Academic Paper |
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| Title: | A real-time window on 19th-century vernacular French: The Récits du français québécois d'autrefois |
| Author: | Shana Poplack |
| Email: | click here to access email |
| Institution: | University of Ottawa |
| Author: | Anne St-Amand |
| Institution: | University of Toronto |
| Linguistic Field: | Sociolinguistics; Text/Corpus Linguistics |
| Subject Language: |
French
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| Abstract: | This article describes the construction of a corpus of spoken French with a time depth of a century and a half, the Récits du français québécois d'autrefois (RFQ). The folktales, local legends, and interviews constituting the RFQ were produced by speakers born between 1846 and 1895. They spoke the French of 19th-century rural Québec, a variety shown to be replete with the vernacular structures and inherent variability of contemporary dialects. The authors review the advantages and drawbacks associated with this type of diachronic material, and argue that, exploited judiciously, it effectively represents an earlier stage of spoken French. They show how systematic comparison of the RFQ with contemporary vernaculars can help pinpoint the existence, date, and direction of language change. |
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This article appears in Language in Society Vol. 36, Issue 5, which you can read on Cambridge's site or on LINGUIST . |
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