As a native (swiss-)french speaker, some of my nightmare words in english were: rarer, error and mirror. But I noticed that, in general, a good deal of the difficulties we face lie in the spellings that don’t "properly map" the actual pronounciations; my life got a whole lot easier for instance when I noticed that I was fine saying "reh-er", "eir-er" and "me-er" (another good example of this is the word "squirrel", which will make you miserable, unless you realize that "skwerl" is all it is). Likewise, notice that "coquelicot" is simply pronounced "cau-cli-cau", and "cueillir" is "keu-ir". So every time a you bump into one of those, try to forget the letters and focus on the sounds instead (if a source is available of course) ;)
You got it ! Double L sounds like "ye" Bouilloire - bou yoi re L'oeil - leu ye Cueillir - keu yir > to pick Cuillère - Ku i yère > spoon Yaourt - ya our te Quincaillerie - kun ka ye rie Bravo !
When you learn a new pronounciation, cut the word into syllables and say it outloud more and more quickly. For instance the word : coquelicot is pronounced slightly different than the written word : coklico that's the sound you hear when you say the word in a conversation. Also , the fact that you pronounce a letter or not depends on its roots. Some french words may come from another language, or from greek or latin or from ancien french.
english speakers try to make the french "r" sound with their tongues, so it become a "w" sound, or a rolled "r"... the french "r" sound is from further back in the mouth : you should be able to make it with the tongue anywhere (out of the mouth or else)... try to gently fake snoring, but exhale instead of inhale
Cueillir = harvest. Spoon = cuillière For me, in English is "i" and "ee" that are a nightmare like ship and sheep, I won't say how manytime, I said "Ho, look at the ship in the field".
Totally, the i and e in english has got to be a nightmare. Beach and B*tch often sound the same when a french person says them! And thanks for the spoon comment, i'll never confuse those two words again!
@@UnintentionallyFrenchified That for sure seeing that every single French person comented about it. I wouldn't write it if I did read the previous comment before. But I wrote as soon I saw it.
@@UnintentionallyFrenchified Yes It was fun to see you both together since I follow your channels. And so fun also to see my fellow citizens jump on your cuillère mistake in their comments, so much in line with french reputation to complain before embracing the joy of the moment 😂
You did good (I won’t point out again the cuillère /cueillir thing, it’s been explained in many other comments). The only thing I could say that might help you, is to be careful with the different sounds between “in/un/ein/ain”(probably many other spellings too, it’s French after all lol !) , the sound “an/en” and the sound “on”. They’re very subtle but in French they are very different sounds. Get them right and your French will improve instantly. The same with the sound “eu” and “é”. “u” and “ou”, etc... Subtle for not French speakers but very different in French. So get them right and you’ll be sailing through! Last but not least, the hardest part I guess is the R. The French R, that soft restriction sound from the base of the throat. It’s extremely difficult to be able to say it naturally and softly if you’re not native. That’s why words like fourrure or serrure might become nightmares. My last tip : don’t let the QU frighten you !! It’s mostly pronounced like “k”. Quincaillerie looks scary but really it’s just “kin-kaï-ri”. Anyway, just my 2 cents, I hope it was helpful, well done to the both of you ! Being able to speak French as well as you do is already such an achievement. 😁 I’m French, I used to live in London and now I live in Japan so believe me when I say I sympathize with struggling to speak a foreign language perfectly. You’re both awesome. (Jordan’s “heureux” was perfect but you win the coquelicot one 😉). Bonne continuation !
Thank you! And thanks for the little tips! They will be helpful for other people besides just me. :) And good luck learning japenese. That must be really different from french and english!
I’ve been living in France for six months now learning French. Been kicking myself for not learning so many stuff. You guys give me hope being there for years 😅😅
I'm an American in France & have had to work pretty hard to get words like this! I'm able to do it really well according to spontaneous comments from Frenchies, but it's so much more of an effort than Spanish was for me.
Heureux and content are not really interchangeable. Heureux would be used for a more permanent state vs content for a temporary feeling. It was really fun watching you. My Danish boyfriend has similar struggles as well as not hearing the difference between some words such as dessert et désert or poisson et poison.
Really! I didn't know the two couldn't be interchangeable. I almost never use heureux. And i completely agree with your boyfriend. Dessert et désert are rough! :)
@@UnintentionallyFrenchified They can... that depends about people. Just that lol this person does not say that maybe but personally I do you totally can say "je suis heureuse" or "je suis contente" in the same situation.
@@UnintentionallyFrenchified By the way, in France we mainly use the word "yaourt", but the word "yogourt" exists in French and could be used too - it is more usual in Belgium, Switzerland abd Québec - and it may be easier for English speaker.
There are many reasons to have silent word in the end... logical grammatical reason for most of it, that French brain can understand after learning it at school. I’m sorry it’s hard to explain in a comment but you can find ressources if you are really motivated 🙃 sometimes it’s the rule of accordance to gender and number, sometimes you have to look at the etymology to understand why it’s end like this... etc Good luck 😇
Very amusing vidéo. Bravo to both of you for being willing to expose your pronunciation challenges. For me, "fourrure" is much harder than "serrure" because of the transition from "ou" to "u" with the "r" sound in between. Just this week I was talking to a French friend and completely butchered "chirurgie". In my defense, it was the first time I've ever said the word. It took me 5 tries to get it right. Ne vous inquiétez pas. À mon avis, les Français ont un problème similaire lorsqu'ils prononcent un mot comme en anglais.
I recommend the textbook “Savoir Dire” for a technical/linguistic perspective on pronunciation. It’s written in French for the advanced intermediate level.
Si vous aimez les mots compliqués en français, il y en des tas ! Une petite liste pour s'amuser : sollenel, paon, exergue, gabegie, infarctus, inextricable, quinquennat ! Bravo pour vos efforts de prononciation. J'apprécie votre bonne humeur !
The trick is in french, you must take as many letters as a rule exists. For your first word (bouilloire), in fact you must take ouilloire in one sound... yes tricky i know. Miss, sorry but you must learn to make your 'u'. I do not speak about 'r', this one is hell for a lot of foreign people ^^
Grammar tip: a regular "e" is pronounced "é" while it's before a double consonant (like serrure), it's a common rule. And split the syllables while you are speaking !! We learn French pronunciation this way at primary school ^^. A common exercise in french primary school is to identify the syllables, for making good connections between reading and speaking in French, maybe try this method. Last tip: the "r" sound is not coming from the throat but from the back of the palate! even if it sounds hard you should feel a rolling effect on your back or top palate (depends on the guys and accents, if you know Sète...). The "r" sound from the throat is actually used in Arabic, and even french struggle to do it ^^so don't try to reach your "r" so far! French is made of very manifest sound, so don't be shy!
So a classic problem for native English speakers is the U sound. I would say it's your biggest point to work since it can be very treacherous (the infamous dessous vs. dessus). Try to keep do a very pointy "e" sound like in "see" and round your lips like an "o" but without changing your tongue's location. Other than that, I think your accent are both pretty good ! Jordan's can do some pretty good "r" sounds, that's impressive !
Yaourt and the spoken T wouldnt follow standard french pronunciation because it is a borrowed word from turkish. Try google translate from Yaourt in french to Turkish and listen to the pronunciation ;)
You picked some good ones! It's interesting to see which words are hard to pronounce because they look strange and which ones are easy to read but difficult to form the sounds.
Il faut y aller par son. Comme dans Quin Caille Rie. Tu prononces les trois sons séparément après tu les mets ensemble et ça se fait tout seul. C'est comme ça que l'on apprend aussi quand on est enfant. *** Fourrure aussi par exemple. C'est deux sons: Fou et rure. Fourrure.
That's funny! You know, that same thing happens to me. My native language is Brazilian Portuguese and I'm learning English. I'm having a hard time trying to learn English pronunciation. Spelling and pronunciation are so misleading and tricky. The same letters or group of letters can be pronounced different ways. Take for example the letters *ea* In the word *meat* they make the same vowel sound as in the word she In the word *head* they make the same sound as in the word red In the word "break* they make the same sound as in the word cake. Another example the letters *oo* In the word food , they make the same vowel sound as in the word boo in the word book, they make the same sound as in the word foot in the word blood they make the same sound as in the word bus In the word brooch they make the same sound as in the word coach. In some cases, the same sound can be represented by different letters. For example, the first sound in the word SHake is the same sound represented by different letters in words like Sugar, oCean, iSSue, CHicago, emoTion, tenSion, anXious. What the heck! Take a look at this video and you will understand why english can be so hard too for Foreigners m.th-cam.com/video/mOw7CdpK44w/w-d-xo.html
#Cueillirgate lol Cuillère can also be written Cuiller, like few words in French with more than one correct way to write it.. Ex : Clé/Clef.. I personally go for clé (but not that much) and cuillère (and not the other)
Bonjour. I have 2 tips for pronunciation. 1. Get a person that has enough patience to sit with you and coach you on one sound (in a word), at a time. My French hubby is this for me. Many French people would rather let you say it totally wrong than correct you. 2. Separate the syllables. Yogurt might be easier for you to pronounce if you separate it between the 'a' and the 'ou'. It's Ya-ourt. There's a video I saw on that very word and how it's pronounced a 2 or 3 different ways, depending on the area of France. The most common being Ya-ourt. The stuff was introduced to France via Turkey, and that's how they pronounce it, or how it sounds to the French ear. Kate, you thought heureux sounded like erreur, and it kins of does, except the word for error has an 'é' at the beginning, and an 'r' sound at the end which many Anglos can't even hear, and is not easy to say. The French ear does hear it when you don't pronounce it. I like these collaborations and you seem to be having fun with it! Keep 'em a comin'
The worst part is that the pronunciation "yaourt" arrived in french via english, because that is how the English pronounced the Turkish word yogurt. Belgians and other french speakers have kept the word "yogourt". Moreover, singing in "yaourt" means in French to sing indiscriminately to sound like English.
Not so bad friends ! The main issue for you I think is the prononciation of the "r". I 've tried to pronounce yaourt with the american rolling "r" and I can't do it. With the american "r" prononciation, the tip of the tongue is put up toward the back of the mouth. You shoud try to keep the tong flat and move the back of the tongue towards the palate. Sorry for my laborious english ! I do love your videos. They open roads between US and France because thanks to you I've understood the reason of differences and given up some stereotypes about americans.
@@JordanPatrick well, I realized not for everything. When it comes to looking up meanings and translations of words, I tend to go to Wiktionary. But my husband (French) swears by Word Reference. And they rarely have been wrong, like when I say some weird phrase in English that he's never heard of before (and he's a fluent speaker of English), he looks up key words in French on Word Reference and low and behold more often than not that weird phrase I said was there with the French equivalent, hahahah
In serrure, the "é" is not deep in the throat, and neither is the "u", rather the contrary. It's just the "r". As for the "t" at the end of "yaourt", it's not a french word, but a turkish one. Plus, we have a lot of word ending with a "t" where the "t" is not silent. Like "but", "colt", "coït", "brut", "chut", "blet", "août", "azimut", "basket"... Well, most of them are foreign words, so you have your answer. Old french name ending with a "t" have usually lost the "t" sound over the centuries. Regional accent may vary however. Overall, pretty good job. Your two weakness are the "u" sound and the "r" sound. But rejoice, we have only one "u" sound, while in Sweden they have two ! Now, if you want to become a master of french pronunciation, you have to read those and spot the difference : "Brun" (brown) and "brin" (strand). Don't use google for this one, but rather larousse (google does not seem to know the difference. As most people anyway...) www.larousse.fr/dictionnaires/francais/brun/11507#:~:text=D'une%20couleur%20interm%C3%A9diaire%20entre,toute%20brune%20de%20la%20merJeune" (young) and "jeûne" (fasting) "Louis de Broglie", a famous mathematician of (very old) italian ancestry. THAT ONE, most french people are puzzled by the way you pronounce it. But family names can be tricky. "Boeuf" (beef) and boeufs (beefs). This is a real trap. Same with "oeuf" and "oeufs" "Un os" (one bone) and "des os" (some bones). Same kind of trap. And a few "solo" "Joncher" (strew) "Grillon" (cricket) "Cancoillote" (a recipe of melted cheese)
Hi! I've watched about 20 of your very ineresting videos and this one made me laugh a lot ;-) Both of you were really brave with some of our hard to prononce words. Congrats for the challenge ,-) I especcialy appreciate your videos 'cause I find really interesting to discover how people from other countries (OK, you're also french now. Btw, welcome) look at us and feel in France. Keep on the good work. Merci et à bientôt.
Biarritz is somewhat difficult for Anglos. I hear Ba-ritz (they will leave out the "i") or Bee-a-ritz (3 syllables). It's actually 2 syllables pronounced Bya-reetz.
This was enjoyable! (I was doing pretty well.) I find that it is really hard to member the differences in pronunciation of these while talking... deux ,Dieu, du. On cuillère you were both hitting the American 'r' quite hard at the end. In Georgia the consonants are insane. They have the French 'r' transliterating as 'gh' and the 'r' is heavily rolled. And then they have words where they hang out NEXT to each other. I still can't pronounce this, Tsinamdzghvrishvili Street. In French most of the difficulties come with the diphthongs. In Georgian it's the consonant clusters. Thanks Kate.
My boyfriend loves your channel....he got a good laugh with this one....he said cueillir is not spoon it means gather....spoon is spelt cuillère.... We have been together now 2 years...I am here a lot.....my French is bad....I would like to know more about how you got here and what you had to do in order to stay longer...
quelle chance je suis abonné a vos deux chaines. Félicitation pour la prononciation. Je sais que le francais est une langue dificille à l'écrit comme à l'oral Continuez dans vos efforts et svp garder votre accent .
To me you did well ! you just need to get our "R" sound and it will be perfect; the back of the tongue must be a little higher in the mouth and to the front to make the rolling vibration of the glottis (I'm not a doctor or linguist, but that's how I would describe the difference between your "r" and our): maybe you can try to get it by imitating a dog/wolf growling or a cat purring
I m glad to listen to hear this difficult prononciation but for hardware store I anderstand a global full of things, and with this French word translated it indicates us more a little scraps like screws , Grover's, clamps, ....bisous
Sorry but "cueillir" means to pick or gather (as in flowers), while spoon is "cuiller" or "cuillère" (same pronunciation but the latter is becoming more common).
"Fourrrruooar"... 😁 😁 😁 Good to laugh in the morning. But no worries, I'm married to a Japanese woman. She had the same difficulty with same words. Less now.
Had you ever watched the film. "Roi de Cœur" with Alan Bates, you would have known how to pronounce "coqueliquot" as that is the name of one of the most important characters. Please search out this film, it is amazing.
Nope. "Brico Marché" is one of the many big hardware stores brands. Actually, the word quincaillerie is mostly related to the old fashioned hardware craftman little shops. But only a few still exist now.
Try theses classic pronunciation exercises sentences : "Je suis chez ce cher Serge." "Un chasseur sachant chasser, doit savoir chasser sans son chien." "Ma tactique attaque tous tes tics avec tact."
I think French has been a bit easier for me to pronounce because I know Spanish fluently and the Spanish pronunciation helps. But some words are trop difficile! On another note, Jordan looks like a young Matthew Lillard. :)
Hello et "Bonjour à vous deux " ; just for helping you to pronounce this difficult word => "Quin / Ca / ille / rie" (phonetics: "kain / kaï / ry") [Quin/Kain] [Ca - ille / kaï] [rie / ry] ...... Bravo bravo !! Love watching you .. french language is so hard....will subscribe and support your channel ! ;)
So true. Why pronounce the T at the end of yaourt lol. Never actually paid attention to it. I have absolutely no idea. I laugh so hard with this video. Thank you it’s refreshing. No language is easy. But at least you give it a shot. N for that you guys are brilliant 👏
@@UnintentionallyFrenchified to make a French 'u' sound, you have to pucker your lips and almost *whistle*. it comes from the front of the mouth, not the back, nor the throat. it should be quite easy.
Also : this link "- Our second video on Jordan's YT channel: th-cam.com/video/SW0uLbfKVcU/w-d-xo.html" points to this video and not the one on Jordan's channel :(
Not so bad anyway, some of the words are not easy! My tip listening to you both: work your "R" pronounciation, that's a classic diffulty for english/american speakers =)
@@UnintentionallyFrenchified Yeah, that's the tip to do it, you have to scrape your tongue in the back of your throat/palate. The sound must be close to a growling dog. Of course that's for the training to place your tongue correctly, no need to really growl for each "R"! ^^
I thought Jordan was a French guy with an American accent. Wait. Is he actually American?! I was like why the hell is he pretending not pronouncing words correctly???
Bonjour, yeux comes with the z sound at the beginning so yeux is pronounced zieu, and yaourt gets the final t pronounced because it Is not a French word originally but derived from Turkish.
So cute! Yeux begins with a z sound only when there is a liaison with a previous word ending in a silent s (Les yeux) as there most often is. Bravo to the presenters for your courage in showing just how long and hard it is to master a second language. I was disappointed to read the slightest negative comment; it says so much more about the person who made the comment than about you.
As a native (swiss-)french speaker, some of my nightmare words in english were: rarer, error and mirror. But I noticed that, in general, a good deal of the difficulties we face lie in the spellings that don’t "properly map" the actual pronounciations; my life got a whole lot easier for instance when I noticed that I was fine saying "reh-er", "eir-er" and "me-er" (another good example of this is the word "squirrel", which will make you miserable, unless you realize that "skwerl" is all it is). Likewise, notice that "coquelicot" is simply pronounced "cau-cli-cau", and "cueillir" is "keu-ir". So every time a you bump into one of those, try to forget the letters and focus on the sounds instead (if a source is available of course) ;)
Cueillir means to pick , specifically to pick a fruit or flower, not spoon lol, which is cuillère. Good attempts 👍
Thanks for pointing that out! Had no idea that another word was so close to spoon! ☺
Little mistake. Cueillir is a verb (to pick like "picking strawberries") , cuillère is a name, the name for spoon yes.
Et Jordan a très bien prononcé "cuillère" ;) mais pas "cueillir", en effet.
haha whoops that's embarrassing! haha 😅😂
@@mariebambelle7361 ah bon?? haha j'ai bien prononcé le mauvais mot lol 😅😂 Looking at the positive side! :)
Cueillir means « to pickup or gather » Cuillère means « spoon »
Thanks for pointing that out!
You got it ! Double L sounds like "ye"
Bouilloire - bou yoi re
L'oeil - leu ye
Cueillir - keu yir > to pick
Cuillère - Ku i yère > spoon
Yaourt - ya our te
Quincaillerie - kun ka ye rie
Bravo !
Thanks!!
When you learn a new pronounciation, cut the word into syllables and say it outloud more and more quickly. For instance the word : coquelicot is pronounced slightly different than the written word : coklico that's the sound you hear when you say the word in a conversation. Also , the fact that you pronounce a letter or not depends on its roots. Some french words may come from another language, or from greek or latin or from ancien french.
Thanks!!! That's super helpful!
english speakers try to make the french "r" sound with their tongues, so it become a "w" sound, or a rolled "r"... the french "r" sound is from further back in the mouth : you should be able to make it with the tongue anywhere (out of the mouth or else)... try to gently fake snoring, but exhale instead of inhale
Good tip on the pretending to snore! I didn't realize it was done with the throat and not the tongue..
@Philippe Lemaire it is vert close to the jota as pronounced in south america
Cueillir = harvest. Spoon = cuillière
For me, in English is "i" and "ee" that are a nightmare like ship and sheep, I won't say how manytime, I said "Ho, look at the ship in the field".
Totally, the i and e in english has got to be a nightmare. Beach and B*tch often sound the same when a french person says them! And thanks for the spoon comment, i'll never confuse those two words again!
@@UnintentionallyFrenchified That for sure seeing that every single French person comented about it. I wouldn't write it if I did read the previous comment before. But I wrote as soon I saw it.
Got my espresso in hand this morning to watch this release! It was so fun making these videos, ROUND 2 soon!!! 😂😎🙌
Can't wait!! :)
@@UnintentionallyFrenchified Yes It was fun to see you both together since I follow your channels. And so fun also to see my fellow citizens jump on your cuillère mistake in their comments, so much in line with french reputation to complain before embracing the joy of the moment 😂
You did good (I won’t point out again the cuillère /cueillir thing, it’s been explained in many other comments). The only thing I could say that might help you, is to be careful with the different sounds between “in/un/ein/ain”(probably many other spellings too, it’s French after all lol !) , the sound “an/en” and the sound “on”. They’re very subtle but in French they are very different sounds. Get them right and your French will improve instantly.
The same with the sound “eu” and “é”. “u” and “ou”, etc...
Subtle for not French speakers but very different in French. So get them right and you’ll be sailing through!
Last but not least, the hardest part I guess is the R. The French R, that soft restriction sound from the base of the throat. It’s extremely difficult to be able to say it naturally and softly if you’re not native. That’s why words like fourrure or serrure might become nightmares.
My last tip : don’t let the QU frighten you !!
It’s mostly pronounced like “k”.
Quincaillerie looks scary but really it’s just “kin-kaï-ri”.
Anyway, just my 2 cents, I hope it was helpful, well done to the both of you ! Being able to speak French as well as you do is already such an achievement. 😁
I’m French, I used to live in London and now I live in Japan so believe me when I say I sympathize with struggling to speak a foreign language perfectly. You’re both awesome.
(Jordan’s “heureux” was perfect but you win the coquelicot one 😉).
Bonne continuation !
Thank you! And thanks for the little tips! They will be helpful for other people besides just me. :) And good luck learning japenese. That must be really different from french and english!
Something that can be useful for English speakers: you can pronounce the French R a little like the J in Spanish but a little attenuated ...
I’ve been living in France for six months now learning French. Been kicking myself for not learning so many stuff. You guys give me hope being there for years 😅😅
I'm an American in France & have had to work pretty hard to get words like this! I'm able to do it really well according to spontaneous comments from Frenchies, but it's so much more of an effort than Spanish was for me.
Heureux and content are not really interchangeable. Heureux would be used for a more permanent state vs content for a temporary feeling.
It was really fun watching you. My Danish boyfriend has similar struggles as well as not hearing the difference between some words such as dessert et désert or poisson et poison.
Really! I didn't know the two couldn't be interchangeable. I almost never use heureux. And i completely agree with your boyfriend. Dessert et désert are rough! :)
@@UnintentionallyFrenchified They can... that depends about people. Just that lol this person does not say that maybe but personally I do you totally can say "je suis heureuse" or "je suis contente" in the same situation.
In "yaourt" french pronounce the final "t" cause the word com from an other language (turkish)
Thanks for the insight, i didn't know that until today!
@@UnintentionallyFrenchified By the way, in France we mainly use the word "yaourt", but the word "yogourt" exists in French and could be used too - it is more usual in Belgium, Switzerland abd Québec - and it may be easier for English speaker.
You can also not pronounce the final t, "yaour" instead of "yaourte"
@@pikachuiswatchingyou not really
@@uknowngamer6948 Actually, I agree with Pikachu. I'm French and I've never pronounced the "t". Maybe it's a regional thing.
Never mind la serrure - try la serrrurerie (the locksmith) which gets my English friends tied up in knots ...
Might as well throw le serrurier in there too...
I was thinking of the same word. That's the roughest French word for me.
Yeah, that's a tough one.
I think 3 r's is a little overdone, even for the French
Its not that difficult. Break it down into 4 syllables.
There are many reasons to have silent word in the end... logical grammatical reason for most of it, that French brain can understand after learning it at school. I’m sorry it’s hard to explain in a comment but you can find ressources if you are really motivated 🙃 sometimes it’s the rule of accordance to gender and number, sometimes you have to look at the etymology to understand why it’s end like this... etc
Good luck 😇
Thanks! and thanks for the explanation!
Very amusing vidéo. Bravo to both of you for being willing to expose your pronunciation challenges. For me, "fourrure" is much harder than "serrure" because of the transition from "ou" to "u" with the "r" sound in between. Just this week I was talking to a French friend and completely butchered "chirurgie". In my defense, it was the first time I've ever said the word. It took me 5 tries to get it right. Ne vous inquiétez pas. À mon avis, les Français ont un problème similaire lorsqu'ils prononcent un mot comme en anglais.
I recommend the textbook “Savoir Dire” for a technical/linguistic perspective on pronunciation. It’s written in French for the advanced intermediate level.
Si vous aimez les mots compliqués en français, il y en des tas ! Une petite liste pour s'amuser : sollenel, paon, exergue, gabegie, infarctus, inextricable, quinquennat ! Bravo pour vos efforts de prononciation. J'apprécie votre bonne humeur !
hahhahha non merci ! ils sont trop compliques !!
The trick is in french, you must take as many letters as a rule exists. For your first word (bouilloire), in fact you must take ouilloire in one sound... yes tricky i know. Miss, sorry but you must learn to make your 'u'. I do not speak about 'r', this one is hell for a lot of foreign people ^^
Some spelling and translation mistakes... but lots of fun! Thanks for a good time ahah :-)
Way more than i realized, but a good attempt! I'll have to be more careful next time I write out the words on the slips of paper!
Grammar tip: a regular "e" is pronounced "é" while it's before a double consonant (like serrure), it's a common rule. And split the syllables while you are speaking !! We learn French pronunciation this way at primary school ^^. A common exercise in french primary school is to identify the syllables, for making good connections between reading and speaking in French, maybe try this method. Last tip: the "r" sound is not coming from the throat but from the back of the palate! even if it sounds hard you should feel a rolling effect on your back or top palate (depends on the guys and accents, if you know Sète...). The "r" sound from the throat is actually used in Arabic, and even french struggle to do it ^^so don't try to reach your "r" so far! French is made of very manifest sound, so don't be shy!
thank u so much !! are u french??
Just A Teenager Yes I am :)
@@quentinbobin2549 I moved to Bordeaux last year... but moving back to Miami within 10 days. Love your country!
@@quentinbobin2549 wow cool !! i am living in frame since last august !!
Just A Teenager whao cool :) I hope everything is ok for you ^^ are you struggling with the language ?
So a classic problem for native English speakers is the U sound. I would say it's your biggest point to work since it can be very treacherous (the infamous dessous vs. dessus).
Try to keep do a very pointy "e" sound like in "see" and round your lips like an "o" but without changing your tongue's location. Other than that, I think your accent are both pretty good !
Jordan's can do some pretty good "r" sounds, that's impressive !
Yaourt and the spoken T wouldnt follow standard french pronunciation because it is a borrowed word from turkish. Try google translate from Yaourt in french to Turkish and listen to the pronunciation ;)
Same thing! :)
You picked some good ones! It's interesting to see which words are hard to pronounce because they look strange and which ones are easy to read but difficult to form the sounds.
Good to know that you can be totally integrated into French life but still struggle with some pronunciation! Takes the pressure off!
Hahhaa, I have a hard time ever imaging a life where I don't struggle with pronounciation no matter how integrated I am :)
Try "Miroiterie" (mirror making/maker)
Il faut y aller par son.
Comme dans Quin Caille Rie.
Tu prononces les trois sons séparément après tu les mets ensemble et ça se fait tout seul.
C'est comme ça que l'on apprend aussi quand on est enfant.
***
Fourrure aussi par exemple.
C'est deux sons: Fou et rure.
Fourrure.
That's funny! You know, that same thing happens to me. My native language is Brazilian Portuguese and I'm learning English. I'm having a hard time trying to learn English pronunciation. Spelling and pronunciation are so misleading and tricky.
The same letters or group of letters can be pronounced different ways.
Take for example the letters *ea*
In the word *meat* they make the same vowel sound as in the word she
In the word *head* they make the same sound as in the word red
In the word "break* they make the same sound as in the word cake.
Another example the letters *oo*
In the word food , they make the same vowel sound as in the word boo
in the word book, they make the same sound as in the word foot
in the word blood they make the same sound as in the word bus
In the word brooch they make the same sound as in the word coach.
In some cases, the same sound can be represented by different letters.
For example, the first sound in the word SHake is the same sound represented by different letters in words like Sugar, oCean, iSSue, CHicago, emoTion, tenSion, anXious. What the heck!
Take a look at this video and you will understand why english can be so hard too for Foreigners
m.th-cam.com/video/mOw7CdpK44w/w-d-xo.html
#Cueillirgate lol Cuillère can also be written Cuiller, like few words in French with more than one correct way to write it.. Ex : Clé/Clef.. I personally go for clé (but not that much) and cuillère (and not the other)
Bonjour. I have 2 tips for pronunciation. 1. Get a person that has enough patience to sit with you and coach you on one sound (in a word), at a time. My French hubby is this for me. Many French people would rather let you say it totally wrong than correct you. 2. Separate the syllables. Yogurt might be easier for you to pronounce if you separate it between the 'a' and the 'ou'. It's Ya-ourt. There's a video I saw on that very word and how it's pronounced a 2 or 3 different ways, depending on the area of France. The most common being Ya-ourt. The stuff was introduced to France via Turkey, and that's how they pronounce it, or how it sounds to the French ear. Kate, you thought heureux sounded like erreur, and it kins of does, except the word for error has an 'é' at the beginning, and an 'r' sound at the end which many Anglos can't even hear, and is not easy to say. The French ear does hear it when you don't pronounce it. I like these collaborations and you seem to be having fun with it! Keep 'em a comin'
The worst part is that the pronunciation "yaourt" arrived in french via english, because that is how the English pronounced the Turkish word yogurt. Belgians and other french speakers have kept the word "yogourt". Moreover, singing in "yaourt" means in French to sing indiscriminately to sound like English.
Not so bad friends ! The main issue for you I think is the prononciation of the "r". I 've tried to pronounce yaourt with the american rolling "r" and I can't do it. With the american "r" prononciation, the tip of the tongue is put up toward the back of the mouth. You shoud try to keep the tong flat and move the back of the tongue towards the palate. Sorry for my laborious english ! I do love your videos. They open roads between US and France because thanks to you I've understood the reason of differences and given up some stereotypes about americans.
you guys should've used Word Reference for the pronunciation, they're spot on, lol
Good to know! Thanks!
I didn't know that Word Reference has pronunciations as well!?
@@JordanPatrick well, I realized not for everything. When it comes to looking up meanings and translations of words, I tend to go to Wiktionary. But my husband (French) swears by Word Reference. And they rarely have been wrong, like when I say some weird phrase in English that he's never heard of before (and he's a fluent speaker of English), he looks up key words in French on Word Reference and low and behold more often than not that weird phrase I said was there with the French equivalent, hahahah
Thank you, I feel better about my attempts to get French pronunciation correctly. Still trying.
Merci, ça me fait heureuse de ma travail en France.
Entertaining video! If I could offer a small suggestion, you might want to find better audio samples from a site like WordReference or Forvo.
In serrure, the "é" is not deep in the throat, and neither is the "u", rather the contrary. It's just the "r".
As for the "t" at the end of "yaourt", it's not a french word, but a turkish one. Plus, we have a lot of word ending with a "t" where the "t" is not silent. Like "but", "colt", "coït", "brut", "chut", "blet", "août", "azimut", "basket"... Well, most of them are foreign words, so you have your answer. Old french name ending with a "t" have usually lost the "t" sound over the centuries. Regional accent may vary however.
Overall, pretty good job. Your two weakness are the "u" sound and the "r" sound. But rejoice, we have only one "u" sound, while in Sweden they have two !
Now, if you want to become a master of french pronunciation, you have to read those and spot the difference :
"Brun" (brown) and "brin" (strand). Don't use google for this one, but rather larousse (google does not seem to know the difference. As most people anyway...) www.larousse.fr/dictionnaires/francais/brun/11507#:~:text=D'une%20couleur%20interm%C3%A9diaire%20entre,toute%20brune%20de%20la%20merJeune" (young) and "jeûne" (fasting)
"Louis de Broglie", a famous mathematician of (very old) italian ancestry. THAT ONE, most french people are puzzled by the way you pronounce it. But family names can be tricky.
"Boeuf" (beef) and boeufs (beefs). This is a real trap. Same with "oeuf" and "oeufs"
"Un os" (one bone) and "des os" (some bones). Same kind of trap.
And a few "solo"
"Joncher" (strew)
"Grillon" (cricket)
"Cancoillote" (a recipe of melted cheese)
Vous prononcez super bien "coquelicot" ! 👏🙂
Et Jordan aussi très bien le mot "heureux" 👍
Cocorico ?
Loved this video ! I'm pretty happy to join Jordan and just keep drinking ☕☕ but spoon and yogurt seem like something I should practice 😂
Spoon and yogurt are probably good ones to know, but watch out, we spelled spoon wrong in the video! hahah
Hi! I've watched about 20 of your very ineresting videos and this one made me laugh a lot ;-) Both of you were really brave with some of our hard to prononce words. Congrats for the challenge ,-) I especcialy appreciate your videos 'cause I find really interesting to discover how people from other countries (OK, you're also french now. Btw, welcome) look at us and feel in France. Keep on the good work. Merci et à bientôt.
Biarritz is somewhat difficult for Anglos. I hear Ba-ritz (they will leave out the "i") or Bee-a-ritz (3 syllables). It's actually 2 syllables pronounced Bya-reetz.
This was enjoyable! (I was doing pretty well.) I find that it is really hard to member the differences in pronunciation of these while talking... deux ,Dieu, du. On cuillère you were both hitting the American 'r' quite hard at the end.
In Georgia the consonants are insane. They have the French 'r' transliterating as 'gh' and the 'r' is heavily rolled. And then they have words where they hang out NEXT to each other. I still can't pronounce this, Tsinamdzghvrishvili Street. In French most of the difficulties come with the diphthongs. In Georgian it's the consonant clusters. Thanks Kate.
Glad you enjoyed! I don't even know what to say about Tsinamdzghvrishvili Street... WOW.
My boyfriend loves your channel....he got a good laugh with this one....he said cueillir is not spoon it means gather....spoon is spelt cuillère.... We have been together now 2 years...I am here a lot.....my French is bad....I would like to know more about how you got here and what you had to do in order to stay longer...
hey ! i am also an american living in france and i explain my experience and how i learned french on my channel ! mayb eu will be interested ?
you can say yogourt for yaourt, it's equals.
Tip: "bricolage" is easier than "quincaillerie" ! 😆
HAHA yes thats so much easier! Thanks!!
Mais alors il faut dire "un magasin de bricolage" 😉
Yaourt: "I know what it's supposed to sound like! It's a YOW and a *URT* !" 😂
Wow thanks that helps! It's a lot less intimidating when you put it simply like that!
@@JordanPatrick if you want the real pronounciation, it's simply ya-oort.
quelle chance je suis abonné a vos deux chaines. Félicitation pour la prononciation. Je sais que le francais est une langue dificille à l'écrit comme à l'oral Continuez dans vos efforts et svp garder votre accent .
Merci beaucoup!! :)
Cuillère, cueillir attention quand même ;)
Merci merci!!
xD ! ce non respect. j'adore
Watched Jay Swanson before you,he was talking kettles too.So,I got it twice lol
To me you did well ! you just need to get our "R" sound and it will be perfect; the back of the tongue must be a little higher in the mouth and to the front to make the rolling vibration of the glottis (I'm not a doctor or linguist, but that's how I would describe the difference between your "r" and our): maybe you can try to get it by imitating a dog/wolf growling or a cat purring
I m glad to listen to hear this difficult prononciation but for hardware store I anderstand a global full of things, and with this French word translated it indicates us more a little scraps like screws , Grover's, clamps, ....bisous
Haha I don't think we will ever perfect our pronunciations in French! Such a hard language to master!
Cuillère = spoon
Cueillir = to pick up a flower
Bouilloire is kettle.
Tea kettle is bouilloire a thé .
thanks!
The first word sounds just like the word for fog. New word for me..
Also, there are the words heureux and erreur.
Hi guys. Try to prononce the R more in the back of your mouth and not in your throut, this will definitely help you!
Very cool vidéo thanks
Glad you enjoyed it!
Sorry but "cueillir" means to pick or gather (as in flowers), while spoon is "cuiller" or "cuillère" (same pronunciation but the latter is becoming more common).
Great video👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻👌🏻
For another word that is hard to say (though rarely useful!): oignonière (an onion plantation!).
"Fourrrruooar"... 😁 😁 😁 Good to laugh in the morning. But no worries, I'm married to a Japanese woman. She had the same difficulty with same words. Less now.
It's tough! But we're trying :) haahah
Cueillir (pick a flower) et cuillère (spoon)
Had you ever watched the film. "Roi de Cœur" with Alan Bates, you would have known how to pronounce "coqueliquot" as that is the name of one of the most important characters. Please search out this film, it is amazing.
Moving to Grenoble in a few months fellow Americans :)
How fun! Enjoy!!
Your attempts reminded me of The Rural Juror :P
Good video, i'm stil laughing.
do you try this word "turlututu" .?
What it mean ? It is an onomatopoeia which simulates the sound of the flute.
Cueillir est diffèrent de cuillère.... Attention, pas la même chose !!!!
Thank you for pointing that out!
Don't worry you can roll your french r it's not a mistake Many old people in south west of France and another french countries do that
That was funny 😂 I’ e got the same problem in English and Spanish some words are very difficult to pronounce
You both did great, French struggle even more to pronounce some English words !
that is very true hahah !! are u french ?
I thought a hardware store was always Brico Marché? O pas?
I've never heard of that so i'll let someone else comment!
Nope. "Brico Marché" is one of the many big hardware stores brands. Actually, the word quincaillerie is mostly related to the old fashioned hardware craftman little shops. But only a few still exist now.
...In French bricoler is to tinker/to do a project/DIY
Not everyone pronounces the t in yaourt, you can say ' yaour' it is correct
Bouilloire = Bou-ye-oire
Œil = e-ye ...Perhaps name English "eye" even come from there and oeil became eye :)
It's totally possible!
Try theses classic pronunciation exercises sentences : "Je suis chez ce cher Serge." "Un chasseur sachant chasser, doit savoir chasser sans son chien." "Ma tactique attaque tous tes tics avec tact."
Maybe you'll rather go for the Swiss French version:-) yogourt
Seems easier right? haha
XD
Bravo. Je reconnais que ce n’est pas facile. La langue française adore les exceptions de toutes sortes. « C’est pas de la tarte » 😂
Content is glad....lol...he is laughing good...he laughs at me a lot....
My French husband has trouble pronouncing some of these words too!!!
hhahaha same !! are u french ?
I think French has been a bit easier for me to pronounce because I know Spanish fluently and the Spanish pronunciation helps. But some words are trop difficile! On another note, Jordan looks like a young Matthew Lillard. :)
Hello et "Bonjour à vous deux " ; just for helping you to pronounce this difficult word => "Quin / Ca / ille / rie" (phonetics: "kain / kaï / ry") [Quin/Kain] [Ca - ille / kaï] [rie / ry] ...... Bravo bravo !! Love watching you .. french language is so hard....will subscribe and support your channel ! ;)
cueillir et non a spoon ! on cueille une pomme sur l'arbre
Merci bcp!
So true. Why pronounce the T at the end of yaourt lol. Never actually paid attention to it. I have absolutely no idea. I laugh so hard with this video. Thank you it’s refreshing. No language is easy. But at least you give it a shot. N for that you guys are brilliant 👏
You've got to work on the vowel "u", roll your "r" and cueillir does not mean spoon (but "to pick"). Other than that it's pretty good !
The U is so hard! And that's for cueillir, i won't ever forget that one now! hahah
@@UnintentionallyFrenchified to make a French 'u' sound, you have to pucker your lips and almost *whistle*.
it comes from the front of the mouth, not the back, nor the throat.
it should be quite easy.
Yahourt ...miaou :)
Love me some yahourt!
Most people would give up after "un" and "une"!
Also : this link "- Our second video on Jordan's YT channel: th-cam.com/video/SW0uLbfKVcU/w-d-xo.html" points to this video and not the one on Jordan's channel :(
ptdr ...j'ai mis les sous-titres pour voir ...Google s’emballe ! :)))
Not so bad anyway, some of the words are not easy!
My tip listening to you both: work your "R" pronounciation, that's a classic diffulty for english/american speakers
=)
Yea, the r is killer, but i'm going to try doing it from my throat now and see if it goes better!
@@UnintentionallyFrenchified Yeah, that's the tip to do it, you have to scrape your tongue in the back of your throat/palate. The sound must be close to a growling dog. Of course that's for the training to place your tongue correctly, no need to really growl for each "R"! ^^
Fourrure is the fur, the right word is ferrure
Yaourt pronounces the same way as "yahoo" without the "h" and a full pronounced "rt" at the end.
Cueillir is NOT a spoon you got it wrong, cueillir is to pluck(pike flowers ex)...spoon is Cuillère !!!
A mistake you did with the verb cueillir which means to pick. You can translate une cuillère by a spoon.
The hardest French word for me was "Rue!"
I thought Jordan was a French guy with an American accent. Wait. Is he actually American?! I was like why the hell is he pretending not pronouncing words correctly???
Bonjour, yeux comes with the z sound at the beginning so yeux is pronounced zieu, and yaourt gets the final t pronounced because it Is not a French word originally but derived from Turkish.
Good to know for the turkish word Yaourt! Makes a little more sense now :)
@@UnintentionallyFrenchified Actually, "yaourt" is a greek word. Yoghourt (yoğurt) is the turkish one.
@@UnintentionallyFrenchified And some french people don't pronounce the t at the end...
So cute! Yeux begins with a z sound only when there is a liaison with a previous word ending in a silent s (Les yeux) as there most often is. Bravo to the presenters for your courage in showing just how long and hard it is to master a second language. I was disappointed to read the slightest negative comment; it says so much more about the person who made the comment than about you.
7:23 Because the etymology of yaourt is Turkish
Good to know!
Nope, it's greek. Yoğurt is turkish.
Cueillir is not cuillère.
Cuillère : spoon
Cueillir: cueillir une fleur= to pick a flower
Yaourt n'est pas un mots d'origine, c'est pour celà que l'on prononce le t à la fin
oui j'ai appris ca aujourd'hui! Merci! :)
cueillir n'est pas cuillère, gather or spoon
The « bouilloire » in google trad sounded weird, BOU-OUI-LLOIRE
Cueillir is to pick not spoon.