Modern English is an amalgamation of a plethora of languages. The French language plays a major part in today's English, and a vast amount French words and expressions have made their way into our common speech.
Read the story below along with me as we explore this vocabulary together, put them into context, and ensure we give each a crystal-clear pronunciation!
Check out my video course on Udemy to kick-start your AccenTraining Journey!
https://www.udemy.com/course/command-the-american-accents-rhythm-and-pronunciation/?referralCode=C96318A268600601A20F
"What's your least favorite music genre?" Charlotte asked her fiancé.
"I can't stand today's pop music. That genre's full of generic garbage, there's no imagination anymore." George replied without hesitation.
"I had no idea you were such a connaisseur of popular culture," Charlotte smiled, rolling her eyes.
"A pop connaisseur! I'll add that to my resumé." I may not be an expert, but I know good music when I hear it!"
This felt like deja vu to George, but he had no problem with that. He enjoyed his lunch-time rendez vous (rendezvous) at the café with his fiancée. Her sarcasm made their dialogue a pleasant escape from his mundane schedule.
"We should check out the new salad buffet that opened," Suggested Charlotte enthusiastically. "we've got to start a diet to prepare for the big day! It's time to say bon voyage to cheese and bread, and hello to carrots and tomatoes."
"I heard that buffet has valet parking. It's quite exquisite for a salad bar, is it in our budget?" Inquired George.
"It's just a petite expense to ensure we're healthy, you can't put a price on that!"
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Modern English is an amalgamation of a plethora of languages. The French language plays a major part in today's English, and a vast amount French words and expressions have made their way into our common speech.
Read the story below along with me as we explore this vocabulary together, put them into context, and ensure we give each a crystal-clear pronunciation!
Check out my video course on Udemy to kick-start your AccenTraining Journey!
https://www.udemy.com/course/command-the-american-accents-rhythm-and-pronunciation/?referralCode=C96318A268600601A20F
"What's your least favorite music genre?" Charlotte asked her fiancé.
"I can't stand today's pop music. That genre's full of generic garbage, there's no imagination anymore." George replied without hesitation.
"I had no idea you were such a connaisseur of popular culture," Charlotte smiled, rolling her eyes.
"A pop connaisseur! I'll add that to my resumé." I may not be an expert, but I know good music when I hear it!"
This felt like deja vu to George, but he had no problem with that. He enjoyed his lunch-time rendez vous (rendezvous) at the café with his fiancée. Her sarcasm made their dialogue a pleasant escape from his mundane schedule.
"We should check out the new salad buffet that opened," Suggested Charlotte enthusiastically. "we've got to start a diet to prepare for the big day! It's time to say bon voyage to cheese and bread, and hello to carrots and tomatoes."
"I heard that buffet has valet parking. It's quite exquisite for a salad bar, is it in our budget?" Inquired George.
"It's just a petite expense to ensure we're healthy, you can't put a price on that!"
Open The Accent Training Podcast on Youtube Here
Teachers Appy to Join the Community Here
https://qlh5kgslus7.typeform.com/to/EDLEjgGz
Welcome to the accent training podcast, a podcast where I teach you to harness the sounds of your spoken English and to use the type of accent that you decide for yourself. When you speak the one that I have to offer you is the American accent. Other people will teach you other accents. There's probably Irish accent teachers out there, English accent teachers like you know, from Britain, English, English, that type of accent teachers, Australian accent teachers. Why not? But the American accent is my specialty. My name is pat I'm from Toronto. I live in Mexico and we've got a drought going on in my city at the moment, a drought, drought, D R O U G H T. Drought. What is a drought? A drought is when the water is running out or when it totally runs out. Now we're in a drought because the rivers have run dry. Normally Monterey sees a lot of rain in the wintertime. There's a, a rainy cold season for, you know, maybe three months or so, but past winter, honestly, I can count on one hand how many rainstorms we've had. And that's a problem because without rain, we don't get things growing the way that they should, the water reservoirs don't fill up. And, and now we're at a point where one or two days of the week, your is cut off a different area, gets their water cut off every day. In fact, mine's tomorrow. So I've gotta shower and wash my dishes tonight because tomorrow there's no water coming through those faucets. We're in a drought. We've all gotta make little sacrifices for the greater good. Now, how do I turn that in into an English class? Well, the word drought is itself. An interesting one, isn't it. I'm not really pronouncing it the way that it's spelled D R O U G H T drought, the G and H are totally disappearing. The T can be made into a stop T drought, not even really east and that OU are getting that ow, ow kind of sound. There are a plethora of words in English, which aren't pronounced the way that they're spelled that likely doesn't come as a surprise to you at this point. Now, the reason why is because the English that we speak is made up of many languages that have adapted it over the years. We've got Norwegian, we've got French, we've got Latin, we've got Greek, even Sanskrit. There are even English words that come from the ancient Indian language Sanskrit. So many languages have come together over the years to form our modern English. But today we're just gonna focus on one French. We are gonna break down just a handful of French words that are pretty consistently used in. Today's spoken English. Now we'll get to those in just a moment. But before we do, I've just gotta say, folks, make sure that you hit that subscribe button. Make sure that you give this podcast a nice little rating, leave a comment. If you like, what you hear, let me know. I'm happy to hear from you folks. And if you really like what you hear and you think to yourself, I wanna take this to another level. Let's get on track with things together. My friend, you can feel free to send me a message on Instagram or Facebook at accent training club. And we can work out a schedule for some one-on-one classes. I am more than happy to work with anybody. Who's serious about learning the American accent and show you how we can make it happen. Send me a message on Instagram for more details. And beyond that, if one on one classes, isn't your thing, not a problem. There's a video course available on a lovely website called you to me, feel free to check the link in the, the description where we can get started on that together on your own time. All right, so let's get into today's lesson. Let's talk about these words of French origin that maintain the French sounds sometimes even the French spelling. Now what we've got is just a quick little short story. I've written here, a conversation between a couple who are soon to be wed. They are fiance's fiance, a woman speaking with her fiance, a man speaking with his fiance. What is a fiance? Well, a fiance is someone who is promised to be married. They have made a, a verbal agreement with another person that they will pledge their love to them. So what we're gonna do is read through this story here. I will put this story in the description so that you can read along with me yourself, and we'll see just how some of these common French sounding words are used. In context, let's get into this. What's your least favorite music genre. Charlotte asked her fiance. I can't stand. Today's pop music. That genre is full of generic garbage. There's no imagination anymore. George replied without hesitation. I had no idea. You were such a Coner of pop culture. Charlotte smiled, rolling her eyes, a pop conure. I'll add that to my resume. I may not be an expert, but I know good music. When I hear it, this felt like dejavu to George, but he had no problem with that. He enjoyed his lunchtime Ronda whos at the cafe with his fiance, her sarcasm made their dialogue, a pleasant escape from his mundane schedule. We should check out that new salad buffet that opened. We've got to start our diet to prepare for the big it's time to say Bon voyage to cheese and bread and hello to carrots and tomatoes suggested Charlotte. Enthusiastically. I've heard that buffet has valet parking. It's quite exquisite for a salad bar. Is it in our budget? Well, it will. Won't be cheap. Agreed Charlotte, but it's just a petite expense to ensure we're healthy. You can't put a price on that. So George and Charlotte young lovers with a sense of humor, trying to decide between healthy living and wedding expenses. Now let's just quickly break down the words that we read through in here. See how they apply in context. The first one that came up was genre. What's your least favorite music, genre, least favorite music genre. Now genre is the French word for kind or type of something. And that's what we use it for in English, particularly with arts music movies. Now that word genre spelled with G E N R E, but it maintains the French kind of sound in the beginning. I'm not saying genre or Jenner, but genre strong in the beginning genre and then RA RA kind of flat on the ending genre. Now after genre, there was the word fiance. And if you're looking at this script, if you're looking at what I wrote here, you'll notice that the word fiance is spelled with one E and that E has an accent on it. When we put that marking over top of vowels, we call it an accent. This has that accent, which in French would signify the, a kind of sound fiance say fiance. Now, when we're speaking about a male fiance, we spell it with one E but if it's a female fiance, we spell it with two E's. We'll see that double E fiance down below. When we refer to Charlotte anyway, after fiance, it says that genre referring to pop music, that genres full of generic, garbage, garbage, generic, garbage. These are both words that come from French as well. Generic. This does have that G E N spelling, but I'm not saying genre genre, I'm saying J generic. So again, the spelling is the same as genre G E N, but we Americanize it generic, garbage, garbage, another French word. That's been Americanized. I'm not saying garbage with a ending. Some French words in English do get the ending massage or garage, but some of them just get the sound garbage manage damage. Where does that come from? French, but just get a Jew. So after that generic, garbage, which by the way, generic is to say it lacks imagination. It lacks creativity. It's generic. They just come copying what someone else did. And they're not even doing it as well. But then Charlotte hits back with, I had no idea. You were such a Conna sewer con sewer of popular culture. Now again, check this spelling of knoe. This is a good word to know. It's it's a class, the word I like the sound of it. Conure. I don't just like McDonald's, I'm a conure of McDonald's conure someone. Who's an expert at judging something who knows the good from the bad and, and is maybe studied this topic a little bit a Conis. And so here Charlotte is using it sarcastically. She's not literally saying that George is a Conis sewer of popular culture. She's exaggerating the point. She's using an exaggerative word. She's being sarcastic, which by the way, sarcastic sarcasm more words, which come from French, sarcastic sarcasm. I'll make a whole episode about sarcasm in the future, cuz it can be a whole language of its own. And if people are being sarcastic and you don't really catch onto it, it, it can be a little bit annoying. And so I'll make an episode about that kind of communication later on, but the word itself sarcastic over exaggerating something to kind of mock it. She's mocking him another word coming from French. Now next up George says a pop Conis. I'll add that to my resume. A pop con sewer. Again, he's also being sarcastic. Now they're just being silly. I'll add that to my resume. You know, my next job I'll mention I'm a pop, Conis a resume. This is a word it's spelled the exact same as resume R E S U M E resume like the verb to continue with something resume. But we're saying resume. We're given in a strong re and then za and then may resume. And again, check this spelling in the description there you'll notice I spell it using those accents. That's one of those words. It's got an E on the ending and it's maintaining that accent. That's how we know to make the a sound, not super common in English, but it is used. So he says a pop Kaur. I'll add that to my resume. And then we're adding a little bit of emotion to the scene. Just after that, this felt like dejavu to George dejavu, dejavu. It's French to say I've seen this before deja, another commonly used expression in English. You ever get that feeling when something's happening and it feels like that's happened in the past. Maybe you think to yourself, did I dream about this? Am I reliving a moment? Did I have I been right here before? It's a weird feeling, right? We call it dejavu. We steal the word from French. So dejavu. Now this is a two part word it's spelled D E J a deja space VU V U dejavu. And this felt like dejavu to George, but he had no problem him with that. He enjoyed his lunchtime Ronde Voz at the cafe with his fiance, lunchtime Ronde Voz at the cafe with his fiance, a Ronde VU, another two part word. This is using two French words and it's a very common English expression. A Ronde V is when you set a time and a place to meet, you say will Ronde VU here. And then we'll head out for our plans. You just meet will Ronde VU here and chat. Well, Ronde VU here, and I'll bring you up to speed. Ronde V this two part word is spelled R E N D E Z space or hyphen V O U S. Now I believe that can also be spelled without a space or a hyphen. I think that today's modern English will allow that to be pronounced as one individual word. And I say that because I've just made that into one individual word on my Google doc and it didn't tell me it's incorrect. So interesting. Two words have come to be one. After that we said at the cafe cafe again, spelled with an accent, check the description, the spelling it's spelled with an accent, Ron, DVU at the cafe with his fiance. Now this is the fiance spelled with two E fiance, two E on this one that is the feminine fiance. Masculine fiance has only one E her SAR has a made their dialogue, a pleasant escape from his mundane schedule. Whoa, that one's full of French. That sentence was half French sarcasm, dialogue, pleasant, mundane, French all through our English sarcasm. This one's a noun, sarcastic an adjective over exaggerating some example for the sake of mocking something dialogue dialogue, D I a L O G U E. Her Sarcas made their dialogue, a pleasant escape dialogue. Now that L O G U E that's a French ending O G U E you'll often see that in words that come from French notice, I'm not saying UA like UA. You know, I'm not pronouncing that UE. Just a log log dialogue dialogue is of course a discussion and exchange of words between people. And after that we've got pleasant. It was a pleasant escape that also comes from French. Also coming from French pleasant, something that's nice. It's not great. You know, it, it doesn't take you over the moon. It's not the best thing in the world, but it's pleasant often in the day we need eat something pleasant in order to get through our mundane tasks. George wants to escape his mundane schedule. Mundane. Another word coming from French mundane mundane is to say something that's repetitive. It's boring. It's not inspiring drains the life out of you is a description. It's an adjective. This is mundane. This monotonous work is mundane. So just below that next up after pleasant, mundane dialogue, what else do we got? We got buffet. We should check out that new salad buffet that opened salad buffet. Notice buffet, check the spelling. B U F F E T. I'm not pronouncing that T on the ending. I'm not saying buffet or buffet or anything like that, but buffet now I can't speak for all French words. If all French words ending an E T have an a sound. I don't know, but buffet sure does. So we gotta check out the buffet. We've gotta start our diet diet also coming from French. D I E T notice, I'm not saying diet diet, but instead I'm starting strong diet, diet, strong, weak. I, so we've gotta start our diet to prepare for the big day. Now prepare for the big day. It's not a French expression, but this is a good idiom. I just wanna point out prepare for the big day. The big day for these folks is their wedding day. Just a cute way of referring to your wedding day. It's the big day big day's coming up back to the French. It's time to say bond voyage, Bon voyage to cheese and bread and hello to carrots and tomatoes. Bon voyage literally means have a good trip, but in this context again, we're seeing Charlotte here. She's someone who likes playing with her words. She'll eggs being a little silly, and she's saying, have a good trip, cheese and bread, carbs and fats. Hello, carrots and tomatoes, low fat, high nutrient vegetables. Ideal on your diet. I'm not a dietician. Don't take diet advice from me. I'm a McDonald's connoisseur. So Bon voyage again, two words, B O N space V O Y a G E. And notice that voyage another one of those a sounds just like genre, by the way, if you wanna work on that sounds, I do have an episode about that. The Z H podcast episode number 72 deals with that. How and when to say it's a tricky sound, check it out. Bon voyage, but hello to carrots and tomatoes, carrots and tomatoes, both words coming, French carrots and tomatoes. Now, next up, I heard that buffet has valet parking buffet, et ending valet E T ending making an a sound. I'm not saying valet parking Valette, but Vale, when you pull up at a nice place, maybe a casino or something, and somebody in a nice red jacket will take your car keys and go park it for you. Valet parking is quite exquisite for a salad bar. Is it in our budget? Exquisite exquisite comes from French as well. Isn't that a fancy French sounding word, exquisite. All the finer words seem to come from French exquisite, lovely sounding language. Isn't it. And the other budget is it in our budget? B U D G E T. I'm not saying budge, budge, but budget J budget. Now that does have an E ending just like buffet and valet, but it's not bud, not for American English speakers. We say budget budget. We need to make a budget for the wedding, a budget. And then our final French word in here, petite. It's just a petite expense to ensure that we're healthy, petite, a petite expense. Now petite is a word that we use to describe something that is, you know, relatively small petite shoes, for example, a baby, whereas petite shoes, they're petite. They're just little tiny shoes compared to an adult shoes, which are regular nice shoes. So this is like saying this is petite, you know, compared to all of our expenses, this one's petite and it's for our health. We wanna have good pictures at the wedding. Your grandchildren are gonna see these pictures. You wanna look good in those wedding pictures. It's a petite expense for your health and you can't put a price on that. Can that's a classic term from sales people. You can't put a price on that. You can't put a price on that. If someone says that, they're probably trying to sell you something. They're trying to tell you, Hey, Hey, it doesn't matter how much money you put on this. This is priceless. So just give me all your money for it. You can't put a price on that. Another great idiomatic expression. So there you have it. Folks, not only did we just learn a number of new words, we got to put them to work. We used them in context and Hey, if you like, you've got your own quick little dialogue that you, you can read for yourself and you can read it out with a friend. You can practice the pronunciation of these words and you can build some of these words into a habit that you use yourself. There's plenty of good ones here to work with. Well, let's wrap this one up for today. I'm feeling satisfied with what we've accomplished. I think that you can now take the, this applied into your daily life and Hey, share it with a friend. If you like, what you heard, try using these words at work. Use them in front of your boss, guaranteed to give you a promotion. It sounds sophisticated to use French words in your spoken English, the average native English speaker uses these words quite regularly. We just work them into our daily life. It's just regular kind of English for us. However, the typical non-native speaker does not use most of these words. So these are words. That'll set you apart from the crowd. Use them according to your own good judgment. Have a wonderful day. Thank you very much for taking the time to listen. I've been having a great day myself. It's a Sunday. I got to take a little bit of time to just relax, chill out. I thought to myself, I'll record my episode today. I can edit it on Monday, get it out for you by Tuesday. And everybody learns a little something as a result. So keep an eye out for new episodes. Make sure that you hit subscribe so that you're updated. Whenever new things come out last week, I put out two episodes. I had time. I had a good idea for an episode. I thought, why wait on it? Why not just make it, put it out. Now give the people what they want. I can't say I'm gonna do that every week, but if you hit subscribe, you'll know whenever I do. Now, if you're somebody who doesn't wanna wait until next week, and if you want some them hard hitting materials to learn more from, I invite you to check out the link in the description of this podcast episode, which will bring you to a website called U. Now U me is a marketplace. I don't own U Tomy, but I uploaded a video course to U Tomi. You can can go on U and you can search whatever you wanna learn. Personally, I've purchased a course on U about stock investing and I've purchased another course on U about growing social media profiles. Now the stock investing course I learned from, and I a, a little bit of money from however, the social media course I'm still working at. And I really haven't seen that much growth as a result, but beyond those things, you can also learn the American accent on TMY. There are dozens of fantastic courses teaching the American accent on TMY. One of which was created by myself. I put my own blood, sweat, and tears into this to ensure that my students could get advanced materials to learn from this video course is designed to teach you how you can apply the American stress and sound to your own own speech, how you can control the strong and weak and strong and weak sounds in the way that the typical American English speaker would. And we do this by focusing on the letter T we look at it from all angles. We see how T can be strong, like a, like in the word time, but then we also get into the way that T can sound like a bit of a D sometimes how I just did right there. When I said a bit of a bit of a, I didn't say a bit of a, a bit of a D I said a bit of a, a bit of a, in this instance, not only is T sounding like a D, but it's also linking my speech together. You know, if you wanna learn about these concepts for yourself to adjust them to your own speech, and if you to support this podcast a little bit, check out the video course, take a look on you. To me there, just click the link and watch the first couple videos. There's some free videos. I did put a couple free bees up there for you. Check those out, see if you learn a thing or two. And if you like what you hear, I will be happy to teach you many are things through that video course. Well, thank you very much for your time today. Folks now get out there and apply what we've discussed, apply what you've learned and have a good one.