# French for Dummies help?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-for-dummies-help/502251>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [July 7, 2009, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-for-dummies-help/502251 "2009-07-07T21:07:44Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\
**Post date:** [July 7, 2009, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-for-dummies-help/502251/1 "2009-07-07T21:07:44Z")

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I don’t actually need to speak French, but I need to stop mispronouncing French-derived words. I recently discovered that “cuirass” is actually pronounced “kwi-RASS”, with the cui- as in cuisine. So since the French do not use a single letter of the Latin alphabet the same way the English do, can someone point me to a basic “how to not pronounce French like a stupid American” primer?

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**Author:** ![Hypnagogic\_Jerk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hypnagogic_jerk/32/4252_2.png) [@Hypnagogic\_Jerk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypnagogic_Jerk)\
**Post date:** [July 7, 2009, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-for-dummies-help/502251/2 "2009-07-07T21:40:58Z")

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I guess you can start with the Wiki on [French phonology](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_phonology). But of course, due to the wide variety of French dialects, there is no one way French speakers pronounce words. And most French loanwords in English have had their pronounciation adapted to English, so that they’re not pronounced the way the French equivalent is anymore.

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**Author:** ![rowrrbazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rowrrbazzle/32/414_2.png) [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)\
**Post date:** [July 7, 2009, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-for-dummies-help/502251/3 "2009-07-07T22:43:00Z")

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For relatively common English words derived from French, just go to a dictionary with audio pronunciations, like [http://www.merriam-webster.com/](http://www.merriam-webster.com/). Depending on context, pronouncing such words as the French would today could result in people thinking you’re pretentious.

There are sites such as [http://www.oddcast.com/home/demos/tts/tts\_example.php?sitepal](http://www.oddcast.com/home/demos/tts/tts_example.php?sitepal) that provide text-to-speech demos. I can’t guarantee they’re 100 percent perfect.

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**Author:** ![HongKongFooey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c4cdca/32.png) [@HongKongFooey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HongKongFooey)\
**Post date:** [July 7, 2009, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-for-dummies-help/502251/4 "2009-07-07T22:53:06Z")

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> [@Lumpy](#):
>
> I recently discovered that “cuirass” is actually pronounced “kwi-RASS”, with the cui- as in cuisine.

Just out of curiosity, how is this normally pronounced in English? I’ve seen the word and never had to say it but I wouldn’t have thought to pronounce it differently. I do live in a french-speaking area though.

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**Author:** ![lshaw](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e36b37/32.png) [@lshaw](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lshaw)\
**Post date:** [July 7, 2009, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-for-dummies-help/502251/5 "2009-07-07T23:13:46Z")

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Out of curiosity, how did you pronounce it before?