are pronounced separately (i.e., that the vowel pair is not a digraph) For example, Noël, naïf, and compare the forms of the verb haïr [aiʁ] (je hais [ɛ], nous haïssons [aisɔ̃]). It is normally written on the second vowel. It is also added above the feminine adjectival ending -e when the masculine form ends in -gu: aigu, ambigu → aiguë, ambiguë. The same practice is not followed, however, for verbs whose stem ends in -gu. For example, the verb arguer has exactly the same forms as targuer (without the initial t-), even though the two verbs are pronounced very differently ([aʁgɥe] vs. [taʁge], j'argue [ʒaʁgy] vs. je targue [ʒətaʁg]).

Digraphs and trigraphs

 Please help improve this section by expanding it. Further information might be found on the talk page. (August 2008)

Both digraphs and trigraphs in French have their origin in the history and phonology.
In the first case, it is the remaining characters of the word in its move from the original word (usually Latin or Greek) into the modern French one (i.e.: the use of "ph" in words like "téléphone", "th" in words like "théorème" or "ch" in "chaotique").
In the second case, it is either a remaining of an old pronunciation that could have became obsolete (i.e.: "eu", "au", "oi", "ai" or "œu") or the only mean to produce a sound which can't be done with only one character of the French alphabet or a trivial association of many (i.e.: "ch", "on", "an", "ou", "un" or "in").
One can think of a third and later case that is a kind of mix of the formers cases: when the spelling is mainly ruled by the etymology but would otherwise lead to a mistaken pronunciation (i.e.: "ge" in "il mangeait" he ate).

Digraphs

Discriminating between vowels and consonants is not always trivial depending on the point of view (phonetic, phonology, etc.). It is used here with the common point of view of a native French speaker.

Vowels

  • "ai" like in "faire" (to do)
  • "an" like in "France"
  • "au" like in "chaud" (hot)
  • "ei" like in "neige" (snow)
  • "en" like in "vent" (wind)
  • "eu" like in "peu" (few)
  • "et" like in "et" (and)
  • "ez" like in "nez" (nose)
  • "in" like in "vin" (wine)
  • "oi" like in "roi" (king) or like in "oignon" (onion) (pronunciation is not the same)
  • "on" like in "bon" (good)
  • "ou" like in "ou" (or)
  • "où" like in "où" (where)
  • "ui" like in "nuit" (night)
  • "un" like in "un" (one or a)

Consonants

  • "ch" like in "cheval" (horse) or "chaos"
  • "ge" like in "mangea" (eat)
  • "gn" like in "montagne" (mountain)
  • "gu" like in "langue" (tongue)
  • "ng" like in "camping"
  • "ph" like in "téléphone"
  • "ss" like in "baisser" (to lower)
  • "th" like in "thème"

Trigraphs and perhaps more

  • "aon" like in "faon" (fawn)
  • "aou" like in "saoul" (drunk)
  • "aoû" like in "août" (August)
  • "eau" like in "eau" (water)
  • "ien" like in "rien" (nothing)
  • "ion" like in "information" (some can even see there a quadrigraph with "tion")
  • "œi" like in "œil" (eye) (some can even see there a quadrigraph with "œil")
  • "œu" like in "sœur" (sister)
  • "oin" like in "point"

Words from Greek

The spelling of French words of Greek origin is complicated by a number of digraphs which originated in the Latin transcriptions. The digraphs <ph>, <th>, and <ch> are normally pronounced /f/, /t/, and /k/ in Greek loanwords, respectively; and the digraphs <ae> and <oe> are generally pronounced in Greek loanwords as though they were <e>. Further, many words in the international scientific vocabulary were constructed in French from Greek roots and have kept their digraphs (e.g., stratosphère, photographie).

French spelling reforms

Main article: Reforms of French orthography

Bibliography

  • Fouché, Pierre (1956). Traité de prononciation française. Paris: Klincksieck. 
  • Tranel, Bernard (1987). The Sounds of French: An Introduction. Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-31510-7. 

See also

References

  1. ^ fr:Histoire de la langue française

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