Talk:French language in the United States/Archives/2015

Le Michigan

Interesting that there's no discussion of "Les Michiganois" in this article. It was top news two decades ago when then-Archbishop Szoka sparked cries of "linguistic racism" when he announced he would be closing the last French-speaking church in the City of Detroit. (The decision was later reversed because of all the controversy it stirred up, when Michiganois Catholics said they would instead cross the border to worship in French across the river in Windsor, in the neighbour Diocese of London.)

Et je m'a grandit in Milan, Michigan, on the Washtenaw-Monroe county boundary, where our local grocery store had bilingual packaging in the produce section. For years, I wondered how "Pommes Jonathan Apples" differed from "Regular Jonathan Apples" but I knew instinctively that I would not like the Aunt Mid's brand of "Epinards Spinach" any more than I like the Popeye brand of "Regular Spinach".

Francophones are found throughout the state, but the largest concentration of them are in the southeast (Metro Detroit) and the Upper Peninsula, especially near Sault Sainte Marie. The language is at least partly kept alive and vibrant in Michigan by our proximity to French radio and television broadcasts from the CBC/SRC and TV Ontario.

76.126.3.38 (talk) 22:23, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

Untitled

Buffalo was named not after the animal but from Beau-fleuve (pretty river in French) which suffered transformations by English speakers.

That is total conjecture on your part. According to all American dictionaries, including Webster's: the word "buffalo" > Italian bufalo, derived from Late Latin bufalus, bubalus, wild ox, taken from the Greek boubalos, antelope, from bous, ox.

I don't think the anonymous editor who made the (unsigned) comment above (from 207.253.169.203 in 2006) was talking about the word "bufalo" but the toponym. Dusty|💬|You can help! 16:58, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

The toponym is a Senecan Indian name, according to Webster's. It has nothing to do with beau fleuve in French. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.246.127.60 (talk) 21:15, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

What Value does the "Place Names" List Really Add?

I suggest deleting the whole section on the grounds that it's just a single-topic trivia section.

This doesn't match the info given in the French Language article.

That article states that French is the 3rd most common language. Spartacus106 (talk) 05:30, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Any communities today where French is the lingua franca?

The article makes clear that—in a handful of towns in northern Arrowstook County, Maine—the majority of residents speak French at home.

I'm curious, though. In Madawaska (or some other north Arrowstook town) would two total strangers greet each other in French, or in English? Is north Arrowstook sort-of a Francophone equivalent of south Texas, Miami, or Santa Ana, where Spanish remains the lingua franca? Pine (talk) 21:05, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

This is just anecdotal, but I have a friend from a town in another part of Maine (in Androscroggin County, the southern part of the state) where people speak French to each other all the time. To a complete stranger they would probably speak English, because the odds are that that person (being new to town) would not know French. But a French-speaking newcomer will most likely be embraced into the town culture more quickly than a non-Francophone would. Being able to speak French is like being a member of a special club, which sets them apart from the common culture. I believe this is true in parts of the Cajun country of Louisiana as well. Funnyhat (talk) 21:29, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Reverted Reference to Chinese

The article originally stated that French was the 2nd most popular choice for second language study in the US, behind Spanish and ahead of German. An editor misinterpreted a newspaper article to mean that Chinese had surpassed German. (This is not what the article actually claimed,; it only claimed that Chinese was on track to pass German as the third most taken AP Foreign Language test.)

I reverted the article and included cites. Please don't change it back unless/until there are better data to support it.

Thanks, Dave (djkernen)|Talk to me|Please help! 20:03, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

How about this? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_the_United_States#Chinese

Literally every chinese child gets packed off to saturday school to learn more of the language, and you can also see how prevalent german is.

Ouyuecheng (talk) 21:01, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

That reference indicates that Chinese (including both Mandarin and Cantonese) is more widely spoken in the US than German which is not the same thing. (There are better references for that by the way; the US Census data from 2000 state that the combined languages of China are the third most widely spoken in the US after English and Spanish.) I understand that a lot of Chinese children take week-end classes; we did the same thing with my daughter and Greek (her mom's first language). I also believe that Chinese will soon be more popular than German among foreign language students. (That same daughter of mine studies Spanish and Mandarin in her high school but not German.) But, until we have a reliable source that we can cite, we cannot change the article. There are reliable sources saying that the most popular languages for foreign language students are Spanish, French, and German, in that order. I suspect that those data are obsolete but until we can cite new data the article should stand as it is. I am sorry but Wikipedia is an encyclopedia and must be able to cite its sources. Please see the five pillars of Wikiepedia for more info.

Thanks, Dave (djkernen)|Talk to me|Please help! 13:40, 8 September 2011 (UTC)

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: page moved -- JHunterJ (talk) 01:35, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

---

French in the United States → French language in the United States – Move requested for the sake of consistency with other article titles, such as English language in Europe, French language in Canada, Russian language in Belarus, Spanish language in the Philippines, and French language in Africa. Disclaimer: I just unilaterally moved the last one (from the clunky "Situation of the French language in Africa." As for the merits, the current title is ambiguous. It could refer to [The] French in the United States, as in French people. I almost put this in as a technical request, since my intended target exists as a redirect here. --BDD (talk) 04:49, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

• Support since it can easily be confused with French people in the USofA, or French companies, etc. 70.49.124.225 (talk) 06:40, 8 May 2012 (UTC)
• Support per clarity and consistency with Spanish language in the United States In ictu oculi (talk) 09:59, 8 May 2012 (UTC)
• Support as per what IP70 said. Its current name could misinterpret the article as being about French people and not French language. Wesley☀Mouse 21:54, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

No mention of Franco-Canadien/American community in Phoenix, Arizona

I wondered why there wasn't a mention of French-speaking Canadian tourists, winter residents or snowbirds and residents in the Phoenix, Arizona metropolitan area. It is true they find winter homes in Florida and southern California, the Carolinas and south Texas as well, there could been a mention for Arizona is home to a small French-speaking (Canadian) community. 71.102.12.48 (talk) 21:18, 8 November 2012 (UTC)

French American Television

Two satellite-service or cable television stations provide French language TV programming in the USA for French-speakers.

http://frenchamericantv.com/ - FrenchAmericanTV based in San Francisco.

http://www.tv5.org/cms/USA/p-13410-s0-z0-lg3-Accueil.htm - TV5Monde based in Washington DC with its antennae in Oklahoma.

Sometimes on a few PBS stations, France2 and 3 (don't know which one), France24 and TF1 feature half-hour newscasts in French with English subtitles. I don't know of any public television station in the US features French-language Canadian news, then I'm referring to KCET and KVCR-TV in Southern California where I'm from. 71.102.12.48 (talk) 21:18, 8 November 2012 (UTC)

DISHTV also offers TV5 Monde, and a complete package of French programming called the French Bouquet.http://dishfrench.com/69.1.182.126 (talk) 15:09, 3 June 2013 (UTC)--69.1.182.126 (talk) 15:09, 3 June 2013 (UTC)69.1.182.126 (talk) 15:10, 1 June 2013 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.1.182.126 (talk) 14:38, 31 May 2013 (UTC)

Trouble to understand Quebec french

In the article there is a request for a citation needed (his can cause confusion when U.S. students attempt to speak French in Canada, as there are significant dialectal differences between the two; although the differences are fortunately minimized if formal French is used, informal conversational Quebec French can be challenging for Americans and other non-Canadians to understand.[citation needed]) but this clearly falls under common knowledge. I speak fluent French (non native speaker) and am friends with many Quebecois and French people, if Quebecois speak informally it can be hard for non-Quebecois to understand. Everyone who speaks French knows this. For example the movie starbuck (from Quebec) uses French subtitles at some points because European French speakers wouldn't understand. Shouldn't really need a citation ESP for people who learned Parisian French in schools, that's like learning Toronto English and visiting NZ or Scotland. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.69.226.129 (talk) 21:53, 14 November 2013 (UTC)

>As a rule, the French taught in American classrooms is that of France, as opposed to Canadian French, despite the geographic proximity of Canada to the United States. This can cause confusion when U.S. students attempt to speak French in Canada, as there are significant dialectal differences between the two; although the differences are fortunately minimized if formal French is used, informal conversational Quebec French can be challenging for Americans and other non-Canadians to understand.[citation needed] However, the written form of French in Quebec is the same as in France and other parts of Europe.<

It can be interpreted as an insult and it should be removed. This is not a travel guide for American tourists anyway. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.221.38.120 (talk) 03:37, 4 March 2014 (UTC)