Is French from Canada different from that of France??

Question

When I was visiting Canada back in July I met a lot of people that were French speakers, and so a question dawned to me. What does French from Canada, or Quebec sound like compared to that of France or Europe?? Are there any differences in the way they talk, pronounce, spell, etc.?? Is it anything like the difference between Brit and American English or Spain and Latin America?? Anyone who is a French speaker, I'd like to hear their opinions.

Answer 1

Yes, it is. Different regions that speak a common language have regional variations. For example, in order to refer to a soft drink such as Pepsi or 7up, I might say "pop" (I'm Canadian), while an American might say "soda". In Britain they say "lift" to refer to what a North American would call an elevator.

Here's my cleanup of a Babelfish translation of an article on Canadian versus Parisian French. Sorry it's long, but any time you compare major dialects of a language, it's a huge subject for which only a brief outline can be given:

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The French language in Canada is distinguished by certain characteristics that are particular to it. In Canada, the French language is divided into two main groups: the Acadian language and the Franco-Canadian language. To these could be added the "michif" language, the language of the Métis, which is a cross between French and "cri". This site is primarily concerned with the Franco-Canadian language.

For several colonists, the French language was a second language. At the time, each area of France had its own dialect, or "patois". It should be remembered, too, that "Breton", German, Italian, Basque, Catalan and "Occitan" are minority languages in France. Thus, many colonists couldn't understand their neighbors. Taking into account the great linguistic diversity of the colonists of New France, it was necessary for a more homogeneous language to be developed in this country. Of necessity, French became the lingua franca of the people. Even if they used a dialect or another language at home, they made use of French in business. Moreover, educated people already spoke French: the clergy, senior officials, and lower middle class. For the first generation born in Canada, French was the mother tongue and the "patois" was a second language. The small number of colonists also returned the standardization of the easier language with the religious schools. Natives of France travelling in Canada frequently commented on the quality of French in this country. As proof, in 1894 Gailly de Taurines said:

"The distance [and] time have brought some small differences in pronunciation or expressions between Parisian French and French as spoken in Canada, but they don't go beyond those that we can note in France between our different regions. Generally, the main language of the Canadians is infinitely better and more correct than the main language in France.

"For a large number of inventions invented in our century: machines, vapor, railroads [literally ‘roads of iron'], we borrowed words from the English, and adopted their words as our own, without changing their spelling--[and it is] bizarre to our eyes that we are content to pronounce them incorrectly. More of a group of purists and patriots, Canadians wanted to have their own word, belonging to them, and they translated what we adopted without modifications. We've accepted ‘rail' and ‘wagon' [i.e. ‘stagecoach'], they translated ‘lisse' [smooth] and ‘char' [tank], and while we go on the ‘road of iron'--one of the most bizarre expressions when you look at it closely--they take the ‘tanks', which is much more logical."

In 1722, the father [bishop?] of Charlevoix, a Parisian Jesuit, wrote:

"There is no place [aside from Canada] where anyone speaks our language more purely. There's no discernible accent here."


The distinctive characteristics
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Nautical terms
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At the dawn of the colonies of New France and Acadia, there were no roads. The waterways were the main paths. So it was natural that the importance of this mode of transport was reflected in the language. As a result, you don't "get into" a car in Canadian French--you "embark" on it and "disembark" from it. Moreover, the linoleum carpet is usually called the "prélart" and you wash the floor not with a "serpillière" ["floor cloth"] but with a "vadrouille" [Babelfish translates this as "ramble", but I'm sure it's not correct]. In the same way, it was customary to use "se greyer" to get dressed nicely. And this phenomenon was most evident in Acadia-- there, instead of lacing their shoes, people "fasten"or "tie" them.

Amerindian terminology
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As you know, the French came to Canada to exploit its natural resources. The principal industry was the fur trade, which involved constant contact between the French "coureurs de bois" [literally "wood runners"] and the aboriginal peoples. The linguistic contribution of the Amerindian languages was made essentially in the domain of fauna and flora. It was totally natural to borrow from the Amerindians the words used to describe the earth and the environment that were theirs. Here are some examples of loan-words: orignal [moose], pichou, maskinongé, taloudi, atoca [cranberry], ouananiche, achigan [black bass], micouène. Moreover, the Amerindian influence was especially felt in the field of toponymy. Let's take, for example, [the place names] Quebec, Rimouski, Ottawa, Chicoutimi, Témiscamingue, Yamaska and Manicouagan.

Archaisms
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Canadian French is characterized by its archaisms. You can find all sorts of archaisms there: old pronunciations ("moé" instead of "moi"), old usages ("espérer" ["to hope"] in the sense of waiting, and old words or phrases formerly in use in France, but now no longer used ("mais que" with the subjunctive, in the sense of "dès que"). In the grammar of Father Buffier, a Jesuit, published in 1741, the author wrote:


"In the nouns ‘froid' [‘cold'], ‘étroit' [‘narrow'], ‘adroit' [‘skillful'] and in the verb ‘croire' [‘to believe'], the diphthong ‘oi' is most frequently pronounced as ‘è', but sometimes as ‘oè'. In ‘nettoyer' [‘to clean'], and, in the subjunctive, ‘soit', ‘soyons', etc., the sound is pronounced ‘è'."

There also exist phonemes that have existed in Old French, but that are now unknown or marginalized. For example, in certain regions of Canada, people continue to use the classic R of Latin, the "apicalement" rolled R [Babelfish and the online English-French dictionary that I consulted were no help in translating "apicalement", sorry]. However, the "grasseyé" [roughly-rolled?] R of eastern Quebec is gaining in popularity. Also, the aspirated H is actually pronounced in certain regions, as it was in "francien" [I suspect this is a portmanteau word, a combination of "français" and "ancien", hence a reference to Old French]. It should be noted in passing, that these aspirations of H can be found in words of Germanic origin: hache ["chop"], hanche ["hip"], hâte ["haste", "anxious"] and haie ["hedge"].

Dialectisms
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The immigrants in New France came from the following regions: Northwest (Normandy, Pole, Brittany, Maine and Anjou) 33.16%; western France (Poitou and Saintonge) 28.83%; central France (Île-de-France, Orleans, Touraine and Berry) 20.02%. These colonists who came from France spoke the dialects of their original country. They brought with them the words and pronunciations that did not form a part of the dominant dialect in France, Parisian. In this category, we can see "garrocher" for launching, "s'enfarger" for hanging the feet in something and "achaler" in the sense of "emmerder". With regard to pronunciation, there are examples such as "siau" for "seau" and "icitte" for "ici", among others.

Anglicisms
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An anglicism is a word or a usage that has an English origin. When two languages share a common territory, it is inevitable, even normal, to have exchanges between them. In Canada, English and French have been in use for a long time. The loggers of yore borrowed several words from English: "bines" from "beans", "colle" from "cull", "bécosse" from "back-house", and "drave" from "drive".

Perception of anglicisms in Canada isn't the same as in France. The people of France are more numerous and more sedentary. The Canadians, by contrast, have an invading fear of the English language, which is omnipresent in North America. In Canada, the linguistic insecurity is manifested in several ways. Thus, in France, people employ neologisms to replace French words that have too much of an English flavor. French Canadians generally seek to avoid anglicisms of form, whereas in France people prefer to guard the form of origin. Consequently, the anglicism "stop" has been systematically replaced by another anglicism, "arrêt". In the same way, you could add "week-end", which is replaced by the anglicism "fin de semaine" [literally "end of the week"], and "traversier" which replaces "ferry". In St. Paul, Alberta and Sudbury, Ontario, it's possible to note the use of "arène" instead of "aréna" on the official signs of these cities. The people of France see anglicisms as being socially developing, whereas French Canadians perceive English as a menace. The most neurotic see it as a language of conquerors and thus humiliating.

In Canada there is as much contact with spoken English as in written English, whereas in France, it is mostly the written language that is seen. As a result, for French Canadians the words "job", "sandwich", "patch" and "gang" have a feminine sonority. For the French, these have a masculine appearance because they don't have a final E. French lexicographers don't take account of French language use in Canada and these words are masculine in French dictionaries published in France, but feminine in French dictionaries published in Canada.

Certain English words used in Canada maintain their English spelling, but are pronounced in a French-Canadian way. The words "peanut", "waiter" and "candy", when used in French, are pronounced as "oxytones", i.e. the stress is on the last syllable.

Canadian innovations
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Evidently, French is a language rich in vocabulary and history. However, it was necessary to create words that would convey a good description of Canadian geography and society.

In 1967, Gérard Dagenais accepted only eleven Canadianisms: achigan, caribou, érablière, frasil, maskinongé, mille and millage, orignal, ouananiche and tuque. Two years later, the Office of the French Language drew up a list that counted about sixty. Since then, there has been some headway in increasing the value of the words from here in the constant language. However, there's light at the end of the tunnel. Nowadays you can hardly find situations where dictionaries don't have Canadianisms marked but do mark Gallicisms. And who can speak of French dictionaries that neglect to note Canadian usages or define Canadian realities well? Let's take, for example, "érablière" in Le Petit Robert [a popular French-language dictionary], where the definition is "Plantation d'érables" ["maple plantation"]. An "érablière" in Canada is certainly not a plantation [it's mainly a place where maple sap is collected and processed into maple syrup and other related products]. Conversely, other Canadian words are generally accepted and understood in all of Francophony: acériculteur, bleuetière, poudrerie [powder mill], panache d'orignal [plume of moose], bière en fût [draft beer], téléroman [TV series], portager and tourtière [a pie filled with cooked ground beef].

The norm
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It is necessary to acknowledge that the difference in vocabulary is scrambled during communication, but in a momentary way. Most of the time, the difference is more frequently a source of laughter than of disagreements (gosse [kid, child], catin [trollop], secousse [jolt] and vidanges [drainings]). Terminology is one thing, but the common language is another. Without a doubt, it is necessary to officially define a certain number of terms to assure the clarity of speech in the first place, but is it really necessary to "normalize" the everyday language in the same way, as people are sometimes tempted to do in Canada? I don't think so.

It is normal that, in each of our countries, priority is given, in teaching and public speech, to a variety judged to be superior, to a model of language. In France, it's the Parisian model that is imposed on the whole of the country; in Canada, we still have to define this model which will doubtless be a compromise between diverse tendencies. This model can't be defined in a closed vase, or by managers (e.g. the French Language Office, the French Academy) or by correction models. The linguistic model must be defined, rather, by a minimum of a precise description of usage, in order to create the standard which the majority of French Canadians practice in neat speech. This standard exists, but demands to be clarified.

To finish with the question of the question of communication problems between French Canadians and the people of France, it can be said that the difficulties are non-existent when the involved interlocutors practice the variety considered neat in their own country. In other words, despite the multiple differences, communication is assured when everyone dominates a variety a bit larger than that of his family or of his little corner of the planet, or when everyone conserves a large part of his accent of the territory.

So I insist on the necessity of conserving for our various French[-indigenous peoples] the flavor of their origin, for which everyone can comfortably express in this language their ideas, their emotions, their life experience, their country. To improve the quality of the language, it's not our place to disincarnate or asepticize it. In a context such as that in Canada, to disincarnate the language, it would be a running of the risk of losing it.

Answer 2

You already have some very good answers so I won't elaborate too much, but I will reiterate the fact that Canadian French is very different from French from France.

The accent is completely different, and if you are used to hearing European French, you may have a difficult time understanding at first. Many expressions are also different and not used in France, and many words are archaic while others are a mix of French and English. In France, a lot of words are borrowed from English like "parking" (for parking lot) and "shopping" and even "boyfriend" and "gentleman." In Quebec these terms are rarely used as the local government has put much emphasis on translating everything into French because they don't want English influencing the language.

I think the best way to hear the difference would be to rent a Quebecois movie like "Les Invasions barbares" (The Barbarian Invasions") or "CRAZY", then watch something from France. Even if you don't speak the language, you'll definitely be able to hear a difference in the intonation.

I liked this question :-)

Answer 3

he two are VERY different.

Canada French was isolated from outside influences for 2 centuries, and did not evolve much, to the point that language historians could go to Quebec to see what the language was like in the 1700s. This has changed in the last 20 or 30 years when English loan words have been introduced massively, and not the same that French adopted. On the other hand, French has been spoken by a much more heterogenous population, and has been exposed to a lot more external influences, so it has sensibly worn down, and vocabulary evolved at a much quicker pace.

In essence, intonation and pronunciation are different, to the point that a Frenchman hearing a Canadian speak can have trouble understanding, and Quebec French is rife with archaisms and regional terms that are absent from the main language, or completely forgotten, while there are many words and expressions in common use in France that are not present in its lexicon.

I believe that the two are completely separate dialects, and are on the verge of becoming different languages, where a person who speaks only the one can no longer understand the other.

A note on the article. I'm not sure it is quite correct. It assumes French was a lingua franca because the colons were from all over France. Actually, a large proportion of them came from Western France, and more specifically the general Charente Poitou area, so they actually had a common patois together, of which large chunks survive in the modern Quebecer dialect.

Answer 4

I am Canadian, but not francophone. The French in Canada is indeed different than in France, and even in Canada it varies a lot. People who speak French from Alberta and Manitoba often argue about whether Quebecois french is even really french, and vise versa. The same between Quebec and New Brunswick, and even different regions of Quebec. The quality of French has been improving though because of television, radio, newspapers and public education. But there are still a lot of accents that are almost unintelligible to each other. Think about American English and how different Hill Billys (no offense), Bostonians, Alabamanians(?), Texans and Californians sound. In the early years of Television the USA was sending their news reporters Toronto Canada to be taught how to speak. Toronto English was fast enough for the news, slow enough to hear and the accents were generally understandable by the most people. Modern media has a very strong homogenizing effect on languages.

Answer 5

Yes definitely very different.
The canadian french has a completely different accent, it is much more "sing-song" and some of the words are no longer used in european french. After all the french spoken in Quebec has come down from the acadians, the people who went to Canada from France during the 17th. century. French in France has changed and developed over the centuries, whereas the french spoken in Canada still has some archaic words in it that have dissapeared in France.
The spelling and grammar however, are the same in Canada and Europe.

Answer 6

Yes it is different, not so much the vocabulary and grammar, but the pronunciation. I come from the south of England, learned French in school, spent several weeks in France and understood the language quite well. When I went to Quebec I could hardly understand a word. By comparison, I can understand people from New Caledonia and Tahiti quite easily.

Answer 7

Yes it is really different. The basic vocabulary is the same but French from Canada sounds different (I made a Canadian repeat nearly 5 times a simple sentence because i didn't understand what he was saying) and has developped their own vocabulary (for instance "chauffer son char" doesn't mean anything in French from France).

Answer 8

Not that much, the accent is the main difference. There's also some vocabulary that changes but that's normal, it's called the varieties of language. A French Canadian is totally understandable to a French person and vice-versa.

Answer 9

I was raised in french immersion schools, and all the adults always said that the french we were taught is so different to that of France.

Answer 10

French is French

Answer 11

Canadian French is a different dialect than something like Parisian French. Canada's French is called franglais- a mixture of english and french.