Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlearn

[Ars Lande]

Actually, I think it also relates to class and education. I think it's more of a middle-class thing and that kind of demographic is over represented in Paris (though it's definitely more common here). I think women do it more than men too; I wish I could find a serious resource on the subject.

[Ryusenshi]

I don't think you two are talking about the same phenomenon.

• What linguoboy mentions (['jɛsːə] for yes) does sound like Southern French. Again, Southern French speakers tend to pronounce all "e muets", and even sometimes add a schwa to break consonant clusters. For instance, in Marseilles, pneu becomes [pənø] instead of standard [pnø]. It's not a surprise if Southern French speakers end up adding schwas when speaking English.
• What Ars Lande mentions seems more of a tendency to add an "euh" sound at the end of sentences. That's a verbal tic more than a pronunciation difference, I think.

Speaking of annoying pronunciations, another common feature of Parisian French is to add a voiceless fricative [ç] when a sentence ends with a high front vowel, e.g. merci becomes [mɛχsiç]. I recently realized, to my horror, that I do it all the time. I'm currently trying to stop doing it.

[Pole, the]

What Ars Lande mentions seems more of a tendency to add an "euh" sound at the end of sentences. That's a verbal tic more than a pronunciation difference, I think.

I think Ars Lande meant prosodic units (which, in French, can be single words as well as complete sentences), so it would be the same thing.

Speaking of annoying pronunciations, another common feature of Parisian French is to add a voiceless fricative [ç] when a sentence ends with a high front vowel, e.g. merci becomes [mɛχsiç]. I recently realized, to my horror, that I do it all the time. I'm currently trying to stop doing it.

Well, French /i/ is extremely close to a fricative anyway, so going → [ʝ̩] and then devoicing it phrase-finally doesn't seem unusual.

[Zaarin]

Speaking of annoying pronunciations, another common feature of Parisian French is to add a voiceless fricative [ç] when a sentence ends with a high front vowel, e.g. merci becomes [mɛχsiç]. I recently realized, to my horror, that I do it all the time. I'm currently trying to stop doing it.

Leliana does this in Dragon Age; I found it rather endearing.

[Qxentio]

Speaking of annoying pronunciations, another common feature of Parisian French is to add a voiceless fricative [ç] when a sentence ends with a high front vowel, e.g. merci becomes [mɛχsiç]. I recently realized, to my horror, that I do it all the time. I'm currently trying to stop doing it.

Well, French /i/ is extremely close to a fricative anyway, so going → [ʝ̩] and then devoicing it phrase-finally doesn't seem unusual.

I've recently noticed that with lots of German speakers as well. For example, "die" becomes [dʝ̩] or something similar. I find it extremely annoying. My own [iː] is lowered and closer to [eː] than to a syllabic fricative.

[Soap]

Early teens:

underendowed, where "endow" is pronounced ['ɛn.do]. I knew exactly what the word meant from the context, so I assumed that "endow" was simply a word for penis I'd never heard of before, and I liked it, because I've always disliked it when a Latin loanword punches its way to the top either as a euphemism for a native word or for 'scholarly' reasons such as "aquatic" instead of "water(borne)" or "underwater".

I remembered this one while i was in the shower this morning.

[Nortaneous]

Speaking of annoying pronunciations, another common feature of Parisian French is to add a voiceless fricative [ç] when a sentence ends with a high front vowel, e.g. merci becomes [mɛχsiç]. I recently realized, to my horror, that I do it all the time. I'm currently trying to stop doing it.

Well, French /i/ is extremely close to a fricative anyway, so going → [ʝ̩] and then devoicing it phrase-finally doesn't seem unusual.

I've recently noticed that with lots of German speakers as well. For example, "die" becomes [dʝ̩] or something similar. I find it extremely annoying. My own [iː] is lowered and closer to [eː] than to a syllabic fricative.

phrase-final ç-excresence also happens in English; I have it

[Viktor77]

My theory is that French often adds a final /2/ to the end of intonatonal phrases so the stress has somewhere to fall. When speaking French one doesn't always properly plan intonational phrases so if the phrase can't permit final stress on the last syllable another syllable is added. This can be done regardless of whether or not the last syllable has a schwa.

I think the fricatization of final /i/ is also due to stress. It may follow the same paradigm where additional force is added to the /i/ when the phrase isn't ready to be finished and so it's like carrying over the stress through fricatization. This isn't exclusive to Paris. I learned to do this in Belgium and it's common even in some very high registers.

What's interesting in French is that the "parler jeune" is losing more and more liaison. When I was in Belgium I was exposed to the local parler jeune and so when I taught French a few weeks ago I told my students that liaison in "ils sont allés" is optional. It turns out it's required in the standard but to my ears and several of my francophone friends there was nothing wrong with /il sO~ ale/.

[Sumelic]

My theory is that French often adds a final /2/ to the end of intonatonal phrases so the stress has somewhere to fall. When speaking French one doesn't always properly plan intonational phrases so if the phrase can't permit final stress on the last syllable another syllable is added. This can be done regardless of whether or not the last syllable has a schwa.

I think the fricatization of final /i/ is also due to stress. It may follow the same paradigm where additional force is added to the /i/ when the phrase isn't ready to be finished and so it's like carrying over the stress through fricatization. This isn't exclusive to Paris. I learned to do this in Belgium and it's common even in some very high registers.

What's interesting in French is that the "parler jeune" is losing more and more liaison. When I was in Belgium I was exposed to the local parler jeune and so when I taught French a few weeks ago I told my students that liaison in "ils sont allés" is optional. It turns out it's required in the standard but to my ears and several of my francophone friends there was nothing wrong with /il sO~ ale/.

Oh? I guess I forget being taught that, or I was taught non-standard French. The rules I remember learning for obligatory liaisons are:

- between subject pronouns and a following word in the same VP (the word following a subject pronoun is nearly always in the same VP in modern French)
- between a determiner and a following word in the same NP
- before a plural noun preceded by another word in the same NP
- between a verb and a following cliticized pronoun (e.g. "sont-ils")

and traditionally between prepositions and nouns, though I had read that that is relatively commonly left out at least some of the time by native speakers. Wikipedia suggests that adjective-noun is also not made all the time, which I hadn't remembered, and lists adverb-adjective, which I had forgotten (and which are clearly not made by all speakers all the time; for example it lists "trop amusé" and as a learner I know I have never thought I needed to tried to make liaisons with "trop.")

Liaisons between a verb and a following non-cliticized word, even when the verb is an auxiliary and the following word is the associated conjugated verb, were always presented to me as optional. Some of them are relatively common, of course, like "c'est un/une"--I generally use /t/ in this one, although I doubt it's really necessary.

[Echobeats]

Posthumous /p@Ust.'hju:.m@s/

[Qxentio]

I remembered this one while i was in the shower this morning.

Comedy Gold.

[Qxentio]

<patio> baffles me every time I hear it spoken aloud as [ˈpæ.ɾi.o͜ʊ]. I always read the word as [ˈpe͜ɪ.ʃo͜ʊ] in my head.

[linguoboy]

<patio> baffles me every time I hear it spoken aloud as [ˈpæ.ɾi.o͜ʊ]. I always read the word as [ˈpe͜ɪ.ʃo͜ʊ] in my head.

My husband (who grew up in the South Bay area of California) always had the PALM vowel here, perhaps due to Hispanophone influence. Sounded really odd to me the first few times--all the more so given that the name of his hometown, Los Gatos, belonged to the TRAP set (and the Los was LOT instead of GOAT so at first I was confused whether it was Los or Las).

In short, if I'd been reading the name, I would've said /ˌloːsˈgatoːz/, but instead I imitated his /ˌlasˈgætoːz/.

[Soap]

nematode. I actually had this one correct when I was a kid (/'nɛ.mə.tod/), but when I watched an episode of Doug (a children's TV show) entitled "Bag the Neematoad", I figured I just had been wrong about the pronunciation, having only seen it print up until then. But I was right, as I learned recently, after probably more than 20 years. As with nearly all of my other examples, though, it hardly matters since I basically never used the word in spoken language. The same would apply to trematode.

spurious
puerperal
puerile

All without the /j/ offglide after the /p/. Someone laughed at me once when I said "spoorious" and I realized immediately what she was laughing at, but I didnt let it bother me because, in my mind, I was winning the argument and that was just a distraction. (I have no idea what the argument was about, its a distant memory now.)

Quoted from further back in the thread:

Also, I used to [...] shift the initial stress of "alias" onto the following syllable (with accompanying incorrect vowels, schwa and /ai/)

I still do this, but only in the word "antialias" (Photoshop/graphics editing term). Unlike most others, this is a word I may have actually said out loud a few times during classes, but I might have caught myself and used the proper pronunciation when I did so.

Someone just reminded me that for ages I thought febrile was /ˈfɛbrɪl/ or /ˈfɛbraɪl/. (I suppose I was taking my cue from February.)

This one isn't incorrect, but I'm reconsidering my pronunciation of "feral" as /ferəl/ now that I've learned that the pronunciation /firəl/ also exists. I have to think about which one makes more sense to me.

I think with words like this, when I see them in print, I mentally read them with an intermediate vowel I wouldnt be able to clearly represent in IPA. I think it's fairly close to schwa, but not a simple schwa. It's sort of like how conlanging has influenced me to mentally read all foreign words with vocalic "y" as having /ɨ~ɯ/ and when I was younger I would read foreign words with "x" (e.g. Abraxas) with /ɣ/ or /ʒ/. (In my more recent conlangs, "x" is just /x/.)

[jal]

I just (like minutes ago) learned that "preterite" isn't /pritərɑɪt/ but instead /prɛtərɪt/.


JAL

[Salmoneus]

I just (like minutes ago) learned that "preterite" isn't /pritərɑɪt/ but instead /prɛtərɪt/.


JAL

Darn.

I had the first vowel right, but assume /aI/ for the last because gosh darn it that's how -ite is always pronounced. I think the problem sometimes is words that are Latinate, and to most of us seem like late loans, but that to some cabal of lexicographers were loaned much earlier, so they've undergone more soundchanges than they "should" have. Maybe?

Anyway, you're probably not alone on the first vowel either.

I actually have the opposite mistake, in 'preternatural', where I pronounce the first vowel short, as in 'preterite'...

[Travis B.]

I didn't know that either; I pronounced preterite as /ˈprɛtəˌraɪt/

[Zaarin]

I actually have the opposite mistake, in 'preternatural', where I pronounce the first vowel short, as in 'preterite'...

...Is that not how it's pronounced? *looks it up* Lies! Scurrilous lies! I refuse to believe that this word is pronounced with a long vowel. O_O

[Sumelic]

To me, "preternatural," like "febrile," seems to be a case where it's not obvious that the less common pronunciation really deserves to be called "incorect." The two pronunciations of "preter-" seem to have arisen fairly randomly. Walker (1791) shows it with "long e" in all words in which it occurs, including "preterit," even though he's generally a big proponent of applying regular trisyllabic laxing and he's also against giving a long value to "ae" (or "e" derived from "ae") when it's in an environment where normal "e" would regularly be pronounced short (e.g. he advocated the pronunciation of "Daedalus" as "Deddalus" rather than as "Deedalus").

Then modern pronunciation guide author Charles Harrington Elster advocates "pree-ternatural," but the very fact that he feels like he has to advocate for it shows that it's not unversally pronounced the way he would like.

[Boşkoventi]

In short, if I'd been reading the name, I would've said /ˌloːsˈgatoːz/, but instead I imitated his /ˌlasˈgætoːz/.

I can understand the pronunciation of "Los", esp. given "Los Angeles", but /ˈgætoːz/ makes my teeth curl a bit. Oh. But with t-flapping it's probably something like [ˈgæɾoʊz]. "gaddows". euggghhh.

Then again ...

spurious

For whatever reason, I'm with you on "spurious". I even feel that pronouncing it with the /j/ would sound weird.
No idea about "puerperal". Don't think I've ever seen/heard that before. But ... ...

puerile

Oh God. For some reason I've always thought of this as /ˈpwer.ɪl ~ ˈpwer.əl/. Even though of course puer has to be /ˈpu.er/. Scio Latine! Re vere!.

Although, this makes me wonder ... is resistance [ˈfjuɾɪl] or [ˈfju.tʰaɪ̯l]?

I just (like minutes ago) learned that "preterite" isn't /pritərɑɪt/ but instead /prɛtərɪt/.

Well. Glad I got something right.

[Sumelic]

In short, if I'd been reading the name, I would've said /ˌloːsˈgatoːz/, but instead I imitated his /ˌlasˈgætoːz/.

I can understand the pronunciation of "Los", esp. given "Los Angeles", but /ˈgætoːz/ makes my teeth curl a bit. Oh. But with t-flapping it's probably something like [ˈgæɾoʊz]. "gaddows". euggghhh.

I use /ˈgætoʊs/, for some reason. With flapping, so [ˈgæɾoʊs].

spurious

For whatever reason, I'm with you on "spurious". I even feel that pronouncing it with the /j/ would sound weird.

My first mental pronunciation of this word didn't include /j/, but as soon as I learned the standard pronunciation I resolved to switch to it. I basically never say it aloud, so I don't know how effectively I've actually adjusted my pronunciation, but I think I'd be at least 60% likely to use a /j/ now. It's odd because yod-dropping after labials in Latinate words like this is quite uncommon; it's more often seen after velars as in gubernatorial, lugubrious, lacuna (or of course after coronals, where it is regular for a great many speakers), but I guess the variation in the pronunciation of "puma" is synchronically the same kind of thing.

[jal]

spurious

I used to have STRUT in the first syllable, but then again, I only knew the word from "spurious IRQ7".


JAL

[Ser]

Actually, I think it also relates to class and education. I think it's more of a middle-class thing and that kind of demographic is over represented in Paris (though it's definitely more common here). I think women do it more than men too; I wish I could find a serious resource on the subject.

I remember bringing this topic up before, here on the ZBB, since I heard it from my French professors all the time in words like donc and neuf before a pause, and I was told by a Francophone here that it was just the filler "euh" (as Ryusenshi does in this thread), even though to me it really and obviously is not. So I'm somewhat glad to see you recognizing it.

In fact, I remember once finding a paper on this topic (which I couldn't find again for this post), which mentioned that not only is this process attested in French, but also in Galician (where they add -i to words, so that pan becomes ["pani]).

[Zaarin]

Although, this makes me wonder ... is resistance [ˈfjuɾɪl] or [ˈfju.tʰaɪ̯l]?

The first is the typical American pronunciation; the second is the typical English pronunciation. That being said, I think a lot of us have picked up the second pronunciation thanks to a certain Locutus of Borg.

[Soap]

Did anyone else think that "anime" was actually a native English word? I gave it a clumsy pronunciation, /æ.naɪm/, with both syllables stressed, thinking it was simply the stem from which words like "animate" come from. This was pre-Internet, but I could see myself making the same assumption if I were just encountering the word for the first time now.