🇫🇷👂Honest Spelling: light and shadow

Bonjour bonjour !

How's your learning going? Feel free to share any questions or feedback by replying to this email.

I recently travelled to a French city to do a full-day immersion with a learner. Can you guess which city, from the photo below?

I was lying in a park, enjoying the interplay of light and shadow on the building. Can you guess how to say a play of light and shadow in French?

Proper Spelling: un jeu d'ombres et lumières
Honest Spelling: ẽ-je-dõ-bré-lu-myè-r(e)

There's plenty I could break down here, but let's focus on one aspect to keep this email short: the pronunciation of "...d'ombres et...".

English speakers are often tempted to pronounce it -dõ-bre-é- or -dõbre-é-, effectively detaching the word "ombre" from "et".

That's because, in English, audibly separating words is normal.

Issue is, in French it isn't.

French flows.

We like to connectwordstogether. Fusethem. If the words "ombre" and "et" were lovers, they wouldn't just kiss. They would French kiss.

So the final "es" of "ombres" gets swallowed into the -é- sound of "et":

dõ-bré-

So it sounds exactly as if it were spelled "d'ombré lumières".

This is an extremely common phenomenon in spoken French. The official term for it is "enchaînement" ("chaining"), but I like "word kiss" or "word French kiss" better. Here are a few more examples:

• par amour → pa-ra-mour (from: 027: Build me a château)
• huit heures → ui-teur (from: 017 - A Chef At The Local Market)
• la bonne humeur → la-bo-nu-meur (from: 012 - French People's Favourite Conversation Topic)
• courses ici → kour-si-si (from: 011 - Keepin' It Local & 'Bio')
• il commence à xx → il-ko-mã-sa- (from: 024 - Kitchen Backstage)
• on habite ici → õ-na-bi-ti-si (from: 030 Boat Trip To The Market)

In France, there are only three kinds of people who separate sounds instead of making them French-kiss: robots, English speakers, and teachers (when they teach, not when they speak with their friends).

Keeping this in mind will help you understand real spoken French, as well as sound more French and less like a robot. Which in turn makes it less likely French people will switch to English on you.

As always, merci for your interest in my language.
Valentin