TIPA. Travaux interdisciplinaires sur la parole et le langage (Dec 2014)
L’expression de la proéminence à valeur emphatique en anglais par des locuteurs francophones non débutants
Abstract
In English, emphasis may be put on various elements of the sentence, one of them being the validation of the predicative relation (PR), leading to what is known as the "emphatic form" in an affirmative context. The speaker expresses the fact that he validates positively the PR whereas its negative validation is implied in the context. The emphatic form synthesizes several values: it considers the possibility of a negative validation, it takes up this possibility and denies it, and it has a concluding effect. In spoken English, the nuclear stress therefore falls on the auxiliary, which is prominent both morphologically and phonologically (e.g. Herment, 2011 for emphatic do). Co-verbal gestures (McNeill, 1992) with metaphoric and rhythmic values may also be used. According to Bordet (2014), the emphatic form in English is frequent with 25% of the occurrences that imply intensification. In French, when emphasis bears on the validation of the PR, the speaker has recourse to lexical devices such as mais si, si, bel et bien, en effet… (Huart, 2010: 56). For French learners of English, the English emphatic form may therefore be a difficulty. This article addresses several questions: to what extent is the emphatic form in spoken English actually problematic for French learners? How do they express emphasis on the validation of the PR and how do they take into account all the values synthesized in the form?Our corpus is based on a selection of data gathered for an extensive research project on the specific difficulties of French learners in spoken English. Native speakers of English interviewed French learners about a film extract taken from Because I Said So (Michael Lehmann, 2007) they had just seen in English. The interviews were filmed and transcribed (ICOR conventions). The interviews followed a pattern established beforehand, ensuring the presence of different steps in the interview about the film extract: factual report, interpretation and personal opinion. We selected the passages in the interviews when the French speakers deal with the following dialogue about Millie’s dress: (mother) "Millie, you look as if you’re asking for it".(Millie) "I am asking for it". In this extract, the mother’s expression of a hypothesis (you look as if) implies the possibility of the negative validation: you are not asking for it. Millie takes up this possibility, denies it (= not - not ask for it) and puts an end to the dialogue on the topic of her dress. These values are grouped in the emphatic form with the nuclear stress falling on am.The analysis of the corpus shows that when French speakers mention this passage, they have recourse to various speech types, using direct speech in an attempt to reproduce the locutory value (Austin, 1962) of the speech they heard (e.g. she says I’m asking for it), or indirect speech associated to the illocutory value (e.g. so and actually the girl replied that she’s actually waiting for it or wanting for it), as well as personal comments on the extract, about the mother-daughter reationship or about the daughter’s intention with her dress. Such comments imply the perlocutory value of speech (e.g. but the daughter said er she wanted it to be (.) provocative).The analysis also looks at the linguistic resources of English used by French speakers with a specific interest for the values synthetized in the emphatic form which they actually express or not.As far as phonology is concerned, when the French speakers quote the passage in direct speech, the nuclear stress does not fall on the auxiliary but on the subject or on the predicate, therefore expressing irrelevant contrasts. Pauses are sometimes used before and after an adverb (e.g. really in: I really ask it); in that case, all the values of the emphatic form are there except the taking up of the negative validation of the PR.Co-verbal gestures may be used, with one speaker very aptly making a metaphoric gesture when mentioning the mother’s speech, taking up the same gesture and giving it more amplitude when mentioning the daughter’s speech.Some elements of the English morphology such as BE + -ING and BE GOING TO are also used, mostly expressing the concluding effect of the emphatic form.The speakers also use specific structures of the English syntax which allow focusing on some elements of the sentence: it-cleft sentences, ordinary wh-cleft sentences, reversed wh-cleft sentences, and demonstrative wh-clefts. In spoken language, demonstrative wh-clefts are the most frequent among cleft sentences (Biber et al., 1999); we notice that the French speakers conform to the tendency. Their use of these structures is relevant in terms of focus but not in terms of phonology since the nuclear stress does not fall on the focus as it should (Khalifa, 1999). Furthermore, the taking up of the negative validation of the PR is not clearly expressed by these structures.Lexical items are also used, such as because, actually, clearly, really, seduce and yes. They can be analysed as ways the speakers have found to express mostly the concluding effect of the emphatic form.In order to compare the French speakers’ data to what native speakers of English would say in the same context, a few native speakers of the English language were interviewed. The English speakers use adverbs such as intentionally and actually (e.g. with the: buttons undone on the dress it makes her look like she’s asking for it and she actually said that she was). Several English speakers describe the dress by saying that it is too revealing, without mentioning the actual dialogue between Millie and her mother. It appears that the English speakers favour the interpretative approach to the extract.The discussion bears on several aspects of our results: the way French speakers express the emphatic form is often incomplete and this may be due to cultural and / or linguistic reasons. According to Béal (2010), who adopts a cultural point of view, French speakers will express emotions in a more direct way compared to English speakers. It could be the case when the latter use the word revealing whereas the former use the words provocative and seduce / seducing. In their training in English, such cultural differences may not be taught specifically to French learners. Also, the level of French speakers in English may have a limitative effect, being insufficient for them to adopt the interpretative approach native speakers of English use. According to Sperber & Wilson (1989), interpreting implies a high cognitive cost. In their self-evaluation of their level in English, most French participants in the research project consider themselves as being non-autonomous in English. When learners have to concentrate on the way they speak, it may lead them to prefer quoting in a more or less faithful way instead of analyzing what they have heard. Our conclusion is that it is necessary to give French learners the opportunity to compare multimodal aspects of English spoken data by English and French speakers, giving specific attention to the validation of the PR as it is central in linguistic activity.
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