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How good is your French accent?

frenchmeter.com

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Re: How good is your French accent?

#171

Post by minipci1321 »

omginternets wrote: post #56
matthiasb wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Frenchie here. I think it is a very common misunderstanding. My bet is that if you got a blank stare, the person just had no idea what you were saying. It has nothing to do with your proud or protection our language. I got a lot of blank stares when I moved to the US 10 years ago ;-)

Autre Frenchie ici-présent. I concur. A tip to foreigners: it's considered exceptionally rude not to say hello to someone behind the counter, or when entering a store. I often cringe when I see Americans order something at a café counter: they have the best intentions, they're trying hard to be polite, and right off the bad they commit a huge faux-pas by immediately saying "un café s'il vous plait!". tl;dr: always st…

And make eye contact! Then, if you cannot continue in French, smile, people will figure out.

Re: How good is your French accent?

#172

Post by Al-Khwarizmi »

Max_Mustermann wrote: post #163
Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Spanish OOP is "programación orientada a objetos", which suffers from the same mistranslation as in Greek. It also means "programming that is facing objects", in a quite physical sense.

But in Spanish you can use "orientar" in a figurative sense. I fail to see the problem.

I don't really think you could do that in Spanish, at least until we started copying English terms.

Yes, now we also use "orientar a" to translate other English buzzwords like "orientado a resultados" (result-oriented), "orientado a la productividad" (productivity-oriented), etc. But outside of linguistic calques of modern English expressions and buzzwords, I've never heard or read anyone using "orientar a" for anything else than facing a direction.

I might be wrong, of course, as language is very complex and has a lot of regional variations (in particular Spanish, which changes a lot between Spain and the various Latin American countries); but my perception as a Spanish speaker from Spain is that the term originated from a bad translation of English, and something like "programación centrada en objetos", "basada en objetos", etc. would have been better.

Re: How good is your French accent?

#173

Post by minipci1321 »

switch007 wrote: post #119
omginternets wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Autre Frenchie ici-présent. I concur. A tip to foreigners: it's considered exceptionally rude not to say hello to someone behind the counter, or when entering a store. I often cringe when I see Americans order something at a café counter: they have the best intentions, they're trying hard to be polite, and right off the bad they commit a huge faux-pas by immediately saying "un café s'il vous plait!". tl;dr: always st…

Only the French could describe asking for a coffee with "please" on the end as "exceptionally rude". It's almost petty. You will forgive any other faux-pas as long as you start the interaction with "bonjour"? And if you mis-pronounce "bonjour"? Do we need to seek forgiveness from the President? I like flying over France and going to Spain and Italy where none of this nonsense exists.

I think the parent was oversimplifying a bit, and it looks like you took his answer a bit too literally. What is important really here is to establish a contact with the person before asking for service. Anything goes - bonjour, hello, a smile, a nod (works for me very well). Just try to put a bit of your emotions into this (presumably: you are a stranger in a foreign g country not speaking language and needing assistance), and the rest will go accordingly.

Re: How good is your French accent?

#174

Post by glandium »

yodsanklai wrote: post #126

Lot of stereotypes in the comments. I'm little disappointed to read that on HN. Some commenters tell they had bad experiences in France. In my opinion, it's a case of confirmation bias and lack of understanding of cultural differences. For many reasons, you can't expect the same types of interactions with a waiter in Paris and one in NYC or Tokyo. I think people traveling to foreign countries should be open-minded an…

The funny thing about those stereotypes is that they go both ways. American tourists are viewed in France as people who wouldn't even try to speak at least one word in the language of the countries they visit, and expect everyone to speak English, because, you know, everyone speaks English, why make the effort.

I haven't met American tourists like that, and I haven't met French people that are arrogant asshole overprotective of their language. Somewhere, there probably are some specimen of both categories, but, as always, anecdote is not evidence, etc.

Disclaimer: I'm french.

Re: How good is your French accent?

#175

Post by callumlocke »

SilasX wrote: post #88
callumlocke wrote: post #84

Misleading app. If you say "bon appétit" in a good French accent, it fails, then if you say it in a very bad accent but imitating the distinct pitch and rhythm of the guy in the recording, it scores 100%.

Sufficiently advanced imitation of a native French speaker is indistinguishable from a good French accent.

It would be weird if you always said the words "s'il vous plait" exactly like that one guy says it in that one recording

Re: How good is your French accent?

#176

Post by jmnicolas »

rawfan wrote: post #144
jmnicolas wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No we don't. To be frank, podcasts are not a (big) thing here. I love how Quebecois are always inventing these funny french words, always put a smile on my face. I got to talk to my friends about 'baladodiffusions' but I'm not sure that they all know what a podcast is so I doubt they will appreciate this new word to its full extent.

Wait, what? No Podcasting in France? Go start a Podcast ;)

According to Google there are French podcasts, and they are very popular ! I found an article from 2012 that said there was 20 millions podcasts downloads in France every month (we're a bit less than 70 millions French).

I had no idea since nobody I know ever mentioned podcasts to me. Maybe they're all Luddites or they hide their podcast addiction well ;-) Me I exclusively listen to audio books (and I can recommend wholeheartedly the ones from Graphic Audio).

Re: How good is your French accent?

#177

Post by omginternets »

minipci1321 wrote: post #171
omginternets wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Autre Frenchie ici-présent. I concur. A tip to foreigners: it's considered exceptionally rude not to say hello to someone behind the counter, or when entering a store. I often cringe when I see Americans order something at a café counter: they have the best intentions, they're trying hard to be polite, and right off the bad they commit a huge faux-pas by immediately saying "un café s'il vous plait!". tl;dr: always st…

And make eye contact! Then, if you cannot continue in French, smile, people will figure out.

>And make eye contact!

I'm about 99% sure this song is supposed to be satire. If you speak French, you'll get a kick out of it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-VYdBKwSLc

Re: How good is your French accent?

#178

Post by omginternets »

switch007 wrote: post #119
omginternets wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Autre Frenchie ici-présent. I concur. A tip to foreigners: it's considered exceptionally rude not to say hello to someone behind the counter, or when entering a store. I often cringe when I see Americans order something at a café counter: they have the best intentions, they're trying hard to be polite, and right off the bad they commit a huge faux-pas by immediately saying "un café s'il vous plait!". tl;dr: always st…

Only the French could describe asking for a coffee with "please" on the end as "exceptionally rude". It's almost petty. You will forgive any other faux-pas as long as you start the interaction with "bonjour"? And if you mis-pronounce "bonjour"? Do we need to seek forgiveness from the President? I like flying over France and going to Spain and Italy where none of this nonsense exists.

Please stay home.

Re: How good is your French accent?

#179

Post by omginternets »

oblio wrote: post #122
switch007 wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only the French could describe asking for a coffee with "please" on the end as "exceptionally rude". It's almost petty. You will forgive any other faux-pas as long as you start the interaction with "bonjour"? And if you mis-pronounce "bonjour"? Do we need to seek forgiveness from the President? I like flying over France and going to Spain and Italy where none of this nonsense exists.

Bonjour is easy mode. You should see how many words you have to say when you leave a store :D

Two? Au revoir?

Re: How good is your French accent?

#180

Post by omginternets »

song wrote: post #132
switch007 wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only the French could describe asking for a coffee with "please" on the end as "exceptionally rude". It's almost petty. You will forgive any other faux-pas as long as you start the interaction with "bonjour"? And if you mis-pronounce "bonjour"? Do we need to seek forgiveness from the President? I like flying over France and going to Spain and Italy where none of this nonsense exists.

If you go to Japan and do not take off your shoes in certain you'll be considered exceptionally rude. Are you going to criticize the Japanese now? Different countries have different cultural expectations and customs. In France not saying Bonjour is considered rude (and hello works in Paris by the way), in other countries other things are considered rude. It's not because you're traveling and a tourist that you do not…

>Different countries have different cultural expectations and customs.

Thank you!

I'd also like to point out that this yahoo seems unaware of his own cultural baggage. I bet he'd consider it extremely rude for someone to cut in front of a line at a bus stop, whereas such things are perfectly acceptable in other countries (in France we hardly have lines at bus stops).

Just like cutting a bus queue can be taken as a disrespect, engaging in a transaction without acknowledging that the person behind the counter is ... well... a person can be taken as looking down on people who serve you.

Just as I don't assume foreigners are conspiring to pounce on unsuspecting tourists who cut lines, I expect our friend switch007 not to assume we're doing the same with respect to saying "hello".

This kind of blatant ethnocetrism betrays self-ignorance that borders on comical, and invites ridicule hereabouts.

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