Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gvvz8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-25T16:36:56.808Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

16 - French and English in Contact in North America

from Part Four - Emergence and Spread of Some European Languages

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 June 2022

By
Robert A. Papen
Edited by
Salikoko S. Mufwene  and
Anna María Escobar
Salikoko S. Mufwene
Affiliation:
University of Chicago
Anna María Escobar
Affiliation:
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
Get access

Summary

This chapter generally deals with the borrowing of lexical items from English into varieties of North American oral French. First, the socio-historic context of English–French language contact in North America from the late eighteenth century to the present is described. Current demographics on French spoken at home in North America are then provided. An extensive review of the quantitative research on lexical borrowing in oral French in North America follows: the Eastern Townships of Quebec, the Ottawa-Gatineau region, on the border of Quebec and Ontario, Nova Scotia, the case of Chiac in New Brunswick, the community of Hearst in northern Ontario, French in Massachusetts and in Louisiana. In conclusion, the article attempts to compare a number of borrowing features in the communities studied, such as rate of lexical borrowing, grammatical category preference in borrowing, degree of morphological, syntactic and phonological integration, etc.

Keywords

socio-historic context of English–French language contact in North AmericaNorth American oral Frenchlexical borrowingFrench language demographics in North Americaquantitative research on lexical borrowingexternal factors in lexical borrowingcomparable features in lexical borrowing in North American French
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Handbook of Language Contact
Volume 1: Population Movement and Language Change
 , pp. 505 - 539
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2022

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Au, Denis. 2003. The Muskrat French. The survival of French Canadian folklife on the American side of Le Détroit. In Le passage du Détroit. 300 ans de présence francophone, ed. by Bénéteau, Marcel, 167–80. Windsor, ON: University of Windsor Press.Google Scholar
Blais, Suzelle. 1998. Néologie canadienne de Jacques Viger: manuscrits de 1810. Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press.Google Scholar
Brault, Gérard (ed.). 1958. Essais de philologie franco-américaine. Worcester, MA: Collège de l’Assomption.Google Scholar
Brown, Becky. 2003. Code convergent borrowing in Louisiana French. Journal of Sociolinguistics 7.1.3–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Charbonneau, Louise. 1997. L’emprunt lexical et le transfert à l’anglais dans une communauté franco-américaine au nord du Vermont. Unpublished PhD dissertation, New York State University at Albany.Google Scholar
Chevalier, Gisèle. 2007. Les marqueurs discursifs dans une variété de français en contact intense avec l’anglais. Langue française 154.61–77.Google Scholar
Chevalier, Gisèle & Long, Michael. 2005. “Finder out, pour qu’on les frigge pas up, comment c’qu’i work out”: les verbes à particules en chiac. In Approches morphosyntaxiques. Actes du Colloque international grammaire comparée des variétés de français d’Amérique, ed. by Brasseur, Patrice & Falkert, Anika, 201–12. Paris: L’Harmattan.Google Scholar
Clyne, Michael. 2003. Dynamics of language contact. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Ditchy, Jay K. 1932. Les Acadiens louisianais et leur parler, 1901 text by an anonymous author, preparation and introduction by Ditchy. Paris: Droz.Google Scholar
Dubois, Sylvie & Sankoff, David. 1997. L’absence de flexion sur les emprunts à l’anglais dans le français cadjin. In Explorations du lexique, ed. by Auger, Julie & Rose, Yvan, 163–76. Quebec: CIRAL.Google Scholar
Dunn, Oscar. 1880. Glossaire franco-canadien. Quebec: Presses de l’Université Laval.Google Scholar
Dupuis, Jacynthe. 1997. Étude sociolinguistique de quelques caractéristiques des emprunts à l’anglais par les Franco-Américains du Massachusetts. Revue québécoise de linguistique 25.2.53–61.Google Scholar
Falkert, Anika. 2006. La mutation achevée du connecteur ça fait que dans le français acadien des Îles-de-la-Madeleine. In Les variétés de français en Amérique du Nord: évolution, innovation et description, ed. by Papen, Robert A. and Chevalier, Gisèle, special edition of Revue Canadienne de Linguistique Appliquée/Canadian Journal of Applied Linguistics 9.2.39–53.Google Scholar
Fischer, Robert. 1976. A generative phonological description of selected idiolects of Canadian French in Lewiston, Maine. Unpublished PhD dissertation, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY.Google Scholar
Flikeid, Karen. 1989. “Moitié anglais, moitié français?” Emprunts et alternance de langues dans les communautés acadiennes de la Nouvelle-Écosse. Revue québécoise de linguistique théorique et appliquée 8.2.177–227.Google Scholar
Fox, Cynthia. 2007. Franco-American voices: French in the Northeastern United States today. French Review 80.6.1278–92.Google Scholar
Fox, Cynthia & Charbonneau, Louise. 1998. Le français franco-américain: nouvelles perspectives sur les communautés linguistiques. Francophonies d’Amérique 8.65–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Foxcurran, Robert, Bouchard, Michel, & Malette, Sébastien. 2016. Songs upon the rivers. The buried history of the French-speaking Canadiens and Métis from the Great Lakes and the Mississippi across to the Pacific. Montreal: Barak Books.Google Scholar
Gaborieau, Antoine. 1999. La langue de chez nous. Saint-Boniface, MB: Éditions des Plaines.Google Scholar
Gaborieau, Antoine. 2006. Le petit Gabi. Dictionnaire des anglicismes du Canada français. Saint-Boniface, MB: Éditions des Plaines.Google Scholar
Golembeski, Dan. 1999 (revised in 2012). French language maintenance in Ontario, Canada: A sociolinguistic portrait of the community of Hearst. Unpublished PhD dissertation, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN.Google Scholar
Haugen, Eugene. 1950. The analysis of linguistic borrowing. Language 26.2.210–31.Google Scholar
Juneau, Marcel & Poirier, Claude. 1973. Le livre de comptes d’un meunier québécois. Quebec: Presses de l’Université Laval.Google Scholar
Kasparian, Sylvia. 2003. Parler bilingue et actes identitaires: le cas des Acadiens du Nouveau-Brunswick. In Francophonie et langue dans un monde divers en évolution: contacts interlinguistiques et socioculturels, ed. by Stebbins, Robert, Romney, Claude, & Ouellet, Micheline, 159–77. Winnipeg: Presses de l’Université de Saint-Boniface.Google Scholar
Kelley, Henry E. 1980. Phonological variables in a New England speech community. Unpublished PhD dissertation, Pennsylvania State University, State Park, PA.Google Scholar
King, Ruth. 2000. The lexical basis of grammatical borrowing. Philadelphia, PA: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
King, Ruth. 2008. Chiac in context: Overview and evaluation of Acadia’s joual. In Social lives in languages. sociolinguistics and multilingual speech communities, ed. by Meyerehoff, Miriam & Nagy, Naomi, 137–78. Philadelphia, PA: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Klingler, Tom, Picone, Michael, & Valdman, Albert. 1997. The lexicon of Louisiana French. In French and Creole in Louisiana, ed. by Valdman, Albert, 145–81. New York: Plenum Press.Google Scholar
Lavallée, Richard. 1979. Les regionalisms dans le français parlé de l’Estrie (Document de travail no. 15). Sherbrooke, QC: Librairie Dussault.Google Scholar
Locke, William. 1949. The pronunciation of the French spoken at Brunswick, Maine. Greensboro, NC: American Dialect Society.Google Scholar
McQuillan, Aidan. 1983. Les communautés canadiennes françaises du Midwest américain au dix-neuvième siècle. In Du continent perdu à l’archipel retrouvé: le Québec et l’Amérique française, ed. by Louder, Dean & Waddell, Eric, 97–116. Quebec: Presses de l’Université Laval.Google Scholar
Mareschal, Geneviève. 1994. Étude typologique et comparative de l’anglicisation et des anglicismes dans quatre aires de la francophonie. In Actes du colloque sur les anglicismes et leur traitement lexicographique: communications, discussions et synthèses, 25–37. Quebec: Gouvernement du Québec.Google Scholar
Marie-Jean-Guy, Sister & Marie-Rose-Germaine, Sister. 1958. Le glossaire. In Essais de philologie franco-américaine, ed. by Brault, Gérard, 98–124. Worcester, MA: Collège de l’Assomption.Google Scholar
Melanson, Nathalie. 1996. Adaptation ou assimilation? Les comportements linguistiques d’une famille franco-ontarienne de Sudbury. In La langue française en Ontario, special edition of Revue du Nouvel Ontario 20.137–71.Google Scholar
Mougeon, Raymond. 1998. Les emprunts lexicaux à l’anglais fondamental en français ontarien. Paper read at the AUPELF-UREF Colloquium, Quebec City.Google Scholar
Mougeon, Raymond. 2000. Les emprunts en vocabulaire de base de l’anglais en français ontarien. In Contacts de langues et identités culturelles. Actes des quatrièmes journées scientifiques du réseau «Études du français en francophonie», ed. by Latin, Danièle & Poirier, Claude, 29–43 Quebec: Presses de l’Université Laval.Google Scholar
Mougeon, Raymond & Beniak, Édouard. 1989. Language contraction and linguistic change. The case of Welland French. In Investigating obsolescence: Studies in language contraction and death, ed. by Dorian, Nancy, 287–312. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Mougeon, Raymond & Beniak, Édouard. 1991. Linguistic consequences of language contact and restriction: The case of French in Ontario, Canada. Wotton-on-Edge: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Mougeon, Raymond, Beniak, Édouard, & Valois, Daniel. 1985. Contact des langues et changement linguistique: étude sociolinguistique du français parlé à Welland (Ontario). Quebec: Centre de recherche sur le bilinguisme.Google Scholar
Mougeon, Raymond, Nadasdi, Terry, & Rehner, Kathleen. 2009. Évolution de l’usage des conjunctions et locutions de consequence par les adolescents franco-ontariens de Hawkesbury et Pembroke (1978–2005). In Le français d’ici: études linguistiques et socio-linguistiques sur la variation du français au Québec et en Ontario, ed. by Martineau, France, Mougeon, Raymond, Nadasdi, Terry, & Tremblay, Mireille, 175–214. Toronto: GREF.Google Scholar
Mutz, Katrin. 2004. Le lexique des variétés du français en Louisiane et l’influence de l’anglais américain. Un état de la recherche. Globe, Revue international d’études québécoises 7.2.125–54.Google Scholar
Muysken, Pieter. 1981. Halfway between Quechua and Spanish: The case for relexification. In Historicity and cariation in Creole studies, ed.by Valdman, Albert & Highfield, Arthur, 52–78. Ann Arbor, MI: Karoma Press.Google Scholar
Muysken, Pieter. 2000. Bilingual speech: A typology of code-mixing. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Myers-Scotton, Carol. 2002. Contact linguistics. Bilingual encounters and grammatical outcomes. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Neumann-Holzschuh, Ingrid. 1991. Cajun (Louisiana) und Acadien (Kanada): Konvergenzen und Divergenzen im Lexicon. Zeitschrift den Gesellschaft für Kanada-Studien 19.115–40.Google Scholar
Papen, Robert A. 1984. Quelques remarques sur un parler méconnu de l’Ouest canadien: le métis. Revue québécoise de linguistique 14.1.113–39.Google Scholar
Papen, Robert A. 2005. Le mitchif: langue franco-crie des Plaines. In Le français en Amérique du Nord. État present, ed. by Valdman, Albert, Auger, Julie, & Piston-Hatlen, Deborah, 327–47. Quebec: Presses de l’Université Laval.Google Scholar
Papen, Robert A. 2006. Les parlers oubliés d’Amérique: le franco-minnesotain et le franco-dakotain. In Les variétés de français en Amérique du Nord : évolution, innovation et description, ed. by Papen, Robert A. & Chevalier, Gisèle, special edition of Revue Canadienne de Linguistique Appliquée/Canadian Journal of Applied Linguistics 9.2.149–71.Google Scholar
Papen, Robert A. 2014. Hybrid languages in Canada involving French. The case of Michif and Chiac. Journal of Language Contact 7.154–83.Google Scholar
Paradis, Carole & Lacharité, Diane. 2008. Apparent phonetic approximation: English loanwords in Old Quebec French. Journal of Linguistics 44.1.87–128.Google Scholar
Perrot, Marie-Ève. 2005. Le chiac de Moncton: description synchronique et tendances évolutives. In Le français en Amérique du Nord. État present, ed. by Valdman, Albert, Auger, Julie, & Piston-Hatlen, Deborah, 307–26. Quebec: Presses de l’Université Laval.Google Scholar
Picone, Michael. 1994. Code-intermediate phenomena in Louisiana French. CLS, Papers from the Regional Meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society, 30.320–34.Google Scholar
Picone, Michael & Lafleur, Amanda. 2000. La néologie et les anglicismes par tranches d’âge en français louisianais. In Contact des langues et variétés culturelles: perspectives lexicographiques. Actes des quatrièmes journées scientifiques du réseau «Études du français en francophonie», ed. by Latin, Danièle & Poirier, Claude, 15–27. Quebec: Presses de l’université Laval.Google Scholar
Poplack, Shana. 2018. Borrowing. Loanwords in the speech community and in the grammar. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Poplack, Shana & Meecham, Marjorie. 1998. How languages fit together in code mixing. In Instant loans, easy conditions: The productivity of bilingual borrowing, ed. by Poplack, Shana & Marjory Meecham, special issue of International Journal of Bilingualism 2.2.127–38.Google Scholar
Poplack, Shana, Sankoff, David, & Miller, Claude. 1988. The social correlates and linguistic processes of lexical borrowing and assimilation. Linguistics 26.47–104.Google Scholar
Potier, Pierre Philippe. 1743–58. Façons de parler proverbiales, triviales, figures, etc., des Canadiens au VIIIe siècle. Manuscript published in Bulletin du parler français au Canada. Quebec, La Société du parler français au Canada, 3 (1904–5) and 4 (1905–6).Google Scholar
Raymond, Valérie. 2011. L’emprunt lexical à l’anglais dans le français oral des locuteurs bilingues de Sudbury (Ontario): contraintes ou enrichissement pour une langue minoritaire? Unpublished MA thesis, Université Laval, Quebec.Google Scholar
Read, William. 1931. Louisiana French (University Studies 5). Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press.Google Scholar
Rochet, Bernard. 1993. Le français parlé en Alberta. Francophonies d’Amérique 3.5–24.Google Scholar
Rodriguez, Liliane. 2006. La langue française au Manitoba (Canada): histoire et évolution lexicométrique. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag.Google Scholar
Rottet, Kevin. 2018. L’emprunt et l’alternance codique en français lousianais: perspectives lexicographiques. Paper presented at the Colloque international: Les français d’ici, Concordia University, Montreal, May 2018.Google Scholar
Roy, Marie-Marthe. 1979. Les conjonctions “but” et “so” dans le français de Moncton. Unpublished MA thesis, Université du Québec à Montréal.Google Scholar
Szlezàk, Edith. 2007. “Parfois le bon mot nous échappe”: Interference phenomena among Franco-Americans in Massachusetts. Glottopol. Revue de sociolinguistique en ligne 9.98–119.Google Scholar
Tardivel, Jules. 1880. L’anglicisme, voilà l’ennemi. Quebec: Imprimerie du Canadien.Google Scholar
Thomason, Sarah. 2001. Language contact: An introduction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.Google Scholar
Thomason, Sarah & Kaufman, Thomas. 1988. Language contact, creolization, and genetic linguistics. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Valdman, Albert. 2005. Introduction. In Le français en Amérique du Nord. État présent, ed. by Valdman, Albert, Auger, Julie, & Piston-Hatlen, Deborah, 1–35. Quebec: Les Presses de l’Université Laval.Google Scholar
Valdman, Albert & Rottet, Kevin (eds.). 2010. Dictionary of Louisiana French: As spoken in Cajun, Creole and American Indian Communities. Jackson, MS: University of Mississippi.Google Scholar
Walker, Douglas. 2005. Le français dans l’Ouest canadien. In Le français en Amérique du Nord. État present, ed. by Valdman, Aalbert, Auger, Julie, & Piston-Hatlen, Deborah, 187–205. Quebec: Presses de l’Université Laval.Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×