Difference between Québec & French accent?

[aFrenchie]

Thanks for the infos. I was too lazy to search by myself, since there are so many Canadians here

[Twitch]

Most English families were forced to learn French in Québec, as when the Bloc Québecois (separatists) made English signs illegal in the province (not enforced since the Bloc left power) they also wanted to close all English schools. But they decided to just require all English schools to teach French to their students, French schools though were not required to offer English classes. So now most of the English people who were living in Québec can now speak French(if you don't good luck finding a job), but most of the French still only speak French. That is generalised but it gives you an idea of what things are like.

EDIT: And the term québecois has come into use by the separatists, as they consider themselves québecois and not Canadian. So the term québecois has political meanings as well, and doesn't necessarily include everybody who lives in Québec. The separatists would argue that Québec's English population is not included. But in that context it is usually la nation québecoise. Like this picture, which is sure to piss of the Canadians, just remember guys it bothers me off too but when you live right on the border you tend to not to brush something like another referendum on Québec sovereignty under the rug. I have been using this forum as a barometer to keep tabs on how strong the separatists movement is, and also to see how much pro Canada stuff I can post before getting banned.

[HibyPrime]

The part of that that pisses me off the most is that they are alienating not only the rest of Canada (obviously), but they are alienating the french in Québec who are non-separatists.. How good of a nation would they be if they alienate their own people?

Originally Posted by Twitch

And on a side note about Québec being different, the québecois just got declared as a separate nation inside of a united Canada by Parliament.

what? when was that?

[Twitch]

Originally Posted by HibyPrime

what? when was that?

Back in November, here see: 'Your View'

And some Just for Laughs footage of comedians from Québec. You might not understand them but it lets you hear the accent.

Jean-Christian Thibodeau
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And others:
Louis-José Houde
Réal Beland
JMP
and well this guy... brigadier

I didn't watch all of the videos to see the skits were funny but it should let you hear some of the different accents that exist in Québec. Since this is stand up they won't have the polished up speech that journalists and TV announcers would have and it lets you hear more of how French is spoken in Québec.

[Perhonorificus]

Hi guys,

French Canadian Linguistics student here, and one who enjoys Alizée's music (though I was sorely disappointed when I learned she lipsynches so much). The question was "Difference between Québec & French accent"; I believe I can provide somewhat of an answer.

The first major difference is diphthongs (the Alizée FAQ falsely claims that there are no diphthongs in French, which is untrue--they just aren't in France French).

A diphthong, as stated by dictionary.com, is "an unsegmentable, gliding speech sound varying continuously in phonetic quality but held to be a single sound or phoneme and identified by its apparent beginning and ending sound, as the oi-sound of toy or boil." A good Québécois example of this would be the 'a' in "page", which sounds more like "pa-age"--the 'a' here is clearly longer in Québécois than standard French, where all vowels are given equal importance in speech.

The second major difference is affricates, which, too, are non-existent in standard French. Affricates are a transition between some consonants and vowels. In Québec French, they are usually [dz] and [ts] sounds. For example, as a Québécois, I would pronounce "tirer" as [tsirer], and "durer" as [dzurer]. Affricates have a big impact on the way we sound, and are perhaps what makes Québec and French accents sound so totally different at times.

There are other differences, of course, but I believe I highlighted the most prominent ones. Keep in mind I'm no Phonetics buff. Personally, I have no inferiority complexes when it comes to the way I pronounce my words (which is in no way as exaggerated as in the video above): it's easier on the tongue and allows us to pronounce every sound distinctively. With the way the French accent is evolving, it's actually hard to tell apart some of the sounds that are uttered by Frenchmen (the future and conditional moods, for instance, sound extremely similar over there).

[Twitch]

Welcome to the site Perhonorificus

I was to lazy to type all of that and I have never studied linguistics at that level so couldn't really explain most of that so I just linked the pages on Wiki that talked about it. Although in the Gaspesian region of Québec, which is the part that borders where I live in New Brunswick, the affricates are not present so we sound closer to international speakers than do most other Quebecers. And being that I learned French as a second language and used it only in school I still sometimes have difficulty understanding Quebecers that use affricates. But my biggest hurdle is simply all the expressions and slang you just don't learn from a book, and there are so many in québecois that understanding the words is just not enough to understand the expressions.

And as for those videos I tried to choose ones with really strong or exagerated expressions to make it easier for the English members to be able to notice the differences. I myself do not sound anywhere like that either, and didn't understand everything that was said in some of them. I still need the nice clear French spoken on the news, either from France or Canada, to really in confidance say that I understood everything.

[Perhonorificus]

Thanks for the welcome. Cool, I'm half Acadian myself, from my mother's side. Very true about people from that region not using affricates!

No accents are better than others, really. It's all a matter of perspective and preference.

[rwd716]

Wtf does all this bs mean? So Quebec isn't actually its own country; rather, Parliament merely stated that they are a nation of people? O Canada! What's going on?

[Twitch]

Actually currently it doesn't mean anything because there were no changes to the Constitution. It is all just words for the moment, basically politians playing politics. But it is not Québec, but the québecois that were declared a united nation inside of Canada. But how are they more a nation in Canada, than say the Acadians, or First Nation tribes, and why not Newfounlanders, they have their own dialect of English. While we're at it should we add the Gaelic speakers of Cape Breton? The list could go on forever because Canada doens't assimilate its imigrants but allows them to keep their cultures(as long as they don't conflict with current laws).

So like I said I have always considered Canada to be a country formed by many united nations, so why start to single certain ones out now? Even residents of Québec don't seem quite sure what to make of it, or who exactly would be considered a québecois.

IMO it is just Ottawa's attempt at stoping the separatist movement by telling them they don't have to leave Canada to be a nation, but in reality the separatists are not going to be sastified by just this and are now going to push for Constitutional changes to make it more than just words.

Québec btw is the only province not to have signed our Constitution, and has laws based on France's Code Napoléon that do not exist in the rest of Canada. Most non separatists in Québec, from what I've heard, view Québec's non signing more as French defiance of the British Crown rather than not wanting to be a part of Canada. And our Constitution still applies to Québec even though they haven't officially accepted it yet.

[Seapaddler]

I've had Metropolitan French speakers tell me that Quebec French has a 200 year old accent and considered old French like we have modern and old English. Their French has been stuck in a time warp while being separated from the Motherland by the big pond all these years.