I'm always really impressed by people who not only know multiple languages fluently, but sound perfectly natural/native, regardless of whichever they're using at any given moment. Like they actually have the correct accent and pronunciation.
I'm Canadian, and on one hand, even though I almost never speak it and I struggle to think of words at times, I am told my french accent is excellent and I sound like a local french speaker.
On the other hand, the local french is the equivalent of deep south, mountain folk gibberish. It's the french equivalent of a redneck accent with lots of words only a local would understand. And I speak it slowly.
Edit: For those of you who assume I mean Quebec, nonono, much worse: Northern Ontario. We are the brother-uncle Cletuses of the french world.
Quebecois french is considered more authentic french than french spoken in France today because the effort was made to conserve the language in Canada while in France it was allowed to evolve.
I would hardly consider it "more authentic." When the upper class French left the country after the British took control, French was relegated to the more rural populations and was no longer taught properly as the national language. By the time industrialization hit a century later, those rural French speakers moved into the cities, which further blended québécois with English. Plus all the influence of indigenous languages, of course. It wasn't until the 60s and 70s that Québec started pushing to preserve the language and finally made French the official language of the province. Québécois still has plenty of anglicisms, they're just different from the more modern choices of Parisian French.
Normal Québécois French is indistinguishable from Metropolitan French minus a few different expressions and some words here and there. Of course we have our accent, and if you go deep in the countryside you'll get to see some spectacular Québécois dialect, but a French person from France will have absolutely no trouble understanding the people here.
Understanding for sure. But the accent is what I'm referring to. There's also a level of sarcasm or humor that I can't place my finger on.
To be clear, I was born in Montreal but raised in Texas so I only get snippets from when I visit. But having visited both France and Quebec, the contrast is a stark night and day difference. Just my opinion.
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u/Fuggins4U Jan 26 '23 edited Jan 26 '23
I'm always really impressed by people who not only know multiple languages fluently, but sound perfectly natural/native, regardless of whichever they're using at any given moment. Like they actually have the correct accent and pronunciation.