Quebec English
Encyclopedia
Quebec English is the common term for the set of various linguistic
and social phenomena affecting the use of English
in the predominantly French
-speaking Canadian
Province of Quebec
.
There are few distinctive phonological features and very few restricted lexical features common among English-speaking Quebecers. The English spoken in Quebec generally belongs to West/Central Canadian English
whose Sprachraum
comprises one of the largest and most homogeneous dialect areas in North America. The dialect is common in Montreal
, where the vast majority of anglophones in Quebec live, as well as in large metropolitan areas of Ontario
and Western Canada
. It is very similar to General American
English. English-speaking Montrealers also have established ethnic groups that retain distinct lexical features: Irish, Jewish, Italian, and Greek communities all speak discernible varieties of English. Given that these communities have considerable mobility within Canada, they retain traits common in many Canadian cities.
Important regional variations also occur in rural and remote regions near Quebec's borders and are associated with local cross-border contact. Rural Townshippers
and Châteauguay Valley residents in southern Quebec are reported by some to have a dialect more similar to that of Vermont English
. Isolated fishing villages on the Lower North Shore of Quebec speak Newfoundland English
, and many Gaspesian
anglophones speak Maritime English
. Finally, the Kahnawake Mohawks of south shore Montreal and the Cree and Inuit of Northern Quebec speak English with their own distinctive accents, word usage and expressions stemming from their respective Indigenous languages. Over centuries of contact, numerous English and French words have also been incorporated into their languages.
Francophone second-language
speakers of English use an interlanguage
with varying degrees of French-accented pronunciation. Since French-speaking Quebecers
greatly outnumber English-speakers in most regions of Quebec, it is more common to hear this in public areas. Some English-speakers in overwhelmingly francophone areas exhibit some of these features (such as replacement of [θ] and [ð] by [t] and [d]), but their English is remarkably similar to that of other varieties of English in Canada (Poplack
, Walker, & Malcolmson 2006 ).
All of these variations constitute what is commonly perceived as Quebec English.
Note: The following practices are denoted by the symbol N@, as they are not deemed acceptable in English-language writing and broadcasting
in Quebec. The same lack of acceptability holds true by standards of English outside Quebec.
, where many of the province's entities have a designation only in English.
Particular cases: Pie-IX (as in the boulevard, bridge
and métro station
) is pronounced /pinœf/ or /pinʌf/ ("pea nuf"), not as "pie nine". On the other hand, sometimes a final written consonant is included or added in pronunciation, where an historic English-language name and pronunciation exists among Anglophone or English-dominant Allophone communities associated with particularly neighbourhoods such as for "Bernard", which in French is known as rue Bernard. Montreal
is always pronounced as an English word, following its historic official English-language name. English-speakers generally pronounce the French Saint- (m.) and Sainte- (f.) in street and place names as the English "saint"; however, Saint-Laurent (the former city, now a borough of Montreal) can be pronounced as in French /sɛ̃lɔrɑ̃/, whereas Saint Lawrence Boulevard
can be pronounced as "/sɛ̃lɔrɑ̃/" (silent t) or as the original English name, Saint Lawrence. Sainte-Foy
is pronounced "saint-fwa" /seɪnʔ.fwa/ not "saint-foy" /seɪnʔ.fɔɪ/, which would be used elsewhere in English-speaking North America. Saint-Denis is often pronounced on the Saint model with a silent s in Denis, or as "Saint Dennis". Verdun, as a place name, has the expected English-language pronunciation, /vəɹˈdʌn/, while English-speakers from Verdun traditionally pronounce the eponymous street name as "Verd'n", /ˈvɜɹdn/. Saint-Léonard
, a borough of Montreal, is pronounced "Saint-Lee-o-nard" /seɪnt li.oˈnɑɹd/, which is reputedly neither English nor French.
Used by both Quebec-born and outside English-speakers, acronyms with the letters pronounced in English, not French, rather than the full name for Quebec institutions and some areas on Montreal Island are common, particularly where the English-language names either are or, historically, were official. For instance, SQ --> Sûreté du Québec
(pre-Bill 101: QPP --> Quebec Provincial Police, as it once was); NDG --> Notre-Dame-de-Grâce
; DDO --> Dollard-des-Ormeaux; TMR --> Town of Mount Royal
, the bilingual town's official English name.
Finally, some French place names are very difficult for English-speakers to say without adopting a French accent, such that those proficient in French nonetheless choose an English pronunciation rather than accent-switching. Examples are Vaudreuil, Belœil
and Longueuil
in which pronunciation of the segment /œj/ (spelled "euil" or "œil") is a challenge. These are most often pronounced as "voh-droy" /vo.drɔɪ/, "bel-oy" /bɛl.ɔɪ/ and "long-gay" /loŋ.ɡeɪ/ or less often "long-gale" /loŋ.ɡeɪl/.
2. N@ (when written) – The practice of using English versions of place names that may now be officially in French, especially where such place names had official English-language designations. Far from being restricted to monolingual, older English speakers of British Isles ancestry, this practice is particularly common among immigrant communities associated with central Montreal districts and who, as was allowed, were schooled in and acculturated via English-language institutions. Particularly among more recent Anglophone newcomers to Montreal, the practice of regarding only French-language place names as legitimate has grown, giving rise to the surprising phenomenon of recent arrivals correcting long-established Montrealers as to the pronunciation of street names on which entire generations grew up; this is generally considered overzealous, officious or pretentious within the community.
3. The use of limited number of Quebec French terms for everyday places (and occasional items) that have English equivalents; all of these are said using English pronunciation or have undergone an English clipping or abbreviation, such that they are regarded as ordinary English terms by Quebeckers. Some of them tend sometimes to be preceded by the definite article in contexts where they could normally take "a(n)".
4. French-language first and last names using mostly French sounds. Such names may be mispronounced by non-French-speakers, for instance a first-syllable stress or silent-d pronunciation in Bouchard --> /buʃard/. French speakers, as are most Quebec English speakers, are on the other hand more likely to vary pronunciation of this type depending on the manner in which they adopt an English phonological framework.
Marie-Claire Blais
Jean Charest
Jean Chrétien
Robert Charlebois
Céline Dion
This importation of French-language syllabic stresses and phonemes into an English phonological framework may be regarded as interlanguage
or translation.
5. A limited number of lexical and phonological features that are more or less limited to Montreal. For example, in most of Canada, carbonated beverages are commonly referred to as "pop", whereas in Montreal they are known as "soft drinks".
Also, Montrealers tend not to tense the vowel [æ] before nasal consonants, unlike most other (urban) Canadians, so that the vowel sound in "man" is more or less the same as the vowel in "mat", rather than being higher and fronter (cf. Boberg 2004).
", these phenomena are a product of interlanguage
, calques or mistranslation and thus may not constitute so-called "Quebec English", to the extent that these can be conceived of separately particularly since such phenomena are similar among English-subsequent-language French speakers throughout the world, leaving little that is Quebec-specific:
A. N@ – The use of French collocation
s.
Close the door. – Lock the door.
Open the light. – Turn on the lights.
Close the light. – Turn off the lights.
Take a decision. – Make a decision. (NB "Take" is the older British version)
Put your coat. – Put your coat on.
B. N@ – The use of French grammar or no grammatical change. Many of these constructions are grammatically correct but only out of context. It is both the calquing and linguistic transfer from French and the betrayed meanings that make these sentences foreign to English.
Me, I work in Laval. --> I work in Laval. (vocal stress on "I")
It/He have many books. --> There are many books. (from French il y a meaning "there is/are")
I like the beef and the red wine. --> I like beef and red wine. (overuse of definite article
to mean "in general")
You speak French? --> Do you speak French? (absence of auxiliary verb
; otherwise it means surprise, disbelief or disappointment when out of context)
I don’t find my keys. --> I can’t find my keys. (lack of English modal auxiliary verb
)
At this moment I wash the dishes. --> I’m washing the dishes right now. (verbal aspect
)
My computer, he don’t work. --> My computer won’t work. (human pronoun, subject repetition, uninflected auxiliary verb)
I would like a brownies. --> Could I have a brownie? (plural –s thought to be part of the singular word in relexification
process; other examples: "a Q-tips", "a pins", "a buns", "a Smarties", "a Doritos", etc.)
I would like shrimps with broccolis. -–> Could I have some shrimp and broccoli? (use of regular plural instead of English unmarked plural
or non-count noun
; this is not a case of hypercorrection
but of language transfer).
Do you want to wash the dishes? --> Will/would you wash the dishes? (lack of English modal verb
; modal vouloir from French instead – Voulez-vous faire la vaisselle?)
We have to go in by downstairs --> We have to go in downstairs (via the non-standard French 'entrer par')
C. N@ – Pronunciation of phoneme
/ŋ/ as /n/ + /g/ (among some Italian
Montrealers) or /n/ + /k/ (among some Jewish Montrealers, especially those who grew up in Yiddish
-speaking environments), for instance due to high degrees of ethnic connectivity within, for instance, municipalities, boroughs or neighbourhoods on the Island of Montreal
such as Saint-Léonard
and Outremont
/Côte-des-Neiges/Côte-Saint-Luc. These phenomena occur as well in other diaspora
areas such as New York City
.
D. N@ – The use of false cognate
s (faux-amis); this practice is quite common, so much so that those who use them abundantly insist that the false cognate is the English term even outside of Quebec. Note that these French words are all pronounced using English sounds and harbour French meanings. While the possibilities are truly endless, this list provides only the most insidious false cognates found in Quebec.
Few anglophone Quebeckers use many such false cognates, but most understand such high-frequency words and expressions. Some of these cognates are used by many francophones, and others by many allophones and anglophone accultured in allophone environments, of varying English proficiencies, from the bare-minimum level to native-speaker level.
Linguistics
Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. Linguistics can be broadly broken into three categories or subfields of study: language form, language meaning, and language in context....
and social phenomena affecting the use of English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
in the predominantly French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
-speaking Canadian
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
Province of Quebec
Quebec
Quebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....
.
There are few distinctive phonological features and very few restricted lexical features common among English-speaking Quebecers. The English spoken in Quebec generally belongs to West/Central Canadian English
West/Central Canadian English
The West–Central Canadian English dialect is one of the largest and most homogeneous dialect areas in North America, ranging from Ontario, through the Prairie Provinces to British Columbia. It forms a dialect continuum with the accent in the Western United States, and borders the Canadian North,...
whose Sprachraum
Sprachraum
Sprachraum is a linguistic term used to designate a geographical region/district where a language, dialect, group or family of languages is spoken. The German word Sprachraum literally means "language area"....
comprises one of the largest and most homogeneous dialect areas in North America. The dialect is common in Montreal
Montreal
Montreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
, where the vast majority of anglophones in Quebec live, as well as in large metropolitan areas of Ontario
Ontario
Ontario is a province of Canada, located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province and second largest in total area. It is home to the nation's most populous city, Toronto, and the nation's capital, Ottawa....
and Western Canada
Western Canada
Western Canada, also referred to as the Western provinces and commonly as the West, is a region of Canada that includes the four provinces west of the province of Ontario.- Provinces :...
. It is very similar to General American
General American
General American , also known as Standard American English , is a major accent of American English. The accent is not restricted to the United States...
English. English-speaking Montrealers also have established ethnic groups that retain distinct lexical features: Irish, Jewish, Italian, and Greek communities all speak discernible varieties of English. Given that these communities have considerable mobility within Canada, they retain traits common in many Canadian cities.
Important regional variations also occur in rural and remote regions near Quebec's borders and are associated with local cross-border contact. Rural Townshippers
Eastern Townships
The Eastern Townships is a tourist region and a former administrative region in south-eastern Quebec, lying between the former seigneuries south of the Saint Lawrence River and the United States border. Its northern boundary roughly followed Logan's Line, the geologic boundary between the flat,...
and Châteauguay Valley residents in southern Quebec are reported by some to have a dialect more similar to that of Vermont English
Vermont English
Vermont English is a dialect of English Language spoken in the U.S. state of Vermont. Although a New England state, the variety of English spoken in most parts of the state generally has more in common with the accent spoken in nearby New York State and parts of the Midwest...
. Isolated fishing villages on the Lower North Shore of Quebec speak Newfoundland English
Newfoundland English
Newfoundland English is a name for several accents and dialects thereof the English found in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador. Most of these differ substantially from the English commonly spoken elsewhere in Canada...
, and many Gaspesian
Gaspé Peninsula
The Gaspésie , or Gaspé Peninsula or the Gaspé, is a peninsula along the south shore of the Saint Lawrence River in Quebec, Canada, extending into the Gulf of Saint Lawrence...
anglophones speak Maritime English
Maritimer English
Canadian Maritime English or Maritimer English is a dialect of English spoken in the Maritime provinces of Canada. Quirks include the removal of pre-consonantal sounds, and a faster speech tempo...
. Finally, the Kahnawake Mohawks of south shore Montreal and the Cree and Inuit of Northern Quebec speak English with their own distinctive accents, word usage and expressions stemming from their respective Indigenous languages. Over centuries of contact, numerous English and French words have also been incorporated into their languages.
Francophone second-language
Second language
A second language or L2 is any language learned after the first language or mother tongue. Some languages, often called auxiliary languages, are used primarily as second languages or lingua francas ....
speakers of English use an interlanguage
Interlanguage
An interlanguage is an emerging linguistic system that has been developed by a learner of a second language who has not become fully proficient yet but is approximating the target language: preserving some features of their first language , or overgeneralizing target language rules in speaking or...
with varying degrees of French-accented pronunciation. Since French-speaking Quebecers
Francophone
The adjective francophone means French-speaking, typically as primary language, whether referring to individuals, groups, or places. Often, the word is used as a noun to describe a natively French-speaking person....
greatly outnumber English-speakers in most regions of Quebec, it is more common to hear this in public areas. Some English-speakers in overwhelmingly francophone areas exhibit some of these features (such as replacement of [θ] and [ð] by [t] and [d]), but their English is remarkably similar to that of other varieties of English in Canada (Poplack
Shana Poplack
Shana Poplack is a leading proponent of variation theory, the approach to language science pioneered by William Labov. She has extended the methodology and theory of this field into bilingual speech patterns, the prescription-praxis dialectic in the co-evolution of standard and non-standard...
, Walker, & Malcolmson 2006 ).
All of these variations constitute what is commonly perceived as Quebec English.
Note: The following practices are denoted by the symbol N@, as they are not deemed acceptable in English-language writing and broadcasting
Broadcasting
Broadcasting is the distribution of audio and video content to a dispersed audience via any audio visual medium. Receiving parties may include the general public or a relatively large subset of thereof...
in Quebec. The same lack of acceptability holds true by standards of English outside Quebec.
First-language English-speaker Phenomena in Montreal
1. The use of French-language toponyms and official names of institutions/organizations which have no official English names; this is probably not a uniquely Quebec phenomenon, though, so much as the practice of calling a thing by its name. Though not normally italicized in English written documents, these Quebec words are pronounced as in French, especially in broadcast media. Note that the reverse language status situation holds true when using French in a province such as British ColumbiaBritish Columbia
British Columbia is the westernmost of Canada's provinces and is known for its natural beauty, as reflected in its Latin motto, Splendor sine occasu . Its name was chosen by Queen Victoria in 1858...
, where many of the province's entities have a designation only in English.
- the Régie du Logement, the Collège de MaisonneuveCollège de MaisonneuveCollège de Maisonneuve is a francophone Cégep pre-university and technical college located at 3800 Sherbrooke Street East in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.-Partnerships:...
- Québec SolidaireQuébec SolidaireQuébec solidaire is a democratic socialist and sovereigntist political party in Quebec, Canada, that was created on 4 February 2006 in Montreal. It was formed by the merger of the left-wing party Union des forces progressistes and the alter-globalization political movement Option Citoyenne, led...
, the Parti QuébécoisParti QuébécoisThe Parti Québécois is a centre-left political party that advocates national sovereignty for the province of Quebec and secession from Canada. The Party traditionally has support from the labour movement. Unlike many other social-democratic parties, its ties with the labour movement are informal... - Hochelaga-MaisonneuveHochelaga-MaisonneuveHochelaga-Maisonneuve is a district of Montreal, Quebec, situated on the eastern half of the island, generally to the south and south-west of the city's Olympic Stadium. A part of the borough of Mercier–Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, its borders are roughly rue Moreau to the west, rue Sherbrooke to the...
, Trois-RivièresTrois-RivièresTrois-Rivières means three rivers in French and may refer to:in Canada*Trois-Rivières, the largest city in the Mauricie region of Quebec, Canada*Circuit Trois-Rivières, a racetrack in Trois-Rivières, Quebec...
Particular cases: Pie-IX (as in the boulevard, bridge
Pie IX Bridge
The Pie IX Bridge is a bridge in Quebec, spanning the Rivière des Prairies. It connects the Saint-Vincent-de-Paul area of Laval, on Île Jésus, and the borough of Montreal North in Montreal, on the Island of Montreal...
and métro station
Pie-IX (Montreal Metro)
Pie-IX is a station on the Green Line of the Montreal Metro rapid transit system operated by the Société de transport de Montréal . It is in the district of Hochelaga-Maisonneuve in the borough of Mercier–Hochelaga-Maisonneuve in Montreal, Quebec, Canada...
) is pronounced /pinœf/ or /pinʌf/ ("pea nuf"), not as "pie nine". On the other hand, sometimes a final written consonant is included or added in pronunciation, where an historic English-language name and pronunciation exists among Anglophone or English-dominant Allophone communities associated with particularly neighbourhoods such as for "Bernard", which in French is known as rue Bernard. Montreal
Montreal
Montreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
is always pronounced as an English word, following its historic official English-language name. English-speakers generally pronounce the French Saint- (m.) and Sainte- (f.) in street and place names as the English "saint"; however, Saint-Laurent (the former city, now a borough of Montreal) can be pronounced as in French /sɛ̃lɔrɑ̃/, whereas Saint Lawrence Boulevard
Saint Lawrence Boulevard
For the Ottawa road, see St. Laurent Boulevard. For the Gatineau road called "Boulevard Saint-Laurent", see Boulevard des Allumettières.Saint Lawrence Boulevard or boulevard Saint-Laurent is a major street in Montreal, Quebec, Canada...
can be pronounced as "/sɛ̃lɔrɑ̃/" (silent t) or as the original English name, Saint Lawrence. Sainte-Foy
Sainte-Foy
Sainte Foy or Sainte Foi is a French expression meaning either Saint Faith, as a person, or "holy faith" .See also Santa Fe.Sainte-Foy is the name or part of the name of several places:-In France:...
is pronounced "saint-fwa" /seɪnʔ.fwa/ not "saint-foy" /seɪnʔ.fɔɪ/, which would be used elsewhere in English-speaking North America. Saint-Denis is often pronounced on the Saint model with a silent s in Denis, or as "Saint Dennis". Verdun, as a place name, has the expected English-language pronunciation, /vəɹˈdʌn/, while English-speakers from Verdun traditionally pronounce the eponymous street name as "Verd'n", /ˈvɜɹdn/. Saint-Léonard
Saint-Léonard (borough)
Saint Leonard is a borough of Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Formerly a separate city, it was amalgamated into the city of Montreal in 2002.The former city was originally called St...
, a borough of Montreal, is pronounced "Saint-Lee-o-nard" /seɪnt li.oˈnɑɹd/, which is reputedly neither English nor French.
Used by both Quebec-born and outside English-speakers, acronyms with the letters pronounced in English, not French, rather than the full name for Quebec institutions and some areas on Montreal Island are common, particularly where the English-language names either are or, historically, were official. For instance, SQ --> Sûreté du Québec
Sûreté du Québec
Sûreté du Québec or SQ is the provincial police force for the Canadian province of Québec...
(pre-Bill 101: QPP --> Quebec Provincial Police, as it once was); NDG --> Notre-Dame-de-Grâce
Notre-Dame-de-Grâce
Notre-Dame-de-Grâce , also nicknamed NDG, is a residential neighbourhood of Montreal located in the city's west-end. It is one of five districts of the borough of Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce...
; DDO --> Dollard-des-Ormeaux; TMR --> Town of Mount Royal
Mount Royal, Quebec
Mount Royal is a town located on the northwest side of Mount Royal, north of downtown Montreal, on the Island of Montreal in southwestern Quebec, Canada. The town is completely surrounded by Montreal. The population was 18,933 at the 2006 census...
, the bilingual town's official English name.
Finally, some French place names are very difficult for English-speakers to say without adopting a French accent, such that those proficient in French nonetheless choose an English pronunciation rather than accent-switching. Examples are Vaudreuil, Belœil
Beloeil, Quebec
Belœil is a city in southwestern Quebec, Canada on the Richelieu River, east of Montreal. The population as of the Canada 2006 Census was 18,927. It is part of the Regional County Municipality of La Vallée-du-Richelieu, within the Administrative Region of Montérégie. It occupies the west shore...
and Longueuil
Longueuil
Longueuil is a city in the province of Quebec, Canada. It is the seat of the Montérégie administrative region and sits on the south shore of the Saint Lawrence River directly across from Montreal. The population as of the Canada 2006 Census totaled 229,330, making it the third largest city in...
in which pronunciation of the segment /œj/ (spelled "euil" or "œil") is a challenge. These are most often pronounced as "voh-droy" /vo.drɔɪ/, "bel-oy" /bɛl.ɔɪ/ and "long-gay" /loŋ.ɡeɪ/ or less often "long-gale" /loŋ.ɡeɪl/.
2. N@ (when written) – The practice of using English versions of place names that may now be officially in French, especially where such place names had official English-language designations. Far from being restricted to monolingual, older English speakers of British Isles ancestry, this practice is particularly common among immigrant communities associated with central Montreal districts and who, as was allowed, were schooled in and acculturated via English-language institutions. Particularly among more recent Anglophone newcomers to Montreal, the practice of regarding only French-language place names as legitimate has grown, giving rise to the surprising phenomenon of recent arrivals correcting long-established Montrealers as to the pronunciation of street names on which entire generations grew up; this is generally considered overzealous, officious or pretentious within the community.
- Pine Avenue, Park Avenue, Mountain Street, Dorchester Blvd., St. James Street – often used without St., Blvd., Ave., Rd., etc. (names for the designations "avenue des Pins", "av. du Parc", "rue de la Montagne", "boulevard René-Lévesque", "rue St-Jacques"; the English-language official designations have reputedly been revoked, although evidence for this is difficult to find)
- Guy and Saint Catherine Streets
- Town of Mount RoyalMount Royal, QuebecMount Royal is a town located on the northwest side of Mount Royal, north of downtown Montreal, on the Island of Montreal in southwestern Quebec, Canada. The town is completely surrounded by Montreal. The population was 18,933 at the 2006 census...
, as it was chartered, which charter has not been revoked - Pointe Claire (English pronunciation and typography, instead of official "Pointe-Claire")
3. The use of limited number of Quebec French terms for everyday places (and occasional items) that have English equivalents; all of these are said using English pronunciation or have undergone an English clipping or abbreviation, such that they are regarded as ordinary English terms by Quebeckers. Some of them tend sometimes to be preceded by the definite article in contexts where they could normally take "a(n)".
- autoroute instead of expressway
- branché instead of trendy (colloquial)
- chez nous instead of "where we live"
- the dep – instead of corner, variety, or convenience store; from dépanneurDépanneurA dépanneur is a convenience store, usually part of a chain, or an independently-run corner shop, general store or deli, in the province of Quebec in Canada...
- the gallery – instead of balcony
- the guichet – instead of bank machine, even when all ATMAutomated teller machineAn automated teller machine or automatic teller machine, also known as a Cashpoint , cash machine or sometimes a hole in the wall in British English, is a computerised telecommunications device that provides the clients of a financial institution with access to financial transactions in a public...
s are labelled "ATM"; - the SAQ – the official name of the government-run monopoly liquor stores , the Société des alcools du QuébecSociété des alcools du QuébecThe Société des alcools du Québec , often abbreviated and referred to as SAQ, is a provincial Crown corporation in Quebec.-Organization:...
. This usage is similar to that in other provinces, such as in neighbouring Ontario where liquor stores are referred to as the LCBO (for Liquor Control Board of OntarioLiquor Control Board of OntarioThe Liquor Control Board of Ontario is a provincial Crown corporation in Ontario, Canada established in 1927 by Lieutenant Governor William Donald Ross, on the advice of his Premier, Howard Ferguson, to sell liquor, wine, and beer through a chain of retail stores...
). - marché – marketMarketA market is one of many varieties of systems, institutions, procedures, social relations and infrastructures whereby parties engage in exchange. While parties may exchange goods and services by barter, most markets rely on sellers offering their goods or services in exchange for money from buyers...
- the metro – like the SAQ, this practice consists of calling a thing by its proper name, making it particularly unremarkable; the ParisParisParis is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
metro is pronounced similarly, as is the Washington D.C. metro and so on. - poutinePoutinePoutine is a Canadian dish of French fries and fresh cheese curds, covered with brown gravy or sauce. Sometimes additional ingredients are added.Poutine is a fast food dish that originated in Quebec and can now be found across Canada...
– french fries with gravy and cheddar cheese curds - primary one, two, three, in contrast to Canadian EnglishCanadian EnglishCanadian English is the variety of English spoken in Canada. English is the first language, or "mother tongue", of approximately 24 million Canadians , and more than 28 million are fluent in the language...
grade one, two, etc. - resto – restaurant
- stage – apprenticeship or internship, pronounced somewhat as in FrenchFrench languageFrench is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
- terrasse – the French pronunciation of 'terrace' is common among anglophones in casual speech yet considered incorrect in formal speech. Spelling remains as in English.
- undertaking – businessBusinessA business is an organization engaged in the trade of goods, services, or both to consumers. Businesses are predominant in capitalist economies, where most of them are privately owned and administered to earn profit to increase the wealth of their owners. Businesses may also be not-for-profit...
or enterpriseCompanyA company is a form of business organization. It is an association or collection of individual real persons and/or other companies, who each provide some form of capital. This group has a common purpose or focus and an aim of gaining profits. This collection, group or association of persons can be... - subvention – government grant or subsidy. The word exists in both French and English, but is rarely heard in Canadian EnglishCanadian EnglishCanadian English is the variety of English spoken in Canada. English is the first language, or "mother tongue", of approximately 24 million Canadians , and more than 28 million are fluent in the language...
.
4. French-language first and last names using mostly French sounds. Such names may be mispronounced by non-French-speakers, for instance a first-syllable stress or silent-d pronunciation in Bouchard --> /buʃard/. French speakers, as are most Quebec English speakers, are on the other hand more likely to vary pronunciation of this type depending on the manner in which they adopt an English phonological framework.
Mario Lemieux
Mario Lemieux, OC, CQ is a Canadian former professional ice hockey player. He is acknowledged to be one of the best players of all time. He played 17 seasons as a forward for the Pittsburgh Penguins of the National Hockey League between 1984 and 2006...
Marie-Claire Blais
Marie-Claire Blais
Marie-Claire Blais, is a Canadian author and playwright.- Life :Born in Quebec City, Quebec, she was educated at a convent school and at Université Laval. It was at Laval that she met Jeanne Lapointe and Father Georges Lévesque, who encouraged her to write and, in 1959, to publish her first...
Jean Charest
Jean Charest
John James "Jean" Charest, PC, MNA is a Canadian politician who has been the 29th Premier of Quebec since 2003. He was leader of the federal Progressive Conservative Party of Canada from 1993 to 1998 and has been leader of the Quebec Liberal Party since 1998....
Jean Chrétien
Jean Chrétien
Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien , known commonly as Jean Chrétien is a former Canadian politician who was the 20th Prime Minister of Canada. He served in the position for over ten years, from November 4, 1993 to December 12, 2003....
Robert Charlebois
Robert Charlebois
Robert Charlebois, OC, OQ is a Quebec author, composer, musician, performer and actor. He is an important figure in French language song....
Céline Dion
Celine Dion
Céline Marie Claudette Dion, , , is a Canadian singer. Born to a large family from Charlemagne, Quebec, Dion emerged as a teen star in the French-speaking world after her manager and future husband René Angélil mortgaged his home to finance her first record...
This importation of French-language syllabic stresses and phonemes into an English phonological framework may be regarded as interlanguage
Interlanguage
An interlanguage is an emerging linguistic system that has been developed by a learner of a second language who has not become fully proficient yet but is approximating the target language: preserving some features of their first language , or overgeneralizing target language rules in speaking or...
or translation.
5. A limited number of lexical and phonological features that are more or less limited to Montreal. For example, in most of Canada, carbonated beverages are commonly referred to as "pop", whereas in Montreal they are known as "soft drinks".
Also, Montrealers tend not to tense the vowel [æ] before nasal consonants, unlike most other (urban) Canadians, so that the vowel sound in "man" is more or less the same as the vowel in "mat", rather than being higher and fronter (cf. Boberg 2004).
French-language phenomena in English (not restricted to Quebec)
High-frequency, second-language phenomena by francophones, allophones, and generally non-native-English speakers occur, predictably, in the most basic structures of English. Commonly called "Frenglish" or "franglaisFranglais
Franglais , a portmanteau combining the French words "français" and "anglais" , is a slang term for an interlanguage, although the word has different overtones in French and English....
", these phenomena are a product of interlanguage
Interlanguage
An interlanguage is an emerging linguistic system that has been developed by a learner of a second language who has not become fully proficient yet but is approximating the target language: preserving some features of their first language , or overgeneralizing target language rules in speaking or...
, calques or mistranslation and thus may not constitute so-called "Quebec English", to the extent that these can be conceived of separately particularly since such phenomena are similar among English-subsequent-language French speakers throughout the world, leaving little that is Quebec-specific:
A. N@ – The use of French collocation
Collocation
In corpus linguistics, collocation defines a sequence of words or terms that co-occur more often than would be expected by chance. In phraseology, collocation is a sub-type of phraseme. An example of a phraseological collocation is the expression strong tea...
s.
B. N@ – The use of French grammar or no grammatical change. Many of these constructions are grammatically correct but only out of context. It is both the calquing and linguistic transfer from French and the betrayed meanings that make these sentences foreign to English.
- He
Definite Article
Definite Article is the title of British comedian Eddie Izzard's 1996 performance released on VHS. It was recorded on different nights at the Shaftesbury Theatre...
to mean "in general")
Auxiliary verb
In linguistics, an auxiliary verb is a verb that gives further semantic or syntactic information about a main or full verb. In English, the extra meaning provided by an auxiliary verb alters the basic meaning of the main verb to make it have one or more of the following functions: passive voice,...
; otherwise it means surprise, disbelief or disappointment when out of context)
English modal auxiliary verb
In the English language, a modal verb is a type of auxiliary verb. The key way to identify a modal verb is by its defectiveness...
)
Grammatical aspect
In linguistics, the grammatical aspect of a verb is a grammatical category that defines the temporal flow in a given action, event, or state, from the point of view of the speaker...
)
Relexification
Relexification is a term in linguistics used to describe the mechanism of language change by which one language replaces much or all of its lexicon, including basic vocabulary, with that of another language, without drastic change to its grammar. It is principally used to describe pidgins, creoles,...
process; other examples: "a Q-tips", "a pins", "a buns", "a Smarties", "a Doritos", etc.)
English plural
In the English language, nouns are inflected for grammatical number —that is, singular or plural. This article discusses the variety of ways in which English plurals are formed for nouns...
or non-count noun
Mass noun
In linguistics, a mass noun is a noun that refers to some entity as an undifferentiated unit rather than as something with discrete subsets. Non-count nouns are best identified by their syntactic properties, and especially in contrast with count nouns. The semantics of mass nouns are highly...
; this is not a case of hypercorrection
Hypercorrection
In linguistics or usage, hypercorrection is a non-standard usage that results from the over-application of a perceived rule of grammar or a usage prescription...
but of language transfer).
Modal verb
A modal verb is a type of auxiliary verb that is used to indicate modality -- that is, likelihood, ability, permission, and obligation...
; modal vouloir from French instead – Voulez-vous faire la vaisselle?)
C. N@ – Pronunciation of phoneme
Phoneme
In a language or dialect, a phoneme is the smallest segmental unit of sound employed to form meaningful contrasts between utterances....
/ŋ/ as /n/ + /g/ (among some Italian
Italian language
Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...
Montrealers) or /n/ + /k/ (among some Jewish Montrealers, especially those who grew up in Yiddish
Yiddish language
Yiddish is a High German language of Ashkenazi Jewish origin, spoken throughout the world. It developed as a fusion of German dialects with Hebrew, Aramaic, Slavic languages and traces of Romance languages...
-speaking environments), for instance due to high degrees of ethnic connectivity within, for instance, municipalities, boroughs or neighbourhoods on the Island of Montreal
Island of Montreal
The Island of Montreal , in extreme southwestern Quebec, Canada, is located at the confluence of the Saint Lawrence and Ottawa Rivers. It is separated from Île Jésus by the Rivière des Prairies....
such as Saint-Léonard
Saint-Léonard (borough)
Saint Leonard is a borough of Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Formerly a separate city, it was amalgamated into the city of Montreal in 2002.The former city was originally called St...
and Outremont
Outremont
Outremont may refer to:*Outremont, Quebec - a borough and former town in Montreal*Outremont - a Canadian federal electoral district*Outremont - a Quebec provincial electoral district...
/Côte-des-Neiges/Côte-Saint-Luc. These phenomena occur as well in other diaspora
Diaspora
A diaspora is "the movement, migration, or scattering of people away from an established or ancestral homeland" or "people dispersed by whatever cause to more than one location", or "people settled far from their ancestral homelands".The word has come to refer to historical mass-dispersions of...
areas such as New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
.
D. N@ – The use of false cognate
False cognate
False cognates are pairs of words in the same or different languages that are similar in form and meaning but have different roots. That is, they appear to be, or are sometimes considered, cognates, when in fact they are not....
s (faux-amis); this practice is quite common, so much so that those who use them abundantly insist that the false cognate is the English term even outside of Quebec. Note that these French words are all pronounced using English sounds and harbour French meanings. While the possibilities are truly endless, this list provides only the most insidious false cognates found in Quebec.
- a stage – an internship
- college – Cégep (collège, cégep; collégial, cégepien), the acronym which is the official name of the institution which dispenses college-level technical education and precedes university in Quebec.
- Chinese pâté – shepherd's pieShepherd's pieCottage pie or shepherd's pie is a meat pie with a crust of mashed potato.The term cottage pie is known to have been in use in 1791, when the potato was being introduced as an edible crop affordable for the poor Cottage pie or shepherd's pie is a meat pie with a crust of mashed potato.The term...
(pâté chinois; Quebeckers' pâté chinois is similar to shepherd's-pie dishes associated with other cultures) - a cold plate – some cold-cuts (reversed gallicismGallicismA Gallicism can be:* a mode of speech peculiar to the French;* a French idiom;* in general, a French mode or custom.* loanwords, words or phrases borrowed from French....
– assiette de viandes froides) - coordinates – for address, phone number, e-mail, etc.
- (a) salad – (a head of) lettuce
- a subvention – a (government) grant
- a parking – a parking lot/space
- a location – a rental
- a good placement – a good location
- It’s ok. – It’s fine. (from Ça va.)
- That’s it. – That is correct. (from C'est ça.)
- all-dressed pizza – a deluxe pizza with pepperoni, mushrooms and green peppers (from pizza toute garnie.)
- soup, two times – two soups, or two orders of soup
Few anglophone Quebeckers use many such false cognates, but most understand such high-frequency words and expressions. Some of these cognates are used by many francophones, and others by many allophones and anglophone accultured in allophone environments, of varying English proficiencies, from the bare-minimum level to native-speaker level.
See also
- English-speaking Quebecer
- Quebec FrenchQuebec FrenchQuebec French , or Québécois French, is the predominant variety of the French language in Canada, in its formal and informal registers. Quebec French is used in everyday communication, as well as in education, the media, and government....
- Canadian EnglishCanadian EnglishCanadian English is the variety of English spoken in Canada. English is the first language, or "mother tongue", of approximately 24 million Canadians , and more than 28 million are fluent in the language...
- FranglaisFranglaisFranglais , a portmanteau combining the French words "français" and "anglais" , is a slang term for an interlanguage, although the word has different overtones in French and English....
External links
- Bill 199 Charter of the French and English Languages