Do French speakers understand English texts and vice versa?

[Kati Svaby]

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Hi V.B.

You wrote:

[Hakam1970]

Dear Alan,

I want learn French but I can not attend classes in any of the study centre. What should I do ?

Is here any way to learn french without any guidance. Kindly reply me .

Best regards
Hakam Singh

[Kati Svaby]

Hi Hakam,

here you can learn Francais:

http://www.laits.utexas.edu/fi/html/voc/01.html
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We always deceive ourselves twice about the people we love - first to their advantage, then to their disadvantage.

[Mahmoudsult]

Thank you very much it is a great issue as it clarrifies the way some French words joined and still affect English language. It also show some practical and interesting differences between some synonyms.
Best regards,
Mahmoud Sultan

[Alaaz68]

of course the native speakers whose did not study french language they will not be able to understand about 95 % of any simble text in french langauge.
I think french language has a specific and different grammar than English language ,

may there are alot of similar vocaubalry in both langauges but French is more sophosticated stucture as a langauge.

Who did not study English language from French people may can understand English langaue . because the English is more popular and easy than French language.

[Our Tort System]

[Cristina.ro]

[Rituvirodhi]

Hello Everyone
Thanks for such an excellent lesson .I am not a native speaker of English.But I try my best to learn it as I really like this language.
Both languages French & English are different so its not possible for French & English speakers to understand each other language without learning.

[Kati Svaby]

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Hello Christina,

I agree with you. I would say even one thing what was easier in French than in English - at least for me. This was that I began to learn French,we learned very quickly the strict pronunciation rules and after I never had to control how pronounce a word. But in the English I have to control always the new words; where is the word stress, on which syllable and the stress how changes the pronunciation.

I think it is most difficult for them who are not native.

And about the conjugation. I read a very interesting dispute between Alan and Beeeneees about the use the present perfect and present perfect continuous. Unfortunately I don't tell you where is it. It was very instructive.

Regards:
Kati Svaby
_________________
We always deceive ourselves twice about the people we love - first to their advantage, then to their disadvantage.

[Our Tort System]

[Cristina.ro]

Hi Kati,

As far as I am concerned, I don't necessarily find the French pronunciation easier than the English one.

I guess what bothers me the most about the French pronunciation is the way that words sort of melt into each other; I mean the way they join/link some words. For example, the -s at the end of a word is pronounced -z and it joins the following word, if that word begins with a vowel. Erm… or something like that. I think it is called 'la liaison'. Anyway, I hate it when that happens! Especially when it comes to understanding spoken French, this thing they do is a pain in the neck! :-)
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[Cristina.ro]

[Kati Svaby]

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Hello Christina,

What you say about 'les liaisons' it is interesting only in the spoken language. For example: les amis you say: /lézami/ or ils arrive you say:/ ilzarive/ etc. but I think it is not difficult because you learn the rule of the " la liaison" there are some of them but they are very logic.

If we speak about the grammar there are lot of exception but there is a rule always.
For example the adjective you have to learn than English collocations: because you have to make adjectives agree with the nouns.

-une femme hereuese
-un homme hereux

I think this isn't difficult.

And when the pronunciation change, perhaps your brothers told you this:

'J'attend une femme.' Femme is a noun but if you use an object direct instead of the femme. The pronunciation of the 'attend' changes, but only if the noun is feminine or feminine plural: You say: je l'attende. Here you can pronounce "d" but in the first case you say a nasal "nd". Or : J'attend les filles. / Je les attendes . Here is you are harmonizing. Pronunciation of attend remains the same.But this is grammar and if you learn the rules you have no problem! But these are also very logic.

You are right that sometimes the very quick speech is difficult to understand.

But I only spoke about when I learn a new word in English. And if I had learned it earlier in French I am inclined to pronounce it in French. I think for a native French it is an easier situation. I have to control the similar words and this is time consuming.

By:
Kati
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We always deceive ourselves twice about the people we love - first to their advantage, then to their disadvantage.

[Cristina.ro]

Hi Kati,

Thank you for the explanations. Who knows, I may even decide to give French another try some day.

Truth is, I am looking forward to the day when Romanian is going to become an international language! ;-)
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[Kati Svaby]

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Hello Christina,

If I am not mistaken the Romanian language is member of Latin language family. And if I know well it has lot of similarity with French. I know your great writer, Panait Istrati lived also in France, and if i am not mistaken wrote in French also, but at this time lot of artists went Paris. And Brancusi had an artist school in Paris. One of the great Hungarian sculpture Beni Ferenczy learned in his school. Briefly the Romanian language can easier understandable in Europe than the Hungarian.Don't you think ?

You have hope!
Kati
_________________
We always deceive ourselves twice about the people we love - first to their advantage, then to their disadvantage.