French set to replace English as EU’s ‘working language’

Post by dwohnitmok » Wed, Jun 09, 2021, 10:39 PM UTC

tsimionescu wrote: post #246

dwohnitmok wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apart from all the silent letters, which are fairly regular (and I assume is what you're getting at) there's a fair number of pronunciation exceptions. See the different ways of pronouncing "tous" or the different words that have irregularly silent "l"s (e.g. fusil) and other irregularly silent consonants in the middle of words (e.g. automne). French has quite a lot of exceptions to its pronunciation rules in additio…

Those are some good examples, you're right. It is quite a bit less regular than I remembered from my high-school days. For 'er' though, isn't the rule essentially that it is pronounced 'a' at the end of verbs, and 'ar' otherwise? I realize that is not a phonetic rule, though.

Post by mannerheim » Wed, Jun 09, 2021, 10:43 PM UTC

w0de0 wrote: post #209

Apocryphon wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shame there's no real-world interest in the powers that be to officialize Esperanto.

A language with no literature or culture has no business in the halls of state. Such a language is arguably not even a language in the real sense, but a code. A vernacular is needed - language must live and evolve.

Post by gdsdfe » Wed, Jun 09, 2021, 10:47 PM UTC

qsort wrote: post #127

gdsdfe wrote: post #102

Somehow this made wonder if Esperanto or at least the idea behind it that we can come up with one common language to use worldwide. If that was actually successful we might have less of this nonsense but then again good luck having everyone agreeing on something ... Hmm oh well

> if that was actually successful It was successful. That language is English, the obvious choice agreed upon by everyone who isn't interested in playing idiotic political games.

Post by nescioquid » Wed, Jun 09, 2021, 10:52 PM UTC

tsimionescu wrote: post #244

nescioquid wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many ways are there to spell the sound ō (as in l’eau) in French? I once read that it was over 30, but it might have been a tongue-in-cheek joke, like "ghoti" as an alternate spelling of "fish"[1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghoti

As far as I know, there are two: 'o' (as in 'bon') and 'eau' (as in 'beau').While that's one more than it should have been necessary, it's not that bad I think.

Post by Macha » Wed, Jun 09, 2021, 10:53 PM UTC

melesian wrote: post #120

CodeGlitch wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ireland: 99% English

I doubt it's as low as that! Malta and the Netherlands are other countries where a large majority also speak English. In some places in the EU the UK's union jack flag is being replaced with the Irish tricolour on bank ATM's display of language choices, which amuses the Irish.