AS a Cajun “wannabe”, I have always been interested in how much the two groups have diverged (since “le Grand Derangement” of 1766). I would imagine that many linguists have studied this-obviously, in more than 250 years, the two groups must have drifted apart. So, I have some questions:
-are the two versions of French mutually intelligible?
have new/different words emerged in the two dialects?
-the Louisiana Cajuns always have retained a wistful longing for a return to Arcadia- have any done so? (Or is crawfish etouffe too good)?
I was under the impression that Quebecois and French people had a hell of a time understanding each other (much, much moreso than, say a Californian and a Londoner), or is the difference not as pronounced as I’ve been led to believe?
Well there is Quebec French and Quebec French. For that matter there is wide divergence among French dialects in France. As far as I can tell, there is a substantial difference between France and Quebec, but they are mainly intelligible. I don’t know much about Cajun, but Cajun is derived from Acadian (“Cajun” is a corruption of “Acadian”) which is New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. The one fact I can affirm is that a French Canadian friend of mine (from near Trois Rivieres) was a graduate student at Dalhousie (in Halifax) and met a French speaking student from Northeastern Nova Scotia and they could not understand each other’s French… They spoke English.
I was born and live in New Orleans. I went to college at (then) USL in Lafayette, Louisiana. I had taken 4 years of French in high school and when I heard people in Lafayette speaking Cajun, I could barely understand what they were saying because it sounded so much different from what I had learned from a French teacher who was from Canada. A lot of the older people still spoke it, mostly phrases and the odd word or two. They say “Chere” (as in “dear”) a lot, but the pronunciation is more like “chat” (cat). I also think the emphasis on syllables is a little different than the usual French. I don’t know how Canadian French is, but Cajun French is probably a bit different from Canadian French.
It’s not that pronounced, no. Much is made of the alleged difference but it’s no more significant than a person from Chicago speaking to a person from London.
Of course, if you really lay on the accent think you can be deliberately tough to understand, but a normal speaking voice is perfectly understandable between a Quebecois and a French person.
I don’t about Cajun French:Canadian French, but I know a bit about Cajun French:French French.
Cajun G.I’s were able to communicate with French folks in WWII, so the versions are mutually intelligible.
I skimmed through a friend’s book on the topic of Cajun French. One point I recall is that there’s a group of words where the Cajun dialect leaves off endings used in France. I don’t know the specifics (I don’t speak or read French), but I imagine it would be analogous to leaving off the “-ing” from gerunds in English. Sounds weird if you’re not used to it, but doesn’t prevent getting the meaning across.
No, not at all. No Québecois will have any problem understanding what Europeans are saying. The inverse is less true, but it greatly depends on the speaker and the level of speech.
Cajun French, though, in my experience as a native French speaker, can be mostly unintelligible. I say mostly because there are people like singer Zachary Richard who speak with a distinct accent but are nevertheless easy to understand. Older people I’ve seen on documentaries? It might as well be Portugese.
One of my friends from Louisiana (who is not Cajun, but lived in France for a year on a Fulbright) says that one of the biggest differences is that Cajun French has picked up a lot of English syntax. The words are the same, but sentences are structured differently.
As previously mentioned it’s an issue of accent. There are some different words, but I don’t think the differences are more significant than between British and American English. French people are rarely exposed to Quebec accent, and when they do, it’s “standard” Quebec accent. A random guy from a random region of Quebec with a strong accent might be difficult to understand, and what he says might be subtitled on TV (although it sometimes happens too with French people from the countryside having a very strong local accent). I suspect that Quebecois, on the other hand, are more often exposed to “French French”.
On the other hand, I remember once randomly catching on TV a documentary with some foreign guy interviewed about his lifestyle, with subtitles, and I didn’t notice he was in fact speaking Cajun French. Now, that’s purely anecdotal and it might have been due to accent too.
I must admit, I didn’t realize that Cajun French was still spoken. I assumed it had died off long ago, apart from some phrases and individual words. Interesting.
I had a French friend in Lafayette, LA who said that speaking to someone in Cajun French was comparable to an American speaking to someone in Shakespearean English. He could get the gist of what they were saying, but not every word. The syntax and some of the grammar was different.
When I lived in Breaux Bridge, LA (8 miles from Lafayette, and in the heart of Cajun country), I heard Cajun French spoken a lot, bur rarely by anyone under forty. A Cajun I spoke with said that no one teaches their kids Cajun French anymore. French immersion schools (“real” French) are very popular in that part of the state.
In the mid 80s (84-87) I worked/lived in Calcasieu Parish (Lake Charles & Sulphur) while remodeling two Safeway grocery stores.
One of the managers and one of the assistant managers of the store in Lake Charles were both fluent in ‘Cajun French’. I recall that that there were quite a few customers that made it a point to come do their grocery shopping specifically when one or the other of those two gentlemen were ‘on duty’ (there were two managers and two assistant managers, to cover both the day & night shift) because they weren’t very fluent in English.
The manager related to me that he didn’t learn to speak English until he started elementary school, and that some of the customers that shopped there when he was on duty, didn’t speak much English, and a few didn’t speak any English at all. :eek:
The managers son barely spoke it, though. And for that matter, IIRC, I usually only heard older people converse in it.
I really can’t say if it’s ‘compatible’ with the French that’s used in Canada or France.
I’ve always enjoyed hearing it spoken, it seems to have a ‘lyrical/musical’ quality to it, IMHO.
As a French Canadian, I can say that France French are a lot easier to understand than Cajun French. If you take singer Zachary Richard who is from Louisiana but spent a lot of time in Quebec, I can understand him when he speaks but I’m certain that when he gives interviews in French is careful of his accent and language.
Cajun French is overall extremely different than Quebec French.
I basically feel about Cajun the way I feel about Creole, I’ll catch words here and there, maybe enough to understand that the person is saying, but not enough to have an animated conversation with them.
I’ve been led to believe that Cajun French is closer to the Acadian French of the Maritime Provinces than to Quebecois French due to the Acadian history of the Cajuns. So an American speaker of Cajun might have a better time being understood in New Brunswick or PEI than anywhere in Quebec.
When I lived in Lafayette a bit over 30 years ago there was an effort to create a Cajun French dictionary, since it had become a spoken as opposed to written language. My wife had a bunch of Cajun women working for her. She had trouble understanding them given her high school and college French. At that time there were distinct dialects of Cajun French even among the towns fairly close together, and the women from Lafayette made fun of the accent of people from Abbeville.
