Someone asked me the other day, “Should we teach St. John Valley French, Quebec French or France French?”
I replied, “Which English do we teach: Texas English, Boston English, Australian English or that Ayuh English they use downstate?” We teach English. Period.
Why is teaching French different form teaching English or Spanish or Swahili?
Which French accent should we teach? I suspect very few people ask that question of English or any other language.
So, we teach basic English and everybody’s happy. When people move to Texas or Boston or Australia, they then pick up regional accents, regional expressions and regional habits. Before too long some begin to sound like natives.
This is also true of Spanish, I’m sure. They teach basic Spanish and when people move to different areas of Mexico, Latin America, parts of South America or even Spain, they adapt and learn that particular dialect, those sayings, and they too begin to sound like natives.
Why then do we doubt ourselves in French? Let’s teach basic French and if someone goes to Quebec, France, New Brunswick, Louisiana, or to one of several dozen African countries they will also quickly adapt and adopt those sayings, pronunciations, and so on and also begin to sound like natives.
Please keep this simple. Let’s teach basic French.
I’m not saying we abandon our regional French. Let’s be proud of who we are, proud of our distinctive French. We know that those who learn French here and live here will quickly learn our expressions, pronunciations and so on and they, too, will begin to sound like Valley natives.
The same is true of French speakers who move here from away. Some have more difficulty than others adapting to our pronunciation, sayings, speed of speaking, but this is no different from you moving to Rivière-du-Loup, for example.
Some people in central Aroostook say “idear” instead of “idea” but we still understand them. Live there long enough and you’ll be spouting “idears” all over the place. It’s natural.
Let’s keep it simple and universal.
Don Levesque is a Grand Isle native who worked in community journalism for almost 35 years. He was the publisher and editor of the St. John Valley Times for 15 years prior to retiring in 2010. He wrote a weekly newspaper column, called Mon 5¢, in the Valley Times for more than 20 years. He has been inducted into the Maine Journalism Hall of Fame and the Maine Franco-American Hall of Fame.
