Quebec English
Quebec English encompasses the English dialects of the predominantly French-speaking Canadian province of Quebec. There are few distinctive phonological features and very few restricted lexical features common among English-speaking Quebecers. The native English speakers in Quebec generally align to Standard Canadian English, one of the largest and most relatively homogeneous dialects in North America. This standard English accent is common in Montreal, where the vast majority of Quebec's native English speakers live. English-speaking Montrealers have, however, established ethnic groups that retain certain lexical features: Irish, Jewish, Italian, and Greek communities that all speak discernible varieties of English. Isolated fishing villages on the Basse-Côte-Nord of Quebec speak Newfoundland English, and many Gaspesian English-speakers use Maritime English. Francophone speakers of Quebec also have their own second-language English that incorporates French accent features, vocabulary, etc. Finally, the Kahnawake Mohawks of south shore Montreal and the Cree and Inuit of Northern Quebec speak English with their own distinctive accents, usage, and expressions from their indigenous languages.
Quebec Anglophone English
The following are native-English phenomena unique to Quebec, particularly studied in Montreal English and spoken by the Quebec Anglophone minority in the Montreal area. Before the 1970s, minority-language English had the status of a co-official language in Quebec.Phonology
Anglophone Montreal speaks Standard Canadian English, which has the Canadian Vowel Shift and Canadian raising, with some additional features:- Resistance to the merry–marry merger: unlike the rest of typical North American English, Montreal English tends to maintain the distinction in words like Mary/merry versus marry, perish versus parish, and Erin versus Aaron. The vowels remain, as in traditional East-Coast American English and often British English, and, respectively.
- The vowel is relatively backed.
- The "short a" or vowel is not raised before as elsewhere in Canada, but it is raised somewhat before for ethnic British and Irish Montrealers. Among other ethnicities, such as Jewish Montrealers, there may be no raising of the vowel in any context.
- The following vowel sounds are linguistically-conservative: the sets of vowels represented by the words,, and .
Vocabulary
Quebec English is heavily influenced by English and French. The phrases and words below show the variation of meaning in the Quebec English dialect.Delay: an amount of time given before a deadline. "I was given a delay of 2 weeks before my project was due".
An animator: is not an artist but is someone who meets and entertains children.
A sweet carbonated beverage is commonly referred to as a "pop" in many parts of Canada, but in Montreal, it is a "soda" or "soft drink". A straight translation of the French liqueur douce.
A formation—this word in English would normally mean a routine stance used in a professional formation.. In Quebec a formation is a reference to an educational course or training session.
A pass—this phrase originates from Italian speakers, the word pass is often used in phrases such as "I am going to pass by a friend on the way to the movies". The phrase is comparatively used when you are already completing one action but can squeeze in another action on the way to your destination.
In standard English, the phrase "Your bus will pass in 2 minutes" would mean that you are about to miss your bus or that you have already missed your bus. Alternatively in Montreal the phrase pass can also mean to arrive or stop as a way to show that the action will happen in a relatively short time frame. Example: "Your bus will pass in 2 minutes".
Locations within the city are also commonly described using syntax borrowed from French. If a building is at the corner of St. Catherine and Peel streets in downtown Montreal, it may be described as being "on Saint Catherine, corner Peel." This is parallel to the French expression, "Sainte-Catherine, coin Peel" or "angle Peel".
French-language toponyms
English-speakers commonly use French-language toponyms and official names for local institutions and organizations with no official English names. The names are pronounced as in French, especially in broadcast media. Examples include the Régie du logement, the Collège de Maisonneuve, Québec Solidaire, the Parti québécois, Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, and Trois-Rivières.- English toponyms in place of French : Older generations of English-speaking Montrealers are more likely to informally use traditional English toponyms that vary from official, French-language toponyms. In a notable generational distinction, it is uncommon among younger English-speaking Quebecers. Examples include Pine Avenue, Park Avenue, Mountain Street, Dorchester Blvd., St. James Street – often used without St., Blvd., Ave., Rd., etc. ; Guy and Saint Catherine Streets; Town of Mount Royal, as it was chartered, and the charter has not been revoked; and Pointe Claire.
French loanwords
The use of a limited number of Quebec French terms for everyday place nouns that have English equivalents; all of them are pronounced with English pronunciations or have undergone English clippings or abbreviations and so are regarded as ordinary English terms by Quebecers. At times, some of them tend to be preceded by the in contexts in which they would normally have a/an.Pronunciation of French names
The pronunciation of French-language first and last names that uses mostly-French sounds may be mispronounced by speakers of other languages. For example, the pronounced "r" sound and the silent "d" of "Bouchard" may be both pronounced:. French-speakers and Quebec English-speakers are more likely to vary such pronunciations, depending on the manner in which they adopt an English phonological framework. That includes names like Mario Lemieux, Marie-Claire Blais, Jean Charest, Jean Chrétien, Robert Charlebois, and Céline Dion.Quebec Francophone English
Francophone second-language speakers of English use an interlanguage with varying degrees, ranging from French-accented pronunciation to Quebec Anglophone English pronunciation. High-frequency second-language phenomena by francophones, allophones, and other non-native-speakers occur in the most basic structures of English, both in and outside of Quebec. Commonly called "Frenglish" or "franglais", such phenomena are a product of interlanguage, calques, or mistranslation and thus may not constitute so-called "Quebec English" to the extent that they can be conceived of separately, particularly since such phenomena are similar for Francophone-speakers of English throughout the world.Phonology
Francophones speaking English often pronounce / instead of /, and some also pronounce for the phoneme, and some mispronounce some words, some pronounce a full vowel instead of a schwa, such as for message. Since French-speakers greatly outnumber English-speakers in most regions of Quebec, it is more common to hear French in public. Some Anglophones in overwhelmingly-Francophone areas use some of the features, but their English is remarkably similar to that of other varieties of English in Canada.Other speakers
There is also a pronunciation of the phoneme as /n/ + /ɡ/ or /n/ + /k/, such as by high degrees of ethnic connectivity within, for instance, municipalities, boroughs, or neighbourhoods on Montreal Island, such as Saint-Léonard and Outremont/Côte-des-Neiges/Côte Saint-Luc. Such phenomena occur as well in other diaspora areas such as New York City.Vocabulary and grammar
- The use of French collocations :
- The use of French grammar : Many of these constructions are grammatically correct but only out of context. It is both the calquing and linguistic transfer from French and the betrayed meanings that make these sentences foreign to English.
- False cognates or faux-amis : This practice is quite common, so much so that those who use them abundantly insist that the false cognate is the English term even outside of Quebec. Note that these French words are all pronounced using English sounds and harbour French meanings. While the possibilities are truly endless, this list provides only the most insidious false cognates found in Quebec.