The weather - La météorologie
Posted by Frenya Tue, 04 Apr 2006 13:51:00 GMT
I thought that a quick list of various words expressing the weather would be appropriate on these very confused times… it seems that the sky does not know what to do these days: be blue and sunny, grey and rainy or white and snowy… I guess that’s what you have to expect from a New England early Spring.
J’ai pensé qu’une liste rapide de mots exprimant la météo serait appropriée en ces temps confus… il semble que le ciel ne sache pas trop quoi faire ces jours-ci: être bleu et ensoleillé, gris et pluvieux ou blanc et neigeux… j’imagine que c’est ce que nous devons escompter d’un jeune printemps de Nouvelle-Angleterre.
The sun - Le soleil (masculine)/ The sky - Le ciel (masculine)/ The rain - La pluie (feminine)/ The wind - Le vent (masculine)/ The snow - La neige (feminine)/ The cloud(s) - Le(s) nuage(s) (masculine)/ The storm - La tempête (feminine)/ The thunderstorm - L’orage (masculine)/ The lighting - L’éclair(masculine)/ The thunder - Le tonnerre (masculine)/ The rainbow - L’arc en ciel (masculine)/ The frost - Le gel (masculine)/ The hail - La grêle (feminine)/
Now, you will be able to speak about the “rain and good weather”! Maintenant, vous pouvez parler de la “pluie et du beau temps”!
What I really need now are audio files with the pronunciations. :-) Some of these are nice easy cognates from Latin, a little polished from a few centuries of orthographic changes. But others…well, I’m sure my guesses are just completely wrong.
We certainly can work on pronunciation. One of the “golden” difference between English and French is the pronunciation of “e”. We use the same sound in French, but it is for the letter “i”...that means a word with “i” in it will be pronounced like if you had an “e” in english. Of course, there are many other differences, but to me this one is key. I should try to find a dictionnay on the web with the pronunciation symbols, that would be useful… any suggestions?
Of course, the vowels are different;but the consonants too. For instance, English speakers typically aspirate voiceless plosives word-initially; whereas the French do not, to speak of. The result is that a French speaker pronouncing the word “pas” sounds very much, to an English speaker, like he’s saying “bah”; while an English speaker attempting the same comes across as if he’s saying “p-hah”. There are lots of little things like this lurking in the phonology, and while many of them are nicely regular and predictable, it’s hard to learn them practically from rules.
That said, it would probably be easier with rules than without. But I suppose what I will have to do at some point is take a course. :-)
I could certainly set up some podcasts for Frenya. :-) She could give us French lessons on the web.
We enjoyed seeing you, Michael. Do take care and visit again some time!
It was excellent to see you both! Thank you so much for your invitation! I hope we can get you to come visit us once we are settled in down in Cambridge, too.
A podcast to learn French. I love the idea! Extremely geeky!
Michael, that was great to see you, thanks a lot to have come. Hopw to see you soon, and let us know if you need any help with your move.
Thank you! I might well take you up on that. Although, I am also considering just hiring a crew to take care of the heavy lifting; that way, all our friends can still come over, but we can have fun and party instead of lifting boxes all day. :-)
Hey, you never know, distance learning has become pretty big in some circles. I admit I’m still somewhat skeptical of it (especially when it comes to something as interactive as language) but I bet it could work. You could start a little language school in your Copious Spare Time™.
“your Copious Spare Time™”
That definitly should be TM!! Could make some monay out of that!
thanks a lot.. it’s very good article.
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