hy_digital

[round marsh]

Please be patient

Our volunteers look into many questions every day; sometimes it takes them a little while to answer.

Pro tip: you can rename the thread title with `.tr <thread name>`

Make it descriptive, including relevant context, but also to the point. This way you improve your chances of getting a more relevant and specific answer.

[worn yew]

Il y a pas d’autres méthodes que la répétition et la mémorisation

[candid wing]

Ah, j’ai compris. Merci beaucoup, bertiebear.

[junior yarrow]

This video suggests analyzing irregular verb conjugations using the IPA representations rather than just using spelling, as it can often pull the "regularity" out of irregular conjugations: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbMSc5btyuA

Using Convaincre as an example:

The spelling is irregular, but the pronunciation is more consistent:

I'm personally finding it useful for remembering and understanding, but ymmv as always

[worn yew]

This helps for a few irregular verbs but the main avenue is still memorisation

For example, in the second group, you have stem-changing conjugations like « je viens /vjɛ̃/ » and « vous venez /və.ne/ »; in the third group « j'écris /e.kʁi/ » and « vous écrivez /e.kʁi.ve/ »; and in the irregulars you have « je reçois /ʁə.swa/ » and « vous recevez /ʁə.s(ə).ve/ »

Unless you studied historical linguistics, it won't jump out to you why and how these changes exist and appear

In addition, the video also mentions throwing out spelling rules and at face-value that does make sense. Spelling is particular to a language and may often represent historical pronunciations that no longer exist but knowing them is still essential to explaining some quirks within the language

For example, -ger and -cer verbs have a consonant change for their first person plural conjugations: Compare « je mange, je commence » and « nous mangeons, nous commençons ». What's happening there?

Well, the consonants G and C can represent two sounds: a hard variant (/g/ and/k/ respectively) and a soft variant (/ʒ/ and /s/ respectively). In French spelling rules, when one of these consonants is followed by a front vowel (/i/, /e/), they are pronounced soft; otherwise, they're hard.

And so if we just conjugate it as « mangons, commencons », we hit a snag because these would be pronounced as the hard consonants /mɑ̃.gɔ̃/ and /kɔ.mɑ̃.kɔ̃/ which don't follow the actual pronunciation of these letters. Thus, French adapted: For G, it adds a silent E just to soften it whereas for C, it creates a new letter called the C cédille to mark that this consonant is pronounced soft.

When you're writing in French, knowing these things can help in your spelling

The other way can also happen. If you want a hard G in front of a front vowel, French adds a silent U like in « naviguer » so you pronounce it as /na.vi.ɡe/ and not /na.vi.ʒe/. For a hard C, French actually changes this sequence into <qu> which is why you have « il convainc » but « vous convainquez ».