Transcript MT Lecture 2 What is grammar

French grammar and
grammatical analysis
Lecture 2
What is grammar (2)
Dr Rachel Hoare
Exercise: Identify agreements
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Marier le sérieux avec l’humour
L’espèce humaine est menacée d’un mal
pernicieux: celui de se prendre au sérieux. Sans
doute est-il naturel que le sport n’échappe pas à
ce fléau. Pourtant rien n’est plus anticonformiste, par essence, qu’un champion. Fort
de cette constatation, on pourrait s’attendre à ce
que nos sportifs sachent faire prevue de moins
de retenue que la moyenne de leurs concitoyens.
Lecture 2 - Outline
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Dictionary usage
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Pronunciation of French – International Phonetic Alphabet
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Syntactic classes
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What is a word?
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What is a noun?
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What is meant by Gender?
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What is meant by number?
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What are articles?
International Phonetic Alphabet
(IPA)
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The IPA is used in dictionaries to indicate the
pronunciation of words.
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The IPA has often been used as a basis for creating new
writing systems for previously unwritten languages.
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The IPA is used in some foreign language text books
and phrase books to transcribe the sounds of languages
which are written with non-Latin alphabets. It is also
used by language learners.
Dictionary use
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Oxford Hachette
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hierarchical organisation by:
grammatical category
sense category
Hierarchical organisation of a
dictionary entry
Kindly / ‘kaindli / I adj
[person, nature]
[smile, interest]
[voice]
[face]
she’s a ~ soul
Hierarchical organisation of a
dictionary entry
Kindly / ‘kaindli / I adj
[person, nature] gentil/ille
[smile, interest] bienveillant
[voice] plein de gentillesse
[face] sympathique
she’s a ~ soul
Hierarchical organisation of a
dictionary entry
Kindly / ‘kaindli / II adv
1 (in a kind nice way) [speak, look, treat]
to speak ~ of someone
2 (obligingly)
she ~ agreed to do
Hierarchical organisation of a
dictionary entry
Kindly / ‘kaindli / II adv
1 (in a kind nice way) [speak, look, treat]
avec gentillesse
to speak ~ of someone
2 (obligingly) gentiment
she ~ agreed to do
The translation process
‘he treated her kindly’
*
Identify the problem word or phrase
*
Look it up and choose the appropriate grammatical
category
*
Choose the appropriate sense category
*
Choose the most appropriate phrase included in the
sense
*
Note the translation
The translation process
‘he treated her kindly’
Identify the problem word or phrase (kindly)
* Look it up and choose the appropriate grammatical category (II
adv)
* Choose the appropriate sense category
1 (in a kind nice way)
*
*
*
Choose the most appropriate phrase included in the sense
(treat)
Note the translation (avec gentillesse)
English and French grammar:
some preliminaries
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Meaning:
(a) generalities
(b) cognates
(c) idioms
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Classification (parts of speech)
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Use (role played in a sentence)
(1) Meaning (a)
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(a) Generalities:
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(i) An English word must be connected with a French
word that has an equivalent meaning.
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(ii) Sometimes, knowing one French word will help you
learn another
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(iii) Usually, there is little similarity between words.
Meaning (b)
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(b) Cognates: sometimes two words are the same or very
similar in both English and French. These words are called
cognates.
(table, la table)
Faux-amis
sensible
photographe
(c) Idioms: when words in combination take on a special
meaning: faire la queue
Classification (a)
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English and French words are classified in eight
categories traditionally called parts of speech.
noun
verb
pronoun
adjective
article
adverb
preposition
conjunction
Classification (b)
Eg: ‘what’:
 (1) What’s happening?
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(2) What time is it?
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(3) Do what you want!
Classification (b)
eg: ‘what’:
 (1) interrogative pronoun: ‘qu’est-ce qui se
passe?
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(2) determiner: ‘quelle heure est-il?’
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(3) relative pronoun without antecedent:
‘fais ce que tu veux’
(3) Use (a)
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A word must be identified according to the role it
plays in the sentence.
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Each word plays a specific role
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Determining this role or function will help you to
choose the correct French equivalent and to know
what rules to apply.
Use (b)
Functions:
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subject
direct object
indirect object
object of a preposition
Ex. Zidane headbutted the wise-cracker
Zidane delivered a headbutt to the wise-cracker
Subject of the sentence
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The subject of a sentence is the person, place,
thing, or idea that is doing or being something.
You can find the subject of a sentence if you can
find the verb.
Ask the question, "Who or what 'verbs' or
'verbed'?" and the answer to that question is the
subject.
e.g. Je suis allé en vacances
Direct object
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A direct object is a noun or pronoun that
receives the action of a verb or shows the result of
the action.
It answers the question "What?" or "Whom?"
after an action verb.
A verb which takes a direct object is called a
transitive verb.
e.g. Il a vu Pierre
Indirect object
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The indirect object is the noun or pronoun
that receives the direct object.
Typically, an indirect object can be found by
asking who or what received the direct
object.
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e.g. J’ai envoyé une lettre à Jean.
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Object of a preposition
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Prepositions are small words that create a
relationship between other words in a sentence
by linking phrases to the rest of the sentence: à,
de, dans, entre
The nouns that follow them are objects of the
preposition.
e.g. Sophie a donné une lettre à Pierre.
Use (c)
‘what’
 What is on the table?
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What is she doing?
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What are you talking about?
Use (c)
‘what’
 What is on the table? Qu’est-ce qui est sur la table?
(Subject)
What is she doing? Qu’est-ce qu’elle fait?
(Direct object)
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What are you talking about?
(Object of a preposition) tu parles de quoi?
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What is a noun?
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A person
A place
A thing or animal
An idea (peace, love, grief etc.)
Proper Nouns
Common Nouns
What is gender?
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In English, the gender corresponds to the sex of
the person we are replacing (masculine,
feminine, neuter – the tree in front of me is an
oak.)
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What about “she is a fine ship”?
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In French, has to be either masculine or
feminine
No neuter
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What is number?
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When a word refers to one person or thing =
singular
When a word refers to more than one = plural
Collective nouns refer to a group of persons or
things but they are considered to be singular, e.g.
a JF language class has 10-12 people in it.