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French linguistic data
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Common questions about French
What linguistic data does this French page show?
Word order, tone, gender count, case marking, adposition direction, syllable structure, consonant inventory traits, vowel system (with nasal vowels), morphological alignment, script, register stratification, speaker count, and geographic area. Each row is one feature with French's value visible; you can add other languages to read the same feature side by side.
Where do the French data points come from?
Typological features are merged from URIEL+ (Mortensen et al.) and a curated set authored against descriptive grammars. Speaker counts come from Ethnologue and Glottolog. Geographic area is computed from the Asher 2007 world language atlas. Similarity scores combine genetic distance, typological overlap, and lexical-borrowing data.
What are the French nasal vowels?
Standard French has four phonemic nasal vowels: /ɑ̃/ (an, en), /ɔ̃/ (on), /ɛ̃/ (in, un, ein), and historically /œ̃/ (un, brun) which most speakers have merged into /ɛ̃/. They contrast with their oral counterparts in minimal pairs like beau /bo/ versus bon /bɔ̃/, and pas /pa/ versus pan /pɑ̃/.
What is liaison?
Some word-final consonants are silent in isolation but surface when the next word begins with a vowel. les amis /le.z‿a.mi/ ('the friends') pronounces the final s of les; les copains /le ko.pɛ̃/ does not. Liaison is partly grammatical (obligatory after determiners), partly stylistic (formal speech has more), and partly fossilized.
Why does French show high similarity with Italian or Spanish?
All three are Romance languages descended from Vulgar Latin, share core grammar (SVO, two genders, similar verb morphology), and have heavily overlapping core vocabulary. French diverged most on phonology — heavy phonetic erosion, nasal vowels, loss of final consonants in pronunciation. The factor breakdown chip on the row tells you which dimensions contributed most.
Sources for French
The grammatical descriptions on this page are informed by the following published reference and descriptive grammars. Grammatical facts themselves are not subject to copyright; the scholars who documented them deserve attribution.
- Grevisse, Maurice & Goosse, André (2008). Le Bon Usage, 14e éd. De Boeck. — The definitive French grammar reference ("the grammar bible"), continuously updated since 1936; ~1600 pp covering all aspects of French grammar with extensive examples from literary and contemporary sources. [via static/grammar-library/fra/grevisse-goosse-2008-bon-usage-14e.pdf]
- Riegel, Martin; Pellat, Jean-Christophe & Rioul, René (2011). Grammaire méthodique du français, 4e éd. Paris: PUF (Quadrige Manuels). — Major university-level reference grammar, widely used in French linguistics departments; comprehensive, methodical approach to syntax, morphology, and semantics. [via static/grammar-library/fra/riegel-pellat-rioul-2011-grammaire-methodique.pdf]
- Hawkins, Roger & Towell, Richard (2015). French Grammar and Usage, 4th ed. Routledge Reference Grammars. ISBN 978-1-138-85110-8. — Practical usage-focused reference grammar. [via static/grammar-library/fra/hawkins-towell-2015-french-grammar-usage.pdf]
- Fagyal, Zsuzsanna; Kibbee, Douglas & Jenkins, Fred (2006). French: A Linguistic Introduction. Cambridge University Press. [via static/grammar-library/fra/fagyal-kibbee-jenkins-2006-french-linguistic-intro.pdf]
- Detey, Sylvain; Durand, Jacques; Laks, Bernard & Lyche, Chantal (eds.) (2016). Varieties of Spoken French. Oxford University Press. — PFC project methodology and global French varieties. [via static/grammar-library/fra/detey-durand-laks-lyche-2016-varieties-spoken-french.pdf]