French Pronunciation
When learning to pronounce a new language, it is often best to have the ability to listen to the sounds rather than to learn them from written works. Thanks to modern technological advances, you now have the ability to learn a foreign language in the comfort of your own home due to language software programs. These tutorials can be downloaded into your computer system and are designed to teach you a foreign language in the shortest amount of time possible. This software also allows you to listen to the pronunciations of the words to give you a clearer understanding as to what they are supposed to sound like. In this article, we will be concentrated on French pronunciation.
Over 700 million people in the world speak French, either as a first, second, or third language. The dialects are as varied as the people who speak them. For our purposes, we will be using standard French, which is the official government language for the country of France itself.
We will begin with the French pronunciation of vowels. Due to the use of accent marks and other symbols, there are several pronunciations for the same vowels. Below are a listing of these letters and their French pronunciations:
a (“a” in heart” or “card.” Mouth should be less open than the “a” in these words.)
â (same as “a” with the mouth held open slightly more)
e (sounds like a short “a” with a sharper sound, like the second “a” in “karma”)
ê (sounds like “e” in “head” shortened)
è (“ee”)
é (sounds much like “ê”)
i (“ee’ but only shorter)
ï (makes one syllable into two. For example, “naïf” is pronounced “na-if”)
o (sounds like the English short “o” unless it is located at the end of the word. Then it sounds like the English long “o”)
ô (sounds like “o” with the mouth more closed)
u (the French sound for “u” does not exist in the English language. It sounds like a grunted “eh.”)
y (sounds the same as the French double “i.”)
The French pronunciation of these vowels differs when the vowels are combined. Here are a few vowel combinations and their pronunciations:
ou (sounds like the “u’ in “bush”)
oi (“wah” )
au, eau (sounds like a shortened long “o” sound)
ai (shortened “eh”)
eu, oeu (shortened “uh”)
ui (“ree”)
er, et (shortened “ee”)
on (“au” as in “taught” shortened)
au (sounds like the French letter combination “on”)
en (also sounds like the French “on”)
in, ain, ein (shortened “ah”)
The French pronunciation of the consonants varies from English as well. Here are a list of a few of the consonants and their pronunciations:
r (guttural “rr”-sounds similar to the Scottish “r”)
j (sounds like the English “g” in “garden”)
g (If followed by “a,” “o,” or “u”, it sounds like the “g’ in “garden.” If followed by “e’ or “I”, it has the English “j” sound as in “jump.”)
gn (sounds like Spanish “ñ” which sounds somewhat like a shortened “nuh”)
ch (“sh” as in “shoe”)
h (silent when found at the beginning of a word. Otherwise, sounds like the English “h”)
s (when used as a plural at the end of a word, the “s” remains silent. Otherwise, it sounds like “es”)
These are just a few of the French pronunciation rules. If you are interested in learning to speak French properly, you may want to visit one of the many French pronunciation Web sites or you can purchase one of the language software programs that were mentioned previously. Good luck!