Re: French verb conjugation: "je harcele"? or "je harcelle"?

On Mar 29, 2:49 pm, "Brian M. Scott" <b.sc...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Sat, 29 Mar 2008 14:35:08 -0700 (PDT), mb
<azyth...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in
<news:ab6fc7f1-bca5-4579-91f2-7cf5dbffc84f@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
in sci.lang:





On Mar 28, 3:41 pm, "Brian M. Scott" <b.sc...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Fri, 28 Mar 2008 15:24:53 -0700 (PDT), mb
<azyth...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in
<news:4b4bd937-0dc3-4a40-a22c-6cbf157b77af@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
in sci.lang:
On Mar 27, 2:36 pm, "Brian M. Scott" <b.sc...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
[...]
The author of the 'French' section of the Handbook of the
IPA describes it as a central vowel with some rounding and
places it squarely at the schwa point of the quadrilateral.
It's been a while since I last heard much French, but that
or something just a little further forward sounds about
right to me, and unstressed [ø] definitely sounds wrong.
It's possible that barred-o (X-SAMPA [8]) would be slightly
more accurate, but in the absence of any other vowel in that
range the more familiar [@] doesn't seem unreasonable.
Attempts at detailed description of effective
pronunciations (by a foreign ear, who hears what it was
trained to...) are irrelevant. What counts is the phoneme
range and how it is defined (eme range) in the source
language.
Dismissals made in ignorance of the facts are irrelevant.
At least one of the two authors of that section is French.
Right. And my mother tongue is Chinese, and I am just
babling without any idea of any facts while Mr Ross has
perfect command of all or them.

The authors of the article in question are Cécile Fougeron,
of the Institut de Phonétique of the Univ. of Paris, and
Caroline L. Smith.  This 'Mr Ross' appears to be a figment
of your imagination.

So what?
Quoting from above:

"Attempts at detailed description of effective pronunciations (by a
foreign ear, who hears what it was trained to...) are irrelevant."

That was about the foreign ear of Mr. Scott (not Ross, sorry).

" What counts is the phoneme range and how it is defined (eme range)
in the
source language. It could sometimes be heard within the range of the
phoneme "e muet", /
oe-or-zero/ "

Meaning, no one is saying that it does not occur.

"but that is certainly not central, and /@/ does not
represent anything in the source language. It still remains highy
unreasonable to force your own concepts on another language, where
there is no correspondence. "

Now, if a certain Cécile and a Ms Smith chose to explain it in an
English book in these highly inadequate terms it's their problem, You
just read something you're unfamiliar with and you are trying to palm
off the way it is presented there (no doubt for better understanding
by mono English speakers) as dogma under the pretext that one of the
authors is French. You are not even equipped to read it critically
yourself except if you spent many years in French-speaking areas and
are thoroughly familiar with all possible forms of the phoneme (in
fact, I was suggesting that you are trained to hear different). Look
at it again, I think I used the word "jerk" advisedly.

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: French verb conjugation: "je harcele"? or "je harcelle"?
    ... IPA describes it as a central vowel with some rounding and ... At least one of the two authors of that section is French. ... source language. ...
    (sci.lang)
  • Re: non-phonetic english spelling
    ... >>pronunciations of French but it exists nonetheless, ... > totally irrelevant, just the phoneme counts. ... I am not sure I understand what you are saying. ...
    (sci.lang)
  • Re: Cardinal vowels
    ... Portuguese, with all the French names in perfect French pronunciation ... These people really have two complete and distinct phoneme ...
    (sci.lang)
  • Re: Cardinal vowels
    ... Portuguese, with all the French names in perfect French pronunciation ... These people really have two complete and distinct phoneme ...
    (sci.lang)
  • Re: English compared to other European languages
    ... >> Brian M. Scott wrote: ... > that) the British pronounce borrowings from French more like ... because I regard errors such as omitting a phoneme (e.g. the /s/ ... Incorrect stress will make a French word sound very odd to French ears. ...
    (sci.lang)