I came to Jersey from UK to work here 5 years ago and I heard Jerriais being spoken by an elderly couple in a shop called 'Pound Magic', at Les Quennevais. I'd never heard it spoken before, but I knew it wasn't French French! I had worked in Canada a few years prior and heard Canadian French spoken, but with a different accent; that's how I could tell the difference. Fascinating!
As a French-speaking Swiss from Lausanne, I can somewhat understand some bits.. "Septante" made me smile since we don't say " soixante-dix" but "septante" in Switzerland. Very interesting but tragic too because Jersey French is sadly moribund.
Passionnant, je suis français, j'arrive à comprendre, et les differences sont aussi passionnantes que les similitudes. Ce serait dommage que cette langue disparaisse !!
Aurélie has attempted to transcribe what Rozelle says. Am immensely grateful! There are still some curious turns of phrase but what we can be sure of is that Rozelle was taken by surprise at having to dig deep into the language of her youth. She was searching for words and hesitating and perhaps confusing some words. It took her a while to get into the groove as she probably wouldn't have spoken Jèrriais for many, many years. Merci mille fois AurélieTourangeau-Hamelin.
I read recently that even the various main dialects of Norman, such as Jèrriais and Guernésais, are not mutually intelligible by their speakers, yet I was able to understand most of this with only a knowledge of standard and Belgian French to help me. I know that if Rozelle were speaking Walloon, I would barely have understood a word. Clearly either what I read was wrong, or there is something I have missed. Could it be that exposure to standard French during the decades when Rozelle was not using Jèrriais could have pulled her Jèrriais towards standard French?
@@IAmRobertPersson Yes, that's interesting. I'll ask Rozelle if she actually learned standard french at school in the 1930s. I had the impression that her family spoke Jerriais at home and English at all other times. Would be good to know if standard French and/or jerriais were taught in Jersey schools around 1920-1940. I understand that currently jerriais is taught in Jersey primary schools. Would be interested to know from a local Jersey person what is the current thinking of learning both Jerriais and French as part of the curriculum. Robert, I agree that when I was in Belgium I barely understood Walloon.
@@sandfunderwood9444 She might have learnt standard French but there is a definite Norman something colouring it sometimes hidden under an English layer of sounds...
This is what I heard as a child in Jersey in the 1960s and 1970s. My parents who were French talked French with a Breton accent with Jerriais speakers. There were not many then. I didn't really pay much notice to the difference. For me it is all French. I have no problem with Canadian French either. But when I hear Parisians pronounce an I as if it were an A to avoid nasal sounds my blood boils.
Thanks Bertold. At 3 minutes Rozelle finishes a little memory about her father who was a farmer, and her brother who was living in England. She finishes with the word 'Bacchus' or something that sounds similar to that? Could you tell me in french please what she says?
@@sandfunderwood9444 I think she says backers. She says he was in "the electronics" which I interpret as the Signals Corp. They were deployed in the D-Day landings in 1944 in Normandy. Troops who landed in Normandy were called Backers for obvious reasons.
@@BrendanRiley How can i give you an example. My keyboard doesn't do accents. But a classic example is saying cancer du sang but meaning cancer du sain.
""La vie a changé diversement parce que à ch't'heure..." makes me smile because it ends with an expression I heard in the north of France when I was a child: "à ch't'heure" would mean "à cette heure" which nowadays means "maintenant". In this phrase, I understand "diversement" as "de différentes manières" but I doubt this expression can be found anywhere on the continent. Her pronounciation is a mixture of French and English. I suppose she speaks English most of the time? How is her English? Very interesting document, even if it is difficult to hear each word clearly
She rarely speaks Jèrriais as it is only her elderly friends and a few very elderly family members who speak it. Just one generation later very few of my cousins in Jersey speak Jèrriais fluently. Her English is of course impeccable- many people would not know she even speaks Jèrriais. But she was genuinely chuffed to be able to speak it with me and once her ear tuned in to my French I could sense that she would have liked to continue speaking Jèrriais with me for a long time. Watch this space- I will return to Jersey and interview her with good audio equipment and with well thought out questions!
@@sandfunderwood9444 If a French person heard her speak not knowing where she was from, would they guess she was an English speaker by her accent? Thanks.
@@brythonicman3267 im Acadian french, and yeah we can tell she's an english speaker by some of her pronounciations. my french is actually somewhat similar to hers in this video
I'd be interested to know which languages she was exposed to in which languages, just local media, French language or English or a mix of all of course. also can she speak easily with a speaker of the Guernsey dialect? As a Englishman her voice is like a strong English accent speaking French.
I would imagine that she would have been exposed to primarily English-language media, as it overwhelmingly dominant in Jersey. That being said, her Jèrriais seems to have quite a but of French influence, so it seems likely that she was exposed to that in some way (either via visits to mainland France or from French farm workers that came to Jersey) or she is adapting her choice of words to be more understandable to the interviewer. Yes, Jèrriais speakers and Dgèrnésiais can in fact understand each other quite well. Look up a video called 'La Faîs'sie d'Cidre 2015: eune convèrsâtion' that shows speakers of both languages talking to each other.
I love that she uses the word « clos» to describe what was most likely a simple « potager », Louisiana French speakers use that word like she does and pronounce it exactly the same : le kee-o. What a lovely lady, I could listen to her all day. Jèrriais is so nice and interesting!
@@colbylejeune You're probably right, of course, but sometimes an undiscovered form such as ITÉ ("gone", as in "La boucane a monière ité dans mes yeux": The smoke sort of went in my eyes) emerges in the colony of a country while being extinct at its source due to an elite dialect having replaced it in the schools with the advent of widespread literacy. Thus, it's not "J'ai été au bal hier au soir" (I WAS at the dance last night), but rather J'ai ité au bal hier au soir (I WENT to the dance last night). The song title is in error. ITÉ is cognate with Spanish IDA, both from Latin ITUM, the root i- also seen in Cajun and Euro French IRA (Cajun: ira pus "won't go anymore") and IRAIS "would go".
@@morrisyork6133 well the past participle of "aller" is [ete], I've never heard [ite]. Perhaps among the Houma Indians, but they raise [e] to [i] often
@@icxc1233 Wikipedia has some lists, and I later changed to standard French because Norman French had little use for me. Thankfully, most of the words Wikipedia has for Norman French are Jersias, I’d start there.
@@Corpus.Adamus You may be interested in a book by Dr. Louis Emil Menger called "The Anglo Norman Dialect". It's mostly about the Old Norman in England but he does talk about some modern dialects and even gives some bits of Norman texts.
tres interessant! je suis Acadien ( je vis au Nouveau Brunswick). le premier membre de ma famile a vivre au Canada etait nee a Coutence en Normandie pres de 400 ans passer et je doit dire que ce francais est pas mal proche de l'accent Acadien.
Moi aussi je trouve que ça sonne acadien (jsuis juste en haut en Gaspésie). Surtout dans les intonations. Ça me rappelle la maman de mon ex aux Îles de la Madeleine.
It's sad no one speaks the alderney dialect anymore I remember one word my grandad said tattagou don't know if I spelled it correctly but it means be quite
Well I believe the Ancestors of the People of Alderney originally settled Alderney from Guernsey as Jersey and Guernsey were the only Islands with indigenous Populations while the rest of the Islands were originally uninhabited such as Sark as Sarkese People are descended from Jerriais Settlers so if Sarkese People migrated to Jersey while Aldernese People migrated to Guernsey then they would go back to their original Ancestral Homelands. The Youth of both Islands need to be taught their Indigenous Languages instead of English.
@@BumblebeeTuna8 could be alderney was called ridunna in roman times and they had a Fort there anyway I've got family in guernsey jersey and alderney my great grandmother was a le' valley us islanders are a strong brew mate
Question for a native french speaker: would you say when telling a story; 'mon père fut diversement malade'? Would you use the past historic tense and would you choose to use the word 'diversement'?
Use of the passé simple is generally a bit archaic in standard (i.e. Parisian-derived European) French. It's more of a literary form there. In Canadian French, which I speak natively, it is less unusual and it just has different nuances than the passé composé (could be a bit more formal, could be implying something a long time ago, etc.). I use it regularly myself but I do have to use French legalese in my work so maybe I use it more than most. It's not the most conversational of tenses but it does fit well into telling a story. "Fut" has a certain finality that the passé composé lacks ("j'ai été malade" doesn't really preclude that you might be sick again but "je fut malade" implies that it's all in the past -- it's a bit like a "was... back then" in English). "Diversement malade" is an unusual phrasing to my ears. I'm honestly not sure if it's a bit archaic or just sounds like an anglicism. "Atteint de divers maladies" or "avait plusieurs maladies" would be more common phrasings that I would expect both in Canadian or European French. "malade de divers façons" could be said but it's a touch awkward and causes the listener to wonder if those ways include non-physical ones. It is possible that "diversement malade" is unremarkable phrasing in modern day northern France. I'm not familiar enough with the various dialects to be able to tell you. For reference, my French dialect is descended largely from a blending of 17th century northern coastal French dialects (particularly Normand) and pre-revolutionary Parisian, allowed to stew in North America for a few centuries before reconnecting with European French in the past century via modern media. Quebecois French thus shares a lot in common with the northern French regional languages, particularly phonetics and vocabulary (esp. informal vocabulary and grammar) even if our formal grammar and spelling are completely in line with standard French. It's our informal speech and writing that sounds very northern.
@@sandfunderwood9444She normally walked to school, but sometimes she would sit on sacks in a van which would drive to the top of Le Mont Cochons. My parents used the odd English word like van or bus too. They might have picked them up from Jerriais speakers before having even heard much English. All languages do this and Jersey-French is no exception. It is interesting to note which ones get adopted and why?
@@sandfunderwood9444 She says "en desous du van" but she means au dessus. Then she says "sitting on the sacks", which presumably would be on the van and not under it.
Her English accent is quite noticeable in this, but as the video goes on her Jersey accent gets stronger (it sort of sounds like a South African accent). Most older Jerriais speakers, especially when speaking with other Jerriais speakers, would have a quite prominent accent.
There must have been several generations of contact with English speakers and this will have had some impact on the sound of Jersey French. My dad learnt French at an evening class in the 60s and met my mum from Valenciennes partially as a result of this. He sounded a bit like this when he spoke French, better than me by a mile.
Thanks for posting. It's quite different than french. I could only get the gist of it, helped by cues that the French interviewer gave from the questions. Comment from a French Canadian.
I'm also French Canadian and it reminds me of folks who grew up bilingual in Canada but really haven't use their French much in their adult life and so it's developed some odd English-sounding quirks when they try to use it decades later. I realize that Jérrais is very much its own thing but our own dialects have similar phonetics to northern French dialects. My friend's mum, who's a Brit from Kent but spent most of her life living in the Montreal area and thus speaks accented Canadian French, sounds a bit like this... not quite the same of course, but I am reminded of her.
Yes I certainly got the gist of what she was saying and the more I listen , the more I pick up. I wonder what she says at about 3.40-3.50 about her mother's house- has it been standing since 1778?
@@sandfunderwood9444 I will defer to Bertold on parsing that bit since he seems more at ease with the closely related dialects. There are moments where she can be hard for me to follow although I suspect that the audio quality might be adding to it (a bit of echo, seems like some of her quieter moments are hard to hear - nothing unusual from a basic consumer electronics recording but it is an added layer when parsing an unfamiliar distantly related dialect). Wish I could be of more help.
Comme breton, je comprends a peu pres 60 pour cent mais je dois me concentrer As a breton I understand a fair bit but I must concentrate quite a bit also
I'm French living in the UK. I can hear her speak French with a strong English accent. My grandma is from Jersey still living there (97years old!) and she sounds more French than this lady.
this isn't an English accent, this is a Jersey accent. The speech of the Normans resulted in the British pronunciation. Jerriais is not French, its Norman
Yes. She definitely retains a lot of her English accent and rhythm when she speaks Jèrriais.This mini interview really caught her off guard as she had no idea I was going to all of a sudden speak in French. It took her some time to become accustomed to what I was saying as she literally might not have spoken this language of her youth for many, many years. In her daily life she does not speak Jèrriais, she only speaks English.
Are French and Jèrriais mutually intelligible? I speak just a bit of French so I could understand much of the questions but just a tiny bit of the answers.
Yes and no. As you can see here on this thread, there are some French people who find it difficult to understand Jèrriais but others are more attuned to it and can understand the majority of it. But certainly Jèrriais has its foundation in French and so is definitely similar. As can you see in this mini conversation I did not say one word in English and only spoke French to her and she responded 100% in Jèrriais and we managed to understand each other.
if you are French, you can speak other languages and are familiar with the French spoken in Canada, US and Africa as well as Switzerland and Belgium, yes it's perfectly understandable and mutually understandable because they are usually used to hearing modern French.
For the most part, no. My Grandad was a native speaker of Jerriais, but could also speak French and English fluently. When he went to France or spoke with French workers on his farm, it would always have to be in French because he had not met a single French-man who could understand his Jerriais. But it depends on how strong one's accent is, one's use of words only used in Jerriais and what part of the island one is from (or even social class), because a French-speaker could understand a lot of Jerriais in other contexts (as is evidenced by this video).
They're both Langues d Oil/Northern French so yes, they are somewhat intelligible depending on how fluent the Jerriais Speaker is. Now if it was a Langue d Oc/Southern French Dialects then that would be a different Story as it's very difficult for both Groups to understand each other.
Small British accent. Fascinating. Maybe some Quebecois. Fascinating. Strange she says Septante like in Belgium and Switzerland yet she lives near France. Maybe in the old days they said that too.
Quebecois is derived from jerriais / norman french if i understand correctly. Many Jersey, Guernsey and Norman men (families) sailed up to the Gaspe peninsula and started the fishing trade and settled there. I read recently that up until the 50s a lot of fisheries on the North Eastern coast of US/Canada were still owned by Jersey families/companies. Also the term Jersey (sweater) is from that time of sailing - the knitwear the wives of the sailors would send them on their way with :)
It's Gaulish she just said a known Gaulish word beccus Whatmough J. The dialects of Ancient Gaul, Cambridge, 1970. Means hoe like gardening that's why she said a word like Talamh.... I also heard Seventy sounds like Gardening
It sounds french but not french to me I'm hearing French, Brythonic, Gaelige, Celtiberian like references in Portuguese and Galician I feel like French is a spectrum of language people think of today of France But I hear alot of Celtic languages here from abroad like certain words I can understand why it's mistaken as French but I wouldn't call it French or Norman french. Como is Celtiberian found in later romance languages Irish has Conas I heard a word like Talamh and other Gaelige sounds mixed with Bythonic mixed with what people would assume is french what if it's Gaulish in nature and preserved over time... I'm in awwwwww hearing this language
This isn't really Norman-French. In her lifetime most French on the island would have been spoken on farms. Most of the workers there were Breton. This is how Jersey people spoke with them and today with francophile interviewers. There had to be enough "common ground" for it to be intelligible. The accent is similar to the Jersey accent when speaking English. When listening to two Farmers having a conversation in Jerriais I could hardly understand anything, and my French is very good.
Fascinating. I hadn't realised French farm workers from Brittany would have been more usual than from Normandy. I also hadn't realised that maybe she was modifying her language/accent with me so as to make it easier to understand.
@@sandfunderwood9444 It is difficult to say how much she is modifying her French because of you. She said that her father was a farmer so her French will be less Norman and more French than say that of her father. But the Norman influence is still there. Most Bretons came after WWII. She might have dated one. My father perhaps. They were unemployed in Brittany because of mechanisation (tractors). Agriculture in Jersey was different. Lots of steep slopes and Greenhouses where you still need workers. I never met or worked with farmworkers from Normandy. Perhaps there were some. The Bretons came because recruitment offices were set up there. Some came before WWII. My great-aunt must have been there in 1913 already.
I agree with this, it does sound like she has 'frenchified' her Jerriais to be more understandable. My Grandad never spoke his proper regional Jerriais parler to any of his French workers because they didn't understand his Jerriais.
I do not know if I may be correct, I have been studying Norman for the last two months, I see no Jerriais speakers really using much Norman-French Influence anymore, most nouns are similar between their suffixes, but Norman verbs vs Jerriais verbs and their pronouns are different, in Norman, we follow the same aspects of french, so verbs starting with the vowels and H are abbreviated like for an example, the verb abiêmer to insult. We all know how you would do it. Here's how Norman is different, J'abiême I insult T'abiêmes You insult Il/Alle/I' abiême He/She/It Insults Nos abiêmoms We insult (In jerriais they use Je as their pronoun, for we) Vos abiêmez You insult (Informal) Il/Alles abiêment They insult In verbs that may not have a vowel or h as the starting letter, we Normally do not use the J', in Jerriais they do it. In Jerriais they use Oulle instead of Alle, and Ous instead of Vos. Adjectives, are mostly the same. Nouns are mostly different, it's like how Quebec French has different nouns like how they have char instead of voiture, that's pretty much how I could put it as an example for the relations of Norman vs Jerriais, Jerriais is pretty much a far Dialect of Norman. (Side note: We still use the same tenses, Norman French does use preterite, and our influence still comes from our good old viking friends in Scandinavia)
Jèrriais and Jersey French is not the same thing!! Jèrriais is a dialect of the Norman language and Jersey French (Jersiais) is a dialect of the French language.
Bruh Norman and Norman French are the same thing take that for example, they're the same things bro, and they refer to it as Jersey Norman French if you be looking at wikipedia 🙄
@@Corpus.Adamus “Jersey Norman French” is and exonym, it's not they're native name and neither in French. You need to distinguish between Jèrriais dialect of Norman, an Oïl language and Jersey Legal French, dialect of French, another Oïl language. Even within Jersey, the 2 are distinguished: 1 is spoken by a minority, unofficial and recognized, the other one is official and use for administration. And yeah, even with confusing exonyms, you can check on Wikipedia and Wikipedia FR.
@@AllanLimosin Who said anything about the legal one? and no crap it's not their native name it's the way they refer to it because it comes from french. Old Norse----| |-Jerriais French |-----Old Norman-----Norman French Old | |-Guernesais French French--------| |-Sarkese French |-Alderny French |-Augeron |-Cauchois |-Contentinais |-Anglo-Norman----Middle English-Modern English
@@AllanLimosin You said in your comment, Jersey French, but Jersey French also refers to Jerriais by itself too, you either: thought jersey french is a dialect of french, or: meant to put Jersey LEGAL french in your comment. So say it the right way if you were trying to say that.
A British English teacher told me once: English is a French patois. Ex, country, contrée. À butt, un bout. Of course it also has Germanic words (wort). And English words like... Business!!
He obviously didn't know much about his own language in that case. English is a Germanic language (the Angles and Saxons spoke a German dialect), and was later influenced by Old Norse, but has a lot of words borrowed from French and Latin.
@@phil2854 A lot is still an understatement, if you believe Wikipedia or most linguists; you can add words borrowed from Norman. Only a few thousand. And why have most Germanic plurals disappeared for an -s? Hmm...
My grandmother from Jersey spoke Jerriais as did her mother. Such a shame this is a declining language, as it gives us an insight as to how the Normans spoke when they invaded England in 1066. The accent is so different from French, as are some of the words.
@@Ingremance no, many of the Latin and Frankish Words are of Gallic Origin because the Gauls conquered Germany and Italy Centuries before the Roman Empire.
Yes but you could see all accents and varying dialects of a language as a 'massacre' but no one deviation is better or worse than the other. I find it fascinating to note how language changes because of various social, economic and geographical influences. It seems to me that many 'jarring' aspects of a new accent are the unfamiliarity of a difference in the way vowel sounds are made. As a New Zealander, I recall the first time I heard Glaswegian Scottish I simply could not understand it. But with time and attuning my ear to how the words were exactly the same but it was the difference in vowel pronunciation that I had to account for, communication was assured.
@@sandfunderwood9444 Heh, I'm a Canadian who lived in New Zealand for six years, which is also where I met my husband. It took about a month before I could reliably understand the New Zealand accent... and even after a quarter century with him, his accent _still_ trips me up from time to time!
I’m from Quebec. This woman sounds like a distinguished Acadian lady of British origin. I understand her completely.
C’est pas mal spécifique. 😄
On dirait du Chiac de Nouveau Brunswick
Clairement ça!
Lots of jersey folk in gaspe. Also hedley and rozelle are the most jersey names ever!
LOL yes. Too me a little Queecois.
I came to Jersey from UK to work here 5 years ago and I heard Jerriais being spoken by an elderly couple in a shop called 'Pound Magic', at Les Quennevais. I'd never heard it spoken before, but I knew it wasn't French French! I had worked in Canada a few years prior and heard Canadian French spoken, but with a different accent; that's how I could tell the difference. Fascinating!
pound magic is a great little shop haha
Pound magic is the greatest! You get amazing deals AND hear Jersey’s beautiful native language! X
As a French-speaking Swiss from Lausanne, I can somewhat understand some bits.. "Septante" made me smile since we don't say " soixante-dix" but "septante" in Switzerland. Very interesting but tragic too because Jersey French is sadly moribund.
Mec, on anglais, la suisse est “Switzerland”. “Swiss” est un adjectif
Septante, huiptante, and neuftante, are also all used in Belgium. I absolutely adore it, and makes more sense too
I love Nanante.
@@JoDee172surprisingly, some Jèrriais speakers use quatre-vîn instead of huitante. Each parish developed its own accent and pronunciation.
Hey! French Canadian (Gaspesian) here with Jersey roots. I can full understand her :) It is reminescent of various accents of our Maritime area.
I'm here with the same background! (Family's from Perce.) Cool to see the similarities.
Passionnant, je suis français, j'arrive à comprendre, et les differences sont aussi passionnantes que les similitudes.
Ce serait dommage que cette langue disparaisse !!
Aurélie has attempted to transcribe what Rozelle says. Am immensely grateful! There are still some curious turns of phrase but what we can be sure of is that Rozelle was taken by surprise at having to dig deep into the language of her youth. She was searching for words and hesitating and perhaps confusing some words. It took her a while to get into the groove as she probably wouldn't have spoken Jèrriais for many, many years. Merci mille fois AurélieTourangeau-Hamelin.
I read recently that even the various main dialects of Norman, such as Jèrriais and Guernésais, are not mutually intelligible by their speakers, yet I was able to understand most of this with only a knowledge of standard and Belgian French to help me. I know that if Rozelle were speaking Walloon, I would barely have understood a word. Clearly either what I read was wrong, or there is something I have missed. Could it be that exposure to standard French during the decades when Rozelle was not using Jèrriais could have pulled her Jèrriais towards standard French?
@@IAmRobertPersson Yes, that's interesting. I'll ask Rozelle if she actually learned standard french at school in the 1930s. I had the impression that her family spoke Jerriais at home and English at all other times. Would be good to know if standard French and/or jerriais were taught in Jersey schools around 1920-1940.
I understand that currently jerriais is taught in Jersey primary schools. Would be interested to know from a local Jersey person what is the current thinking of learning both Jerriais and French as part of the curriculum.
Robert, I agree that when I was in Belgium I barely understood Walloon.
@@sandfunderwood9444 She might have learnt standard French but there is a definite Norman something colouring it sometimes hidden under an English layer of sounds...
This is what I heard as a child in Jersey in the 1960s and 1970s. My parents who were French talked French with a Breton accent with Jerriais speakers. There were not many then. I didn't really pay much notice to the difference. For me it is all French. I have no problem with Canadian French either. But when I hear Parisians pronounce an I as if it were an A to avoid nasal sounds my blood boils.
Thanks Bertold. At 3 minutes Rozelle finishes a little memory about her father who was a farmer, and her brother who was living in England. She finishes with the word 'Bacchus' or something that sounds similar to that? Could you tell me in french please what she says?
@@sandfunderwood9444 I think she says backers. She says he was in "the electronics" which I interpret as the Signals Corp. They were deployed in the D-Day landings in 1944 in Normandy. Troops who landed in Normandy were called Backers for obvious reasons.
@@bertoldriesenteil1430 Wow that is so interesting. One day I will ask her more about that!
what do you mean pronouncing an I as if it were an A? give me an example
@@BrendanRiley How can i give you an example. My keyboard doesn't do accents. But a classic example is saying cancer du sang but meaning cancer du sain.
""La vie a changé diversement parce que à ch't'heure..." makes me smile because it ends with an expression I heard in the north of France when I was a child: "à ch't'heure" would mean "à cette heure" which nowadays means "maintenant".
In this phrase, I understand "diversement" as "de différentes manières" but I doubt this expression can be found anywhere on the continent.
Her pronounciation is a mixture of French and English. I suppose she speaks English most of the time? How is her English?
Very interesting document, even if it is difficult to hear each word clearly
She rarely speaks Jèrriais as it is only her elderly friends and a few very elderly family members who speak it. Just one generation later very few of my cousins in Jersey speak Jèrriais fluently. Her English is of course impeccable- many people would not know she even speaks Jèrriais. But she was genuinely chuffed to be able to speak it with me and once her ear tuned in to my French I could sense that she would have liked to continue speaking Jèrriais with me for a long time. Watch this space- I will return to Jersey and interview her with good audio equipment and with well thought out questions!
In Quebec we very often say "A's't'heure". Which means "maintenant".
@@sandfunderwood9444 If a French person heard her speak not knowing where she was from, would they guess she was an English speaker by her accent? Thanks.
@@brythonicman3267 im Acadian french, and yeah we can tell she's an english speaker by some of her pronounciations. my french is actually somewhat similar to hers in this video
Ouais, nous-autres itou, on dit "asteur" icitte en Louisiane.
I'd be interested to know which languages she was exposed to in which languages, just local media, French language or English or a mix of all of course. also can she speak easily with a speaker of the Guernsey dialect? As a Englishman her voice is like a strong English accent speaking French.
I would imagine that she would have been exposed to primarily English-language media, as it overwhelmingly dominant in Jersey. That being said, her Jèrriais seems to have quite a but of French influence, so it seems likely that she was exposed to that in some way (either via visits to mainland France or from French farm workers that came to Jersey) or she is adapting her choice of words to be more understandable to the interviewer.
Yes, Jèrriais speakers and Dgèrnésiais can in fact understand each other quite well. Look up a video called 'La Faîs'sie d'Cidre 2015: eune convèrsâtion' that shows speakers of both languages talking to each other.
I love that she uses the word « clos» to describe what was most likely a simple « potager », Louisiana French speakers use that word like she does and pronounce it exactly the same : le kee-o.
What a lovely lady, I could listen to her all day. Jèrriais is so nice and interesting!
Salut le cousin! A Norman from France here! Actually, if I'm not mistaken, "Cllos" can also be a field in these parts.
I've only ever heard "clos" here in Louisiana, but anything is possible with dialects mostly unwritten until the 20th century.
Who have you heard pronounce "clos" like that? No remnants of this [l] > [j] exist in Louisiana to my understanding
@@colbylejeune You're probably right, of course, but sometimes an undiscovered form such as ITÉ ("gone", as in "La boucane a monière ité dans mes yeux": The smoke sort of went in my eyes) emerges in the colony of a country while being extinct at its source due to an elite dialect having replaced it in the schools with the advent of widespread literacy. Thus, it's not "J'ai été au bal hier au soir" (I WAS at the dance last night), but rather J'ai ité au bal hier au soir (I WENT to the dance last night). The song title is in error. ITÉ is cognate with Spanish IDA, both from Latin ITUM, the root i- also seen in Cajun and Euro French IRA (Cajun: ira pus "won't go anymore") and IRAIS "would go".
@@morrisyork6133 well the past participle of "aller" is [ete], I've never heard [ite]. Perhaps among the Houma Indians, but they raise [e] to [i] often
I'm currently learning Norman-French because my ancestry comes from the Norms, so I want to embrace it.
Just finding this. How/where are you learning this bc all the material I know is Standard French or maybe African.
@@icxc1233 Wikipedia has some lists, and I later changed to standard French because Norman French had little use for me. Thankfully, most of the words Wikipedia has for Norman French are Jersias, I’d start there.
Hehehe bienvenue !!
@@Corpus.Adamus You may be interested in a book by Dr. Louis Emil Menger called "The Anglo Norman Dialect". It's mostly about the Old Norman in England but he does talk about some modern dialects and even gives some bits of Norman texts.
Great stuff. Her Norman style is there - flatter and with less lilt than French. Like the English spoken in the more Northern English areas perhaps.
The subtitle software is doing a hilarious job here...
tres interessant! je suis Acadien ( je vis au Nouveau Brunswick). le premier membre de ma famile a vivre au Canada etait nee a Coutence en Normandie pres de 400 ans passer et je doit dire que ce francais est pas mal proche de l'accent Acadien.
Moi aussi je trouve que ça sonne acadien (jsuis juste en haut en Gaspésie). Surtout dans les intonations. Ça me rappelle la maman de mon ex aux Îles de la Madeleine.
It's sad no one speaks the alderney dialect anymore I remember one word my grandad said tattagou don't know if I spelled it correctly but it means be quite
Well I believe the Ancestors of the People of Alderney originally settled Alderney from Guernsey as Jersey and Guernsey were the only Islands with indigenous Populations while the rest of the Islands were originally uninhabited such as Sark as Sarkese People are descended from Jerriais Settlers so if Sarkese People migrated to Jersey while Aldernese People migrated to Guernsey then they would go back to their original Ancestral Homelands. The Youth of both Islands need to be taught their Indigenous Languages instead of English.
@@BumblebeeTuna8 could be alderney was called ridunna in roman times and they had a Fort there anyway I've got family in guernsey jersey and alderney my great grandmother was a le' valley us islanders are a strong brew mate
@@crispyri What are some Auregnais Surnames that People have and how common are they?
Question for a native french speaker: would you say when telling a story; 'mon père fut diversement malade'? Would you use the past historic tense and would you choose to use the word 'diversement'?
Use of the passé simple is generally a bit archaic in standard (i.e. Parisian-derived European) French. It's more of a literary form there. In Canadian French, which I speak natively, it is less unusual and it just has different nuances than the passé composé (could be a bit more formal, could be implying something a long time ago, etc.). I use it regularly myself but I do have to use French legalese in my work so maybe I use it more than most. It's not the most conversational of tenses but it does fit well into telling a story. "Fut" has a certain finality that the passé composé lacks ("j'ai été malade" doesn't really preclude that you might be sick again but "je fut malade" implies that it's all in the past -- it's a bit like a "was... back then" in English).
"Diversement malade" is an unusual phrasing to my ears. I'm honestly not sure if it's a bit archaic or just sounds like an anglicism. "Atteint de divers maladies" or "avait plusieurs maladies" would be more common phrasings that I would expect both in Canadian or European French. "malade de divers façons" could be said but it's a touch awkward and causes the listener to wonder if those ways include non-physical ones. It is possible that "diversement malade" is unremarkable phrasing in modern day northern France. I'm not familiar enough with the various dialects to be able to tell you.
For reference, my French dialect is descended largely from a blending of 17th century northern coastal French dialects (particularly Normand) and pre-revolutionary Parisian, allowed to stew in North America for a few centuries before reconnecting with European French in the past century via modern media. Quebecois French thus shares a lot in common with the northern French regional languages, particularly phonetics and vocabulary (esp. informal vocabulary and grammar) even if our formal grammar and spelling are completely in line with standard French. It's our informal speech and writing that sounds very northern.
@@paranoidrodent Very interesting observations, thank you. Can you understand her anecdote about hiding under something on the way to school?
@@sandfunderwood9444She normally walked to school, but sometimes she would sit on sacks in a van which would drive to the top of Le Mont Cochons. My parents used the odd English word like van or bus too. They might have picked them up from Jerriais speakers before having even heard much English. All languages do this and Jersey-French is no exception. It is interesting to note which ones get adopted and why?
@@bertoldriesenteil1430 or did she hide under the sacks in the cart and 'alors elle n'avait pas besoin de marcher'?
@@sandfunderwood9444 She says "en desous du van" but she means au dessus. Then she says "sitting on the sacks", which presumably would be on the van and not under it.
I can hear the English accent in the Jersey French
I hear English in the Québécois French, but it’s not there - it’s just an influence
Her English accent is quite noticeable in this, but as the video goes on her Jersey accent gets stronger (it sort of sounds like a South African accent). Most older Jerriais speakers, especially when speaking with other Jerriais speakers, would have a quite prominent accent.
There must have been several generations of contact with English speakers and this will have had some impact on the sound of Jersey French. My dad learnt French at an evening class in the 60s and met my mum from Valenciennes partially as a result of this. He sounded a bit like this when he spoke French, better than me by a mile.
"J'tais ichïn": j'étais ici. Quelle douce poésie à mes oreilles! ;-)
Could you explain what does that mean
@@lukasarthur-ow5ht "J'étais ici"
Thanks for posting. It's quite different than french. I could only get the gist of it, helped by cues that the French interviewer gave from the questions. Comment from a French Canadian.
As a second language learner of French (from the United States), I understood the interviewer perfect, but understood none of the Jerriais at all.
I'm also French Canadian and it reminds me of folks who grew up bilingual in Canada but really haven't use their French much in their adult life and so it's developed some odd English-sounding quirks when they try to use it decades later. I realize that Jérrais is very much its own thing but our own dialects have similar phonetics to northern French dialects. My friend's mum, who's a Brit from Kent but spent most of her life living in the Montreal area and thus speaks accented Canadian French, sounds a bit like this... not quite the same of course, but I am reminded of her.
Yes I certainly got the gist of what she was saying and the more I listen , the more I pick up. I wonder what she says at about 3.40-3.50 about her mother's house- has it been standing since 1778?
@@sandfunderwood9444 No she says it was her mother's house since that year. But obviously she means her mother's family.
@@sandfunderwood9444 I will defer to Bertold on parsing that bit since he seems more at ease with the closely related dialects. There are moments where she can be hard for me to follow although I suspect that the audio quality might be adding to it (a bit of echo, seems like some of her quieter moments are hard to hear - nothing unusual from a basic consumer electronics recording but it is an added layer when parsing an unfamiliar distantly related dialect). Wish I could be of more help.
1:22: combien de minutes? J'arrive pas à comprendre ce numéro qu'elle a dit!
Dix minutes.. je crois
@@sandfunderwood9444 Oui, ch'est "dgiêx minnutes". Lé neunmétho est "dgix", mais d'vant des noms nou dit "dgiêx".
Yes. Agreed. Sounds like the accent and word formation of a typical New Brunswick French speaker, with much distinct vocabulary. Vive l'Acadie.
Comme breton, je comprends a peu pres 60 pour cent mais je dois me concentrer
As a breton I understand a fair bit but I must concentrate quite a bit also
It's funny she says "septante" for "soixante-dix". So it probably indicates that septante is the older word.
I'm French living in the UK. I can hear her speak French with a strong English accent. My grandma is from Jersey still living there (97years old!) and she sounds more French than this lady.
You should interview her!
this isn't an English accent, this is a Jersey accent. The speech of the Normans resulted in the British pronunciation. Jerriais is not French, its Norman
Yes. She definitely retains a lot of her English accent and rhythm when she speaks Jèrriais.This mini interview really caught her off guard as she had no idea I was going to all of a sudden speak in French. It took her some time to become accustomed to what I was saying as she literally might not have spoken this language of her youth for many, many years. In her daily life she does not speak Jèrriais, she only speaks English.
Are French and Jèrriais mutually intelligible? I speak just a bit of French so I could understand much of the questions but just a tiny bit of the answers.
Yes and no. As you can see here on this thread, there are some French people who find it difficult to understand Jèrriais but others are more attuned to it and can understand the majority of it. But certainly Jèrriais has its foundation in French and so is definitely similar. As can you see in this mini conversation I did not say one word in English and only spoke French to her and she responded 100% in Jèrriais and we managed to understand each other.
if you are French, you can speak other languages and are familiar with the French spoken in Canada, US and Africa as well as Switzerland and Belgium, yes it's perfectly understandable and mutually understandable because they are usually used to hearing modern French.
For the most part, no. My Grandad was a native speaker of Jerriais, but could also speak French and English fluently. When he went to France or spoke with French workers on his farm, it would always have to be in French because he had not met a single French-man who could understand his Jerriais. But it depends on how strong one's accent is, one's use of words only used in Jerriais and what part of the island one is from (or even social class), because a French-speaker could understand a lot of Jerriais in other contexts (as is evidenced by this video).
They're both Langues d Oil/Northern French so yes, they are somewhat intelligible depending on how fluent the Jerriais Speaker is. Now if it was a Langue d Oc/Southern French Dialects then that would be a different Story as it's very difficult for both Groups to understand each other.
Sounds like a British person speaking French
@B Sell She has a strong British accent rather than a Canuckistani accent.
Norman french heavily influenced English that's why
Because it is.
Interesting accent, it’s almost like an American learned French without fully learning the accent to go with it lol
I’ve been tryna find a video of this thank you my grandma was born in jersey and I’ve always wondered how the French speaking is there
Small British accent. Fascinating. Maybe some Quebecois. Fascinating. Strange she says Septante like in Belgium and Switzerland yet she lives near France. Maybe in the old days they said that too.
Quebecois is derived from jerriais / norman french if i understand correctly. Many Jersey, Guernsey and Norman men (families) sailed up to the Gaspe peninsula and started the fishing trade and settled there. I read recently that up until the 50s a lot of fisheries on the North Eastern coast of US/Canada were still owned by Jersey families/companies. Also the term Jersey (sweater) is from that time of sailing - the knitwear the wives of the sailors would send them on their way with :)
It's Gaulish she just said a known Gaulish word beccus Whatmough J. The dialects of Ancient Gaul, Cambridge, 1970. Means hoe like gardening that's why she said a word like Talamh.... I also heard Seventy sounds like Gardening
This sounds very similar to some english people speaking french in Canada.
Very true. With old Northern France expressions thrown in.
@@jpboileau5473 yes
She sounds like an English person speaking French but without the accent. Very interesting.
Sounds like Cajun French
Vous parlez français ?
It sounds french but not french to me I'm hearing French, Brythonic, Gaelige, Celtiberian like references in Portuguese and Galician I feel like French is a spectrum of language people think of today of France But I hear alot of Celtic languages here from abroad like certain words I can understand why it's mistaken as French but I wouldn't call it French or Norman french. Como is Celtiberian found in later romance languages Irish has Conas I heard a word like Talamh and other Gaelige sounds mixed with Bythonic mixed with what people would assume is french what if it's Gaulish in nature and preserved over time... I'm in awwwwww hearing this language
when the norse men said:" screw y'all, we''ll speak french in our own style. It''s official now, our way has become a new branch of french".
This isn't really Norman-French. In her lifetime most French on the island would have been spoken on farms. Most of the workers there were Breton. This is how Jersey people spoke with them and today with francophile interviewers. There had to be enough "common ground" for it to be intelligible. The accent is similar to the Jersey accent when speaking English. When listening to two Farmers having a conversation in Jerriais I could hardly understand anything, and my French is very good.
Fascinating. I hadn't realised French farm workers from Brittany would have been more usual than from Normandy. I also hadn't realised that maybe she was modifying her language/accent with me so as to make it easier to understand.
@@sandfunderwood9444 It is difficult to say how much she is modifying her French because of you. She said that her father was a farmer so her French will be less Norman and more French than say that of her father. But the Norman influence is still there. Most Bretons came after WWII. She might have dated one. My father perhaps. They were unemployed in Brittany because of mechanisation (tractors). Agriculture in Jersey was different. Lots of steep slopes and Greenhouses where you still need workers. I never met or worked with farmworkers from Normandy. Perhaps there were some. The Bretons came because recruitment offices were set up there. Some came before WWII. My great-aunt must have been there in 1913 already.
I agree with this, it does sound like she has 'frenchified' her Jerriais to be more understandable. My Grandad never spoke his proper regional Jerriais parler to any of his French workers because they didn't understand his Jerriais.
I do not know if I may be correct, I have been studying Norman for the last two months, I see no Jerriais speakers really using much Norman-French Influence anymore, most nouns are similar between their suffixes, but Norman verbs vs Jerriais verbs and their pronouns are different, in Norman, we follow the same aspects of french, so verbs starting with the vowels and H are abbreviated like for an example, the verb abiêmer to insult. We all know how you would do it.
Here's how Norman is different,
J'abiême I insult
T'abiêmes You insult
Il/Alle/I' abiême He/She/It Insults
Nos abiêmoms We insult (In jerriais they use Je as their pronoun, for we)
Vos abiêmez You insult (Informal)
Il/Alles abiêment They insult
In verbs that may not have a vowel or h as the starting letter, we Normally do not use the J', in Jerriais they do it. In Jerriais they use Oulle instead of Alle, and Ous instead of Vos.
Adjectives, are mostly the same. Nouns are mostly different, it's like how Quebec French has different nouns like how they have char instead of voiture, that's pretty much how I could put it as an example for the relations of Norman vs Jerriais, Jerriais is pretty much a far Dialect of Norman.
(Side note: We still use the same tenses, Norman French does use preterite, and our influence still comes from our good old viking friends in Scandinavia)
It sounds like French with a Yorkshire accent 😂
If Britain and France had a baby it would be Jersey lol
Jèrriais and Jersey French is not the same thing!! Jèrriais is a dialect of the Norman language and Jersey French (Jersiais) is a dialect of the French language.
Bruh Norman and Norman French are the same thing take that for example, they're the same things bro, and they refer to it as Jersey Norman French if you be looking at wikipedia 🙄
@@Corpus.Adamus “Jersey Norman French” is and exonym, it's not they're native name and neither in French. You need to distinguish between Jèrriais dialect of Norman, an Oïl language and Jersey Legal French, dialect of French, another Oïl language. Even within Jersey, the 2 are distinguished: 1 is spoken by a minority, unofficial and recognized, the other one is official and use for administration. And yeah, even with confusing exonyms, you can check on Wikipedia and Wikipedia FR.
@@AllanLimosin Who said anything about the legal one? and no crap it's not their native name it's the way they refer to it because it comes from french.
Old Norse----| |-Jerriais French
|-----Old Norman-----Norman French
Old | |-Guernesais French
French--------| |-Sarkese French
|-Alderny French
|-Augeron
|-Cauchois
|-Contentinais
|-Anglo-Norman----Middle English-Modern English
Here's a tree, most of these dialects are influenced of Norman French and Old Norman
@@AllanLimosin You said in your comment, Jersey French, but Jersey French also refers to Jerriais by itself too, you either: thought jersey french is a dialect of french, or: meant to put Jersey LEGAL french in your comment. So say it the right way if you were trying to say that.
I'm French from Normandy (coastal lower Normandy too so right on topic) and I understand less than 20% of what she is saying. 😂
Incroyable !! Ca ressemble au meme francais que ici au quebec !
Oui moi je pensais la meme chose.
"When a language surrenders itself to a foreign idiom, and when all its speakers become bilingual, the penalty is death." -- Thomas Francis O'Rahilly
Trop marrant qu'ils utilisent le mot "diversement" pour dire "beaucoup" !
Ce français ressemble à l’acadien de l’est du Canada.
A British English teacher told me once: English is a French patois.
Ex, country, contrée.
À butt, un bout.
Of course it also has Germanic words (wort).
And English words like... Business!!
Your English teacher is a silly old bastard, English is Germanic.
@@Darryl_Francis well he was English, at the Chamber of Commerce in Pas de Calais!
@@Darryl_Francis yes I told it, an English British teacher ,... Not a French one! Dear. BRIT.?
He obviously didn't know much about his own language in that case. English is a Germanic language (the Angles and Saxons spoke a German dialect), and was later influenced by Old Norse, but has a lot of words borrowed from French and Latin.
@@phil2854 A lot is still an understatement, if you believe Wikipedia or most linguists; you can add words borrowed from Norman. Only a few thousand. And why have most Germanic plurals disappeared for an -s? Hmm...
As a Frenchman I can understand most of it past the obvious accent
As an English speaker I find her easier to understand than many French speakers
My grandmother from Jersey spoke Jerriais as did her mother. Such a shame this is a declining language, as it gives us an insight as to how the Normans spoke when they invaded England in 1066. The accent is so different from French, as are some of the words.
Not sure the Normans spoke this way.. this is heavily influenced by British
C'est assez bizarre, j'ai l'impression d'entendre du 50% Français 50% Anglais.
Il y a tant de dialectes en France. Les français adorent critiquer le parler québécois, sui pourtant vient de leur propre pays….
ça ressemble de beaucoup au patois normand
Beaucoup de français teinté d’accent Normand.
Sounds Celtic (like Breton or Asturian).
Because it's a French Dialect hence the French are the original Celts.
@@BumblebeeTuna8 French is a mix of Latin and Frankish mainly and very little Gaulish has survived in the language, as far as I know.
@@Ingremance no, many of the Latin and Frankish Words are of Gallic Origin because the Gauls conquered Germany and Italy Centuries before the Roman Empire.
sa sonne acadien
That's English not antique french lenguage
What a massacre !!!
That's a dialect for you.
@@riceuteneuer2678 No ...perfectly understand able ...french normand is more clothed with French than ... languedoc dialectes ...
Yes but you could see all accents and varying dialects of a language as a 'massacre' but no one deviation is better or worse than the other. I find it fascinating to note how language changes because of various social, economic and geographical influences. It seems to me that many 'jarring' aspects of a new accent are the unfamiliarity of a difference in the way vowel sounds are made. As a New Zealander, I recall the first time I heard Glaswegian Scottish I simply could not understand it. But with time and attuning my ear to how the words were exactly the same but it was the difference in vowel pronunciation that I had to account for, communication was assured.
look up Language Ideologies
@@sandfunderwood9444 Heh, I'm a Canadian who lived in New Zealand for six years, which is also where I met my husband. It took about a month before I could reliably understand the New Zealand accent... and even after a quarter century with him, his accent _still_ trips me up from time to time!