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Acadian French (le français acadien)
is a variety or dialect of French spoken by francophone Acadians in the Canadian Maritime provinces, the Saint John River
Valley in northern Maine, the Magdalen
Islands and Havre-Saint-Pierre, along the St.
Lawrence's north shore (where the original Acadian is probably best
heard due to the longtime isolation of these localities).
Links to other French
dialects
Just as Quebec
French, it is a variant of Canadian French. Acadian French derives
loosely from late Middle French still widespread in a few
French provinces (mainly: Maine, Anjou, Poitou, Saintonge, Aunis, Angoumois and more specifically Jersey) at the time of the French colonization of
the Americas and conserves characteristics such as pronunciation and
lexical items
(vocabulary) reminiscent of the language of Rabelais and Molière. As a result, it shares some
resemblance with both Metropolitan and Quebec French and a strong
influence of North American English is also
present. Cajun
French, a regional dialect spoken in Southern Louisiana and other parts
of the southern USA, is another off-shoot of older forms of Acadian
French.
Characteristics
Since there was no linguistic contact with France from the late eighteenth century until
the twentieth century, Acadian French retained features that died
out during the French standardization efforts of the
nineteenth century. That can be seen in examples like:
- While other dialects (such as Metropolitan French) have a uvular rhotic, Acadian
French has an alveolar one so that rouge
('red') is pronounced [ruʒ]
- The third-person plural ending of verbs -ont, e.g.
ils mangeont [imɑ̃ʒɔ̃] ('they eat') as compared to
Metropolitan French ils mangent [ilmɑ̃ʒ], which does not have an ending that is
pronounced.
- The use -ions (now only plural first-person ending of
verbs) instead of -ais as the singular first-person
ending, in the "imparfait" tense: e.g. j'avions,
j'aimions, j'étions... instead of
j'avais, j'aimais, j'étais... (meaning:
I was having, I was loving, I was being...). This was most likely
due to the old pronunciation of -ais endings in France
before Louis XIV came to power, which sounded like
-ois in most cases (ex: françois for
français, j'avois for j'avais,
etc.)
Although many aspects of this language (vocabulary, alveolar
"r", etc.) are still common in rural areas in the West of France,
any speakers of other dialects of French, such as speakers of Metropolitan
French, i.e. the French of France, and even of other Canadian
dialects, have difficulty understanding Acadian French, even when
spoken slowly.
See also Chiac, a mixed language based on French and English, and
Saint Mary's
Bay French, a distinct variety of Acadian French spoken around
Clare,
Nova Scotia.
Phonology
- /k/ and /tj/ is commonly replaced by [tʃ] before a front vowel. For example, queue,
cuillère, quelqu'un and cul are usually pronounced
tcheue, tchuillère, tchequ'un and tchu.
Tiens is pronounced tchin [tʃɛ̃].
- /ɡ/ and /dj/ often become [dʒ] (sometimes [ʒ]) before a front vowel. For example, bon
dieu and gueule become bon djeu and
djeule in Acadian French. Braguette becomes
brajette. (This pronunciation led to the word
Cajun, from Acadian.)
Inversion of
er
Metathesis is quite common.
For example, mercredi (Wednesday) is mécordi, and
grenouille (frog) is guernouille. Je
(the pronoun "I") is frequently pronounced euj.
In words, "re" is often pronounced "er". For instance :
- berloque for "breloque", berouette
for "brouette" (wheel-barrow), ferdaine for
"fredaine", guerlot for "grelot",
s'entertenir for "s'entretenir".
Other
- The /ɛr/ sequence followed by another consonant
sometimes becomes [ar] or [ɑʁ]. For example, merde and
perdre become màrde and pàrdre. This
rule is also abundantly consistent in the Quebec French, however the a is
nasal (â).
- The r in words endings by bre is often not
pronounced. For example, libre (free), arbre
(tree), timbre (stamp) would become
lib', arb' and timb'
- oui, (yes) sounds like ouaille or Modern
French ouais meaning yeah (oua is also
used).
- deux, (two) can sometimes sound like
doy.
- trois, (three) can sometimes sound like tro'
(originally troé).
- In the Nova
Scotia communities of Wedgeport and Pubnico the numbers soixante-dix
(seventy), quatre-vingts (eighty) and
quatre-vingt-dix (ninety) are instead called septante,
huiptante et nonante respectively.
Examples of Acadian
words
The following words and expressions are most commonly restricted
to Acadian French, though some can also be found in Quebec French.
- achaler: to bother (Fr: ennuyer)
- ajeuve: a while ago (Fr: récemment, tout juste)
- amanchure: thing, thingy, also the way things join together:
the joint or union of two things(Fr: chose, truc, machin)
- amarrer: (literally, to moor) to tie (Fr: attacher)
- amoureux: (lit. lover) burdock (Fr: (capitule de la) bardane; Quebec: toque, grakia)
(also very common in Quebec French)
- asteur: now (Fr: maintenant, à
cette heure, désormais)
- attoquer: to lean (Fr: appuyer)
- avoir de la misère: to have difficulty (Fr: avoir de la difficulté, avoir du mal)
- bailler: to give (Fr: donner)
- boloxer: to confuse, disrupt, unsettle (Fr: causer une confusion, déranger l'ordre régulier et
établi)
- boucane: smoke, steam (Fr: fumée,
vapeur)
- bouchure: fence (Fr: clôture)
- brâiller: to cry, weep (Fr: pleurer)
- brogane: work shoe, old or used shoe (Fr: chaussure de travail, chaussure
d'occasion)
- brosse: drinking binge (Fr: beuverie)
- caler: to sink (Fr: sombrer,
couler) (also "to drink fast in one shot", caler une bière)
- chassis: window (Fr: fenêtre)
- chavirer: to go crazy (Fr: devenir fou, folle)
- cotchiner: to cheat (Fr: tricher)
- de service: proper, properly (Fr: adéquat, comme il faut)
- ej: I (Fr: je)
- élan: moment, while (Fr: instant,
moment)
- espèrer: to say welcome, to invite (Fr: attendre, inviter)
- faire zire: to gross out (Fr: dégouter)
- farlaque: loose, wild, of easy virtue (Fr: dévergondée, au moeurs légères)
- frette: cold (Fr: froid)
- fricot: traditional Acadian stew prepared with chicken,
potatoes, onions, carrots, dumplings (lumps of dough), and seasoned
with savoury
- garrocher: to throw, chuck (Fr: lancer)
- hardes: clothes, clothing (Fr: vêtements)
- harrer : Battre ou traiter pauvrement, maltraîter
- hucher: to cry out (Fr: appeler
(qqn) à haute voix)
- innocent: simple, foolish or stupid (Fr: simple d'esprit, bête, qui manque de
jugement)
- itou: also, too (Fr: aussi, de
même, également)
- maganer: to overwork, wear out, tire, weaken (Fr: traiter durement, malmener, fatiguer,
affaiblir, endommager, détériorer)
- mais que: when + future tense (Fr: lorsque, quand (suivi d'un futur))
- mitan: middle, centre (Fr: milieu, centre)
- païen: (lit. pagan) hick, uneducated person, peasant
- pire à yaller/au pire à yaller: at worst (au pire)
- plaise: plaice (FR: plie)
- ploye: buckwheat
pancake, a tradition of Edmundston, New Brunswick (Fr: crêpe au sarassin)
- pomme de pré: (lit. meadow apple) American cranberry (Vaccinium macrocarpon)
(Fr: canneberge; Quebec:
atoca)
- poutine râpée: a ball made of grated
potato with pork in the centre, a traditional Acadian dish
- qu'ri: (from quérir) to fetch, go get (Fr: aller chercher)
- se haler: (lit. to haul oneself) to hurry (Fr: se dépêcher)
- se badgeuler: to argue (Fr: se
disputer)
- taweille: Native American
woman, traditionally associated with sorcery (Fr: Amérindienne)
- tchequ'affaire, tchequ'chouse, quètchose, quotchose: something
(Fr: quelque chose)
- tête de violon: ostrich fern fiddlehead
(Matteuccia struthiopteris)
- tétine-de-souris: (lit. mouse tit) slender glasswort, an edible green plant that grows
in salt marshes (Salicornia europaea) (Fr: salicorne d'Europe)
- vaillant, vaillante: active, hard-working, brave (Fr: actif, laborieux, courageux)
References
External
links
Canada: New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince
Edward Island Magdalen Islands,
United States:Maine
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