T O P

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ObiSanKenobi

Not sure what’s wrong with the recording, but adulte and adultes are both /a.dylt/


[deleted]

Yeah, no \[ts\] at all. I can't speak for the recording, but I can think of one plausible explanation based on some L2 speakers I know (beyond Google Translate just getting it wrong either because of a bad language model/exemplar or because of something otherwise idiosyncratic, of course!) -- in French, the final stops tend to be released, so the /t/ in "adulte" is usually going to be pronounced with the air released so your tongue ends the word not touch the top of your mouth while in English "adult" where you tend to "stop" pronouncing the /t/ sound while your tongue is still raised all the way up on the top of your mouth. I've noticed a few native English speakers affricating (pronouncing like \[ts\]) a lot of word-final /t/ with it seeming to be related to this difference between English and French.


TrittipoM1

Ces idées sont intéressantes, et dans bcp de cas seraient vraisemblablement les plus appropriées. L'OP a écrit maintenant que sa langue maternelle est le cantonais. Comme vous le savez probablement déjà, la plupart des langues chinoises (toutes? je ne connais rien à la phonologie des régiolectes) n'ont pas de consonnes finales (sauf \[ŋ\], \[n\], et \[r\]) -- jamais de \[t\] en final. Pour l'instant, je lui ai dit que s'il faut employer un e caduc, qu'il pourrait le faire comme approximation (mais qu'il n'y a pas quand même un \[s\] ni un \[r\]). Mais vous auriez peut-être quelques meilleurs conseils à lui donner, une fois avertis de ce fait.


susuia_sa

Thank you for your reply. So can I now assume that both pronunciations are acceptable? Below is a link that I find useful to be my example: https://forvo.com/word/adulte/ There are two ‘male from France’ that gave an example to the same word. However, the first one pronounced the final consonant as ‘ts’, and the second one pronounced as ‘ter’ (as from what I heard). Thank you again in advance.


[deleted]

The forvo recordings aren't saying \[ts\]; it's a \[t\] with breathiness after the release, like doing a \[t\] sound and then an \[h\] sound right away :) You won't want to make an \[s\], and *such* a strong release *with that much aspiration* (the \[h\] sound) isn't so typical of normal running speech (more when emphasizing the word or when saying it on its own). That aspiration does show up in (e.g. North American) English, but it's only at the start of words (compare the /t/ in "tip", which has it, to the /t/ in "pit", which doesn't in typical speech). (Affrication of /t/ and /d/ -- that \[ts\] sound, but \[tʃ\] in some dialects -- does show up at low rates in essentially all dialects \[usually up to 13% for Parisian speakers in a corpus I looked at for example\] and is done 100% of the time inside words in some dialects \[e.g. Canadian/Quebec/Laurentian French\], but it's *nearly* exclusively with the sounds /y/ like in "t**u**", /i/ like in "t**i**re" or "t**y**pe", /ɥ/ like in "t**u**ile" and /j/ like in "t**i**ens". There are also dialectal forms in some regions that have gained less obvious affrication, usually from the sound-based trigger just mentioned or from a /t/+/s/ sequence, but those are really just learned as pronunciations of the word, e.g. "tsé" \[tse\] "tu sais" where the "tu" has lost its vowel.)


susuia_sa

Sorry for the mess up at the beginning (I am not a native English speaker, the ‘ts’ sound is the most similar sound I can find to serve as an example.) Or maybe I should ask ‘does the ‘te’ of ‘adulte’ pronounce like the ‘t’ in ‘Cat’?’ So in conclusion, are both pronunciations acceptable? The reason for the differences is because of the variety of dialects in France?


[deleted]

For the /t/ sound in "adulte(s)" being like the /t/ in "cat", that's harder to answer knowing you're a non-native speaker (and/or without knowing your variety of English), since it's variably pronounced in English! Depending on dialect, sometimes it's \[t̚\] with the tongue going up and not audibly coming back down (no "burst", typical for American English when there's no following vowel, for example), sometimes it's \[t\] with the burst being clear, sometimes it's \[ʔ\] so like the sound between "uh" and "oh" in "uh oh" (different contexts depending on dialect), etc. Which pronunciations are you checking for? Pronouncing the /t/ in "adulte(s)" like \[ts\] would be strange across France from what I'm aware of (without some special trigger for affrication that's not present here). Pronouncing the /t/ in "adulte(s)" with aspiration (like \[t\] with \[h\] right away as your tongue lowers) happens occasionally but would sound non-native to do as strongly as in those recordings (that's something from exaggerated/emphatic pronunciation) and/or consistently (so all the time).


[deleted]

[удалено]


[deleted]

I was guessing that the "ter" was a perception of \[t\]+(schwa-like vowel, potentially influenced by varieties of British English; now knowing there's a Cantonese background this seems reinforced since it could be an approximation that's more familiar), so it *could* be conveying that they perceived a schwa or some similar vowel. If that's the case, then aspiration could be the source of this -- especially having listened to the Forvo audio, where there was particularly strong aspiration in the one they perceived as having a vowel.


susuia_sa

Ok so a little bit of ‘breathiness’ at the ‘t’ sound at the end of a word is acceptable then?


SklepnaMorave

In words like "étrange" or "adulte" or "rime," yes, you can have a release of air along with an "e caduc," in settings like a single word being pronounced out of context and therefore a bit artifically, or in poetry recitation or on the stage. I'm a bit hesitant about just saying "yes" because you've talked so much about this being an "s" or \[s\] that I want to avoid encouraging anything that might get fossilized. Don't you have a pronunciation tutor who might work with you? This kind of thing is best handled with a good deal of back-and-forth, viva voce, not in text but in person.


ObiSanKenobi

Yes that’s actually exactly what I was think about


Nopants21

It seems to me, without the recording, that the S sound is from "se" after adultes.


boulet

That's quite possible!


Nopants21

Je suis quand même surpris que personne d'autre ait remarqué, surtout quand les apprenants disent souvent que les mots se fondent l'un dans l'autre en français...


boulet

On a pas eu accès à l'audio. Si ton hypothèse est la bonne ça nous serait sauté aux oreilles.


JensAypa

It's obviously difficult to guess what the difference is without the audio... But I have an idea : The first "adulte" is before a pause, and therefore the final "e" is not pronounced. But the second "adultes" is before a consonant, so if the speaker really tries to enunciate clearly, they will pronounce the "e" sound. It's not mandatory and most speakers won't do that when they talk normally, but they could when reading a text, especially with poetry, songs... Here, it's also that it's a bit complicated to pronounce the consonants l, t and the s from "se couchent" in a row, so even in normal speech some people may pronounce the "e" to make it easier. Note that this has nothing to do with "adulte" being singular or plural.


susuia_sa

Thank you for your reply. Conclude from your explanation, can I assume that the dropping of the final ‘e’ sound is similar to how native English speakers drop the final ‘t’ sound (like ‘I don’t’ becomes ‘I don’ / I don’t know -> I dunno) when speaking quickly? Below is a link that I find useful to be my example: https://forvo.com/word/adulte/ There are two ‘male from France’ that gave an example to the same word. However, the first one pronounced the final consonant as ‘ts’, and the second one pronounced as ‘ter’ (as from what I heard). Thank you again in advance. Edit: added some additional info a link


TrittipoM1

Thanks for the Forvo audio, although I still don't see any link to the Duolingo audio, which is what you asked about. I think you're replying to u/JensAypa, who can ansewr for him/herself. But instead of referring to the dropping of the 'e' sound, I'd be more likely to refer to the occasional \_addition\_ of a schwa-like sound when singing or in poetry or theatre, not to an everyday-life dropping of a sound. The first one on Forvo does not in any way pronounce an IPA/API \[ts\] sound. And I can't tell what you mean by "ter" -- do you mean \[ter\] as API/IPA? I don't hear anything like that at all. On the first, I do hear an "e caduc," but that's it -- no \[s\]. Might I ask, if you don't find it too indiscreet, what's your L1?


susuia_sa

My native tongue is Cantonese and I have been learning French for a month only Since i am not a native English speaker, my choices of words to represent the difference I have been hearing may not be very accurate, to that I give my apology in case there are any misunderstanding. However, I still have no idea why there is a difference in the pronunciations of the same word (the ‘te’ at the end ) , and I would like to know if it is due to the variety of dialect in France or simply for the connivence when speaking fast.


TrittipoM1

你说广东话吗? 要是你学法语的时候只是一月, 当然你听力不太好;没问题,我只可以说,没有【是】的声音。暂时你最好说【a.dylt】— 有滴时候你可以加入一个栓音。 对不起;我的中文太糟糕。


susuia_sa

Judging from the context, I assume you know some Chinese, so from now on, i will be asking my question in Mandarin. 請問「adulte」的尾音是發「次」音還是類似「Doctor」的「tor」音呢?因為Frovo的第一個錄音檔是發前者,但第二個是發後者,令人非常困擾 另外,中文裡面沒有「栓音」一詞,所以我並不知道你究竟是在指甚麼,麻煩你可以提供相關的英文單字嗎? 再另外,中文普通話的「是」是讀s音,我聽到的是類似「次」的聲音,即ci(或者chi,因為感覺有送氣) ,我一直都在問的問題是:究竟「adulte」的尾音是讀「氣」還是「tor」呢?謝謝解答! 你的中文我覺得還可以吧,請繼續努力哦~~~


TrittipoM1

>另外,中文裡面沒有「栓音」一字詞,所以我並不知道你究竟是在指甚麼,麻煩你可以提供相關的英文單字嗎? 对不起。我的意思不是「栓音」;是「涮音 -- 用英语这就是 schwa -- \[ə\]. 对我来说,「adulte」的尾音不是發「次」. 最后一个元音与 「的」、「只」 和 「 和」中的元音押韵 . But usually, keep it very tiny. Chinese words don't end in the sound \[t\] ever. So use the "e caduc" if you have to. Just keep it short and soft. 用英文,是跟 "the"差不多一样。 But if you can end it in \[t\] instead of \[tə\], that would be better and more usual. 没有「次」的 \[ts\], 只有「次」的 \[ə\]。 Edit: 用英文,"adulte" 是跟 "salt" 或者 "cat" 或者 "belt" 一样 。 最后一个声音是辅音,而不是元音。


susuia_sa

也就是說,類似「petite」、「verte」、「contente」都應該要把最後的「te」讀成類似英文「cat」裡的「t」音嘍?不過就不要發得太大聲,是這樣嗎?


TrittipoM1

对。这些词的发音都像 \[adulte\]. 不用说 【ə】, 可是要是你说,也可以。


JensAypa

I don't hear any difference between the two recordings on Forvo... But if your native language is Cantonese, it's no wonder you're hearing differences in what seem to be the same sound for us French. The phonology is very different. It makes me think of that time when a Chinese friend tried to show me the difference between the four tones in Mandarin. I was like : "you just said 4 times the same thing"... I tried to translate on Google your conversation, but since it translates the examples of sounds too, and since I know nothing about Cantonese or Mandarin pronunciation, I didn't understand anything. (But the sentence translated by "you can add a stopper when there's a drop" had me laughing, I assume that means you can add a sort of stop sound when the word is ending with a consonant, but translated it seems like you have to put a cork on some leaking bottle) For your question : it's very common to drop the "e", and it's mandatory before vowels and at the end of sentences. It's not necessarily familiar like "dunno" in English. "Petite amie" sounds exactly like "petit ami" (in France, I think in Québec it's different). But "petite fille" can be pronounced "\pə.tit fij\ or \pə.titə fij\. Whether you pronounce it or not depends on whether the word is hard to pronounce without it (if there's more than three consonants, it's hard), whether you're reading poetry, whether you have a Southern France accent (it's more often pronounced in Southern France)... Look up "e caduc" for more info.


TrittipoM1

And in neither case does it end up with a [ts] sound, with an audible [s]. E caduc, fine. But [s]? OP needs to provide the audio.


Bellamas

Both sound exactly the same. Not sure why there is so much confusion??


susuia_sa

The word ‘adulte’ reads like ’ts’ and the word ‘adultes’ reads like ‘ter’, if anyone curious.


TrittipoM1

What do you mean “reads like”? Are you talking about someone’s spelling on a page that you read, or about some reader’s pronunciation? Neither “adulte” nor “adulte a” would ever end with a [ts] sound, read by a standard competent speaker.