How Do You Sound Fancy in French?

[brandrinn]

So in English we have Latinate words for most things when we want to put on our fancy pants. But to a Francophone our attempts to sound urbane must seem feeble. "His visage turned pugnaceous" just means "He looked at me with fighty-face." "She masticated the raconteur into submission" just means "She chewed the naughty man." Our fancy words are just ordinary words to them. So what are their fancy words? This question goes for any language that has lent its vocabulary to other languages, like Arabic, Greek, or Chinese. Do their scientific terms all sound like long-winded baby talk? "Now children, who can tell me the atomic number of Big-Boom-Explodium?" Do they wax poetically about opressively ordinary things? "Shall I compare your face to other good looking things?" Do their measurements sound redundant? "The weather is so fine during warmmonth." In short, how do you sound French in French?

[----]

I don't appreciate racism in the online communities I'm a part of.

[zompist]

If you know some French, the best answer is to go read Raymond Queneau's Exercices de style, which retells the same banal anecdote in 99 different styles. Quite a few of them are various ways of being 'fancy': bureaucratic, scientific, philosophical, hellenistic, Italianate, and many more.

Here's just one extract, from the exercice labelled 'Precieux':

C'etait aux alentours d'un juillet de midi. Le soleil dans toute sa fleur regnait sur l'horizon aux multiples tetines. L'asphalte palpitait doucement, exhalant cette tendre odeur goudronneuse qui donne aux cancereux des idees a la fois pueriles et corrosives sur l'origine de leur mal. Un autobus a la livree verte et blanche, blasonee d'un enigmatique S, vint recueillir du cote du parc Monceau un petit lot favorise de candidats voyageurs aux moites confins de la dissolution sudoripare.

These sentences sound just as silly and parodic as your examples.

French has just as many directions to go for fanciness as English: Latinisms, Biblical cadences, archaic forms of the literary language, scientific and bureaucratic stuffiness. I've noticed that Italian is occasionally used where the idea of an old and sophisticated culture is needed. Note that French authors can also use anglicisms, which can come off as chic or vulgar or both at once.

(I think French surpasses English in the other direction: in ways of expressing colloquial speech. There's a greater distance between the literary and spoken languages, so simply writing as you speak is a bold stylistic choice. And that's without getting into the language's seemingly boundless reservoir of slang.)

Certainly in all the language you mention, technical terms may be etymologically transparent. (Though not always: Lavoisier's 'oxygene' is as opaque to the French as it is to us.) But the same is true of English, especially now that scientists rarely bother to create Greco-Latin terms. String theory, truth quark, black hole, gluon, Higgs particle, base pair, spaceship, hard drive, laptop, motherboarddon't sound like babytalk.

Chinese is a particularly interesting case, because there's no phonetic marker of ancientness-- Old Chinese words aren't pronounced in an Old Chinese fashion. Nonetheless there's a huge gap between wenyan and the modern languages, and wenyan borrowings are generally obvious.

[Legion]

French notably likes to have latinate correspondents (often adjectives) to common nouns or verbs:

fater > père/paternel
bishop > évêque/épiscopal
church > église/ecclésiastique
sheep > mouton/ovin
cattle > vache/bovin
building > immeuble/immobilier
flesh > chair/carnivore, carnassier
horse > cheval/équin
oyster > huître/ostréidé
to burn > brûler/crématoire
hell > enfer/infernal
to do something > agir/acte, action
to hear > entendre/audition

Conversely, many French words have two meaning, a common meaning that is generally the newest one historically, and a more stuffy meaning that is generally closer to the original etymology:

chef: chief, chef, leader/head
nef: nave/vessel, ship
rien: nothing/something
nuée: swarm, flock/cloud, fog
esprit: mind, wit, ghost/product of distillation, breath
musette: bal-musette (a traditional and popular dance music)/bagpipes
amant: alduterer/lover
tiers: third (fraction), another person/tiers (ordinal [normally "troisième"])
menotte: handcuff/small hand
espadon: swordfish/long sword

[Thry]

In Spanish it's mostly Greco-Latin too, but don't forget that what makes a word fancy in the end is not how it sounds, but how it's used (and consequently who uses it and where and since when). There's nothing in Greek that makes it fancy, i.e. problema is hardly ever thought of as a fancy word (and even has its vernacular vulgar variant, poblema), but apparently there is in other less frequent and more scientific terms like hipodermic or subcutaneous (which surprisingly would mean literally the same thing).

And you seem to have forgotten Dutch and German (I'm taking inspiration from them for my germanic conlang), which look like more reluctant to latinate their scientific terms, especially Dutch, cf. the oxygène example from Zompist with Dutch zuurstof "sour stuff", or the radius (i.e 'ray') bone with spaakbeen which I think is spikebone .

[Grunnen]

And you seem to have forgotten Dutch and German (I'm taking inspiration from them for my germanic conlang), which look like more reluctant to latinate their scientific terms, especially Dutch, cf. the oxygène example from Zompist with Dutch zuurstof "sour stuff", or the radius (i.e 'ray') bone with spaakbeen which I think is spikebone .

The last example is interesting I think, because the use of the word 'been' to mean bone is only still found in compounds like this one. Otherwise the word for bone in Dutch is 'bot'. This makes it feel especially far removed from any form of baby talk. Although, off course, if you have a tradition of deriving 'learned' word from common words, such words don't feel like baby talk. I could even easily imagine how someone from such a culture would find the English system strange: surely, all those completely opaque words must sound like the babbling of a baby?

[Pthagnar]

[you can sound very pompous in english with minimal use of greco-latinate words and using good germanic words in their stead, to wit: heretofores, henceforths, outwiths, notwithstandings, wherebyes, theretos, hereins, whithers, hithers, whences, thences, thuses, formers, latters and oftentimes whilsts.]

[Yiuel Raumbesrairc]

Any use of French's simple past tense count as being fancy. It's never used in common speech, but we all use it to write story. It sounds incredably bookish and fancy.

Compare :

Je suis allé chez mon ami hier et j'y ai mangé un vraiment bon gâteau. Ensuite, en soirée, nous nous sommes empiffrés de chocolat. Tellement bon!
J'allai chez mon ami hier et j'y mangeai un vraiment bon gâteau. Ensuite, en soirée, nous nous empifframes de chocolat. Tellement bon!

Especially empifframes.

[clawgrip]

Those plurals were always really old-fashioned looking to me...mangeâmes, mangeâtes, mangèrent

[Thry]

Hm that reminds me of Portuguese 2nd person plural vós, which is a dead pronoun; or Spanish future subjunctive, which is a dead tense in most dialects (I was surprised to find it wasn't in all). They've been replaced, respectively, by a formal pronoun (vocês, lit. your mercies) and by other tenses [I'm guessing modern present subjunctive, I can barely use the tense at all]. But they can be used for literary reasons.

[Viktor77]

Hm that reminds me of Portuguese 2nd person plural vós, which is a dead pronoun; or Spanish future subjunctive, which is a dead tense in most dialects (I was surprised to find it wasn't in all). They've been replaced, respectively, by a formal pronoun (vocês, lit. your mercies) and by other tenses [I'm guessing modern present subjunctive, I can barely use the tense at all]. But they can be used for literary reasons.

Would you say Spanish past subjunctive would also sound fancy in any case except where used to indicate politeness?

For example, pudiera, senor, abrir este tarro, por favor, is fine in speech? But you wouldn't say in speech, Pues, yo queria que abriera este tarro ayer, senor, would you?

[Salmoneus]

A thought: in languages that don't extensively use borrowings for elevated language, but that (as in Legion's examples, or the Dutch 'bone' example) have older and younger words for the same things, or older and younger meanings for the same word...
... is there more semantic drift?

It would seem likely that if people pick up on slight drifts and use them to make register distinctions, maybe the drift will be accelerated? Whereas if you can simply borrow words to make those register distinctions, there might be less 'stigma' (or social signalling content in general) in using words in an 'old-fashioned' way (i.e. less impetus to make sure you only use them in the newfangled way, so less drift).
I didn't explain that well. I guess I'm thinking that one thing that accelerates drift is the desire not to sound old-fashioned (or overly formal, or whatever) in your language use - and that therefore if 'old-fashionedness' is associated primarily with borrowings, there might be less reason to keep strictly up to date with semantic drift, so the drift would be slower?

Just an idea.

[Thry]

Would you say Spanish past subjunctive would also sound fancy in any case except where used to indicate politeness?

No, that's only true for some South American dialects (what did Torco do to you!), I use past subjunctive everyday in my speech (as does European Portuguese btw) and it's necessary and routinary, not elaborate or fancy (-se variants seem rarer than -ra in my area but they're still well alive and not awkward at all). E.g.:

Oye me ha dicho Ana que le dejases/dejaras sus apuntes.
La profesora nos pidió que la ayudáramos a bajar la caja.
Tu madre me acaba de decir que te llamara/llame pa comer.
No creo que estuviera bien el ejercicio, ahora lo miro.

For example, pudiera, senor, abrir este tarro, por favor, is fine in speech? But you wouldn't say in speech, Pues, yo queria que abriera este tarro ayer, senor, would you?

¿Pudiera abrir este tarro? instead of ¿Puede usted abrir este tarro? sounds old and I'd use that with quisiera mostly in written (poetic even) language.

Yo quería que abriera este tarro ayer. is fine, though awkward, make that Ayer quería que [usted] abriera este tarro.

[din]

My (American) boyfriend always makes fun of how transparent Dutch words can be, and for that exact reason I've never really considered the language particularly suited to being 'fancy'. But that does not mean that we can't be poetic, literary, stuffy, formal, etc. As has been said, old forms, uncommon or archaic words, old (otherwise obsolete) grammatical constructions, etc. are all used to express all of these things.

What I love is when people who don't really know how to write formally try to use these words/structures but do so wrongly, or end up mixing 6 different registers. Like mixing "gaarne" with informal pronouns. Or opening letters with "Geachte L.S." (Dear Lectori Salutem)

[Hakaku]

The pattern for pompous language generally seems to rely on the following:

• Avoiding perceived colloquialisms and reductions
• Using words, spellings, expressions and forms once common in the language's past
• Using words and expressions borrowed from a language of prestige
• Using poetic devices, allusions and descriptive words to add to the length

Depending on the extent of these and other factors, you can obtain a whole array of different literary styles, as Zompist pointed out.

At one point in Japanese, for example, government and academic writing was strongly characterized by being written almost solely with Kanji characters. And though today the use of Kanji is regulated, choosing to use older characters or spellings for certain words or choosing to write certain words with Kanji where they are now more commonly written with Hiragana creates an certain effect. With Hiragana particularly, the use of older kana spellings can give that olden appeal (e.g. をる woru vs. おる oru).

This phenomenon also applies to words, forms, and most notably pronouns: using older pronouns gives a more pompous touch (e.g. wagahai), and can also be used in complete jest or mockery. Similarly, using older verb constructions (such as -te oru instead of -te iru, the copula de aru instead of desu or da, or the negative ending -nu instead of -nai) or emphasizing the vowels of devoiced syllables elevates the language style/pompousness. However, under a different context, they could also be used to express insistence or one's anger or frustration. Combine these possibilities with Japanese's existing and extensive array of honorific speech and morphology, and you have a lot to work with.

I've also noted that there's a much greater use of long compound words in literary or academic texts, but I haven't observed anything in particular or different concerning the modern use of native vocabulary vs Sinitic vocabulary. The 'pompous' effect in Japanese seems to stem more from morphology than vocabulary itself.

[Nortaneous]

[you can sound very pompous in english with minimal use of greco-latinate words and using good germanic words in their stead, to wit: heretofores, henceforths, outwiths, notwithstandings, wherebyes, theretos, hereins, whithers, hithers, whences, thences, thuses, formers, latters and oftentimes whilsts.]

...thitherward, and not elsewhither at all!

[dhok]

Whithersoever! And quemely.

[finlay]

The pattern for pompous language generally seems to rely on the following:

• Avoiding perceived colloquialisms and reductions
• Using words, spellings, expressions and forms once common in the language's past
• Using words and expressions borrowed from a language of prestige
• Using poetic devices, allusions and descriptive words to add to the length

Depending on the extent of these and other factors, you can obtain a whole array of different literary styles, as Zompist pointed out.

At one point in Japanese, for example, government and academic writing was strongly characterized by being written almost solely with Kanji characters. And though today the use of Kanji is regulated, choosing to use older characters or spellings for certain words or choosing to write certain words with Kanji where they are now more commonly written with Hiragana creates an certain effect. With Hiragana particularly, the use of older kana spellings can give that olden appeal (e.g. をる woru vs. おる oru).

I did see one of my older students' faxes which said 有難う御座います. it was almost surprising because you normally never see it. of course, I guess the use of a fax is a bit outdated now too anyway.

[Ser]

(and consequently who uses it and where and since when). There's nothing in Greek that makes it fancy, i.e. problema is hardly ever thought of as a fancy word (and even has its vernacular vulgar variant, poblema)

Almóndigas, cocretas... Do you think poblema is a thing used mostly in your area, or can it be heard further up north as well? (Not that I've ever heard them myself.)

[Yng]

Arabic is a slightly complex case because there's such a gulf between speech and writing. In speech, you can sound fancy by using classicisms: šayʾ instead of ši for 'thing', for example, or literary constructions like wulid instead of inwalad for 'he was born'. Since the advent of widespread education in MSA, classicisms are everywhere in spoken language. In writing you sound fancy by adopting literary style, which makes use of prosody and rhyme alongside various different constructions which are less commonly found in lower registers, as well as using less commonly used higher-register synonyms, which Arabic has a ridiculous amount of.

In Persian, incidentally, Arabic words are not necessarily more fancy - the nationalist period in the early 20th century saw lots of native Persian words revived, repurposed, or compounded to coin new words to replace Arabisms and in many cases these have taken on a more formal character. I'm told, for example, that نام nâm is generally considered more formal than اسم esm even though the latter is an Arabic borrowing.

[Thry]

(and consequently who uses it and where and since when). There's nothing in Greek that makes it fancy, i.e. problema is hardly ever thought of as a fancy word (and even has its vernacular vulgar variant, poblema)

Almóndigas, cocretas... Do you think poblema is a thing used mostly in your area, or can it be heard further up north as well? (Not that I've ever heard them myself.)

I say almóndiga, not cocreta though (but ppl do here).

Poblema... hmm... I guess it can be heard anywhere but I really don't know.

[Burke]

(and consequently who uses it and where and since when). There's nothing in Greek that makes it fancy, i.e. problema is hardly ever thought of as a fancy word (and even has its vernacular vulgar variant, poblema)

Almóndigas, cocretas... Do you think poblema is a thing used mostly in your area, or can it be heard further up north as well? (Not that I've ever heard them myself.)

I say almóndiga, not cocreta though (but ppl do here).

Poblema... hmm... I guess it can be heard anywhere but I really don't know.

I have never heard poblema. I would understand it, but it sounds odd to me.

I'm going to preface this by saying I grew up speaking Greek, but in a small family in the US cut off from other Greeks. We've been in the US for maybe 120 years ish.

There still is a T-V distinction for respect as well. Other things I would say is if I was speaking to my Pappou or mother or a superior who spoke Greek, I was taught to typically avoid using commands (imperative?) and to use constructions with subjunctive instead because they sound less forceful.

Example: "Mom, give me the salt" I would avoid in Greek (and English too)
"Mom, might you pass the salt, please." I would typically have said this, but sometimes this feels too extended.

As far as stylistic fanciness, things do get a bit odd. A lot of it for me comes down to choosing between words that are very similar, but have different nuances. διακρίνω & ξεχωρίζω can be translated roughly as I distinguish. However the first is more along the lines of detecting or recognizing, while the second is more along the lines of singling out or separating. I'm not sure if this is what you meant by fanciness, and this example a really big stretch in my mind.

Also, I still toss Katharevousa accidentally into my talking on occasion because of how my pappou saw it (It was what I originally learned to read because of the books he had.) So this might answer some, but the way I speak Greek is admittedly at least a little archaic/strange.

[Penelope]

Do their scientific terms all sound like long-winded baby talk? "Now children, who can tell me the atomic number of Big-Boom-Explodium?"

I do hope the reason nobody has linked to Uncleftish Beholding yet is because we've all read it already, yes?

[clawgrip]

If you like that then don't forget to check out the Anglish Moot.

[brandrinn]

What a fantastically helpful response to an admittedly silly question! There are lots of ideas here for making registers in conlangs. If this discussion keeps going, we should edit out the juicy bits and archive them in L&L Museum.