Joual is the common name for the linguistic features of basilectal
Quebec FrenchQuebec French , or less often Québécois French, is the predominant variety of the French language in Canada, in its formal and informal registers...
that are associated with the French-speaking
working classWorking class is a term used in academic sociology and in ordinary conversation to describe, depending on context and speaker, those employed in lower tier jobs as measured by skill, education, and compensation....
in Montreal which has become a symbol of national identity for a large number of artists from that area. Speakers of Quebec French from outside Montreal usually have other names to identify their speech, such as
MagouaMagoua, which may derive from a word in an Algonkian language which means loon, is a particular dialect of basilectal Quebec French spoken in the Trois-Rivières area, between Trois-Rivières and Maskinongé...
in Trois-Rivières and
Chaouin South of Trois-Rivières.
Joual is the common name for the linguistic features of basilectal
Quebec FrenchQuebec French , or less often Québécois French, is the predominant variety of the French language in Canada, in its formal and informal registers...
that are associated with the French-speaking
working classWorking class is a term used in academic sociology and in ordinary conversation to describe, depending on context and speaker, those employed in lower tier jobs as measured by skill, education, and compensation....
in Montreal which has become a symbol of national identity for a large number of artists from that area. Speakers of Quebec French from outside Montreal usually have other names to identify their speech, such as
MagouaMagoua, which may derive from a word in an Algonkian language which means loon, is a particular dialect of basilectal Quebec French spoken in the Trois-Rivières area, between Trois-Rivières and Maskinongé...
in Trois-Rivières and
Chaouin South of Trois-Rivières. Linguists reserve the term Joual for the basilectal variety of Quebec French spoken in Montreal.
Attitudes towards "joual" range from
stigmaSocial stigma is severe social disapproval of personal characteristics or beliefs that are perceived to be against cultural norms. Stigma is often based on ignorance, irrational or unfounded fears, mass hysteria, lack of education, or a lack of information pertaining to a particular person or group...
to exaltation depending on
forms and components of human communication Communication is a process of transferring information from one entity to another. Communication processes are sign-mediated interactions between at least two agents which share a repertoire of signs and semiotic rules. Communication is commonly defined as "the imparting or interchange of...
such as social setting (formal/informal; public/private), channel (spoken vs. written; broadcast) and so on. "Joual" is often understood to have become a
sociolectIn linguistics, a sociolect is a social dialect spoken by a particular group, such as working-class or upper-class speech in the UK...
of the Québécois working class. However, it can no longer be strictly considered as such given two major events in the latter half of the 20th century: upward socio-economic mobility among the Québécois, and a cultural renaissance around Joual connected to the
Quebec sovereignty movementThe Quebec sovereignty movement refers to the history and present status of multiple, multi-lateral political movements aimed at attaining statehood for the Canadian province of Quebec. Supporters of the movement advocate a variety of proposals...
in the Montreal East-End. At the beginning of the 20th century, "joual" was at best a kind of
CreoleA creole language, or simply a creole, is a stable language that originates from a mixture of various languages. The lexicon of a creole usually consists of words clearly borrowed from the parent languages, except for phonetic and semantic shifts...
that also fitted the description of a diatype more than any other categorization. Today, many Québécois who were raised in Quebec during the last century (command of English notwithstanding) can understand and speak at least some "joual".
Origin of the name joual
Although coinage of the name
joual is often attributed to
French CanadianFrench Canadian refers to a nation or ethnic group of French descent that originated in Canada during the period of French colonization beginning in the 17th century. They constitute the main French-speaking population of Canada...
journalist
André LaurendeauAndré Laurendeau was a novelist, playwright, essay writer, political activist, television commentator, journalist, newspaper editor and politician in Quebec, Canada. He was active in Québécois life, in various spheres and capacities, for three decades...
, usage of this term throughout French-speaking Canada predates the 1930s.
The actual word
joual is the representation of how the word
cheval (horse) is pronounced by those who speak "joual".
Cheval is usually pronounced as one syllable, , by all francophones in the Francophonie. With this in mind, in the chain of speech some vowels and consonants undergo changes due to their environment. In the case of , the
Voiceless postalveolar fricativeThe voiceless palato-alveolar fricative or domed postalveolar fricative is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages....
was
voicedVirtual Organization for Innovative Conceptual Engineering Design is a virtual organization that promotes innovation in engineering design. This project is the collaborative work of researchers at five universities across the United States, and is funded by the National Science Foundation...
to become a
Voiced postalveolar fricativeThe voiced palato-alveolar fricative or domed postalveolar fricative is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is <>, and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is Z. An alternative symbol used in some...
, thereby creating . Next, the at the beginning of a syllable in some regional dialects of French or even in very rapid speech in general weakens to become the semi-vowel written "ou". The end result is the word transcribed as
joual.
Most notable or stereotypical linguistic features
| Joual |
French |
English |
| toé |
toi (from classic French pronunciation of toi) |
you or "ya" |
| moé |
moi (from classic French pronunciation of moi) |
me |
| m'a |
je vais |
I will |
| chus |
je suis |
I'm or "Ahm" |
| ché |
je sais |
I know |
| pantoute |
pas du tout (de pas en tout) |
not at all |
| y |
il |
he or "'e" |
| a |
elle |
she |
| ouais or ouin |
oui |
yeah or "yep" |
| icitte |
ici |
here |
| ben |
bien |
well / very / many (context) |
| s'a |
sur la |
on the 'xyz' (feminine) |
| su'l |
sur le |
on the 'xyz' (masculine) |
| enteka |
en tout cas |
in any case / anyways |
| enwaille (donc) |
envoye (donc) |
come on / let's go |
| t'sé |
tu sais |
y'know |
| nuitte |
nuit |
night |
| dé-hors |
dehors |
outside |
| boutte |
bout |
end, tip |
| litte |
lit |
bed |
| Han? |
hein ? |
eh? huh? or what? |
| eille |
hé |
hey you |
| frette |
froid |
cold |
| fa |
fait |
make or do |
| fak |
donc (ça fait que) |
so, therefore |
| mék |
lorsque (from old FrenchOld French was the Romance dialect continuum spoken in territories which span roughly the northern half of modern France and parts of modern Belgium and Switzerland from around 900 to 1300...
« mets que ») |
as soon as |
| dins |
dans les |
in the |
| s'pas |
ce n'est pas |
it's not |
| end'ssour |
en dessous |
under |
| s'assir |
s'asseoir |
to sit down |
| donne-moi z'en |
donne m'en |
gimme some |
Diphthongs are normally present where long vowels would be present in standard French.
Although
moé and
toé are today considered substandard slang pronunciations, these were the pronunciations of
Old FrenchOld French was the Romance dialect continuum spoken in territories which span roughly the northern half of modern France and parts of modern Belgium and Switzerland from around 900 to 1300...
and French used by the kings of France, the aristocracy and the common people in all provinces of Northern France. After the 1789
French RevolutionThe French Revolution was a period of political and social upheaval and radical change in the history of France, during which the French governmental structure, previously an absolute monarchy with feudal privileges for the aristocracy and Catholic clergy, underwent radical change to forms based...
, the standard pronunciation in France changed to that of a stigmatized form in the speech of Paris, but
QuebecQuebec is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking identity and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....
retained the historically "correct" one, having been isolated from the Revolution by the 1760 British Conquest of New France.
Joual shares many features with modern Oïl languages, such as
NormanNorman is a Romance language and one of the Oïl languages. Norman can be classified in the northern Oïl languages with Picard and Walloon. The name Norman-French is sometimes used to describe not only the modern Norman language, but also the administrative languages of Anglo-Norman and Law French...
,
GalloGallo is a regional language of France. Gallo is a Romance language, one of the oïl languages. It is spoken in Brittany and the west of France along the border with Normandy....
,
PicardPicard is a language closely related to French, and as such is one of the larger group of Romance languages. It is spoken in two regions in the far north of France – Nord-Pas-de-Calais and Picardy – and in parts of the Belgian region Wallonia, district of Tournai and a piece of...
, Poitevin and
SaintongeaisSaintongeais is a dialect spoken halfway down the western coast of France in the former provinces of Saintonge, Aunis and Angoumois, all of which have been incorporated into the current départements of Charente and Charente-Maritime as well as in parts of their neighbouring départements of...
though its affinities are greatest with the 17th century koiné of
ParisParis is the capital of France and the country's most populous city. It is situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
. Speakers of these languages of France predominated among settlers to
New FranceNew France was the area colonized by France in North America during a period extending from the exploration of the Saint Lawrence River, by Jacques Cartier in 1534, to the cession of New France to Spain and Britain in 1763...
.
Another outstanding characteristic of Joual is the use of profanity called
sacreThe literal translation of the French verb sacrer is "to consecrate". However, in Quebec it is the proper word for the form of profanity used in Quebec French. The noun form is sacre....
in everyday speech.
English loanwords
There are a number of English
loanwordA loanword is a word borrowed from one language and incorporated into another.-General:By contrast, a calque or loan translation is a related concept, whereby it is the meaning or idiom that is borrowed rather than the lexical item itself.The word loanword is itself a calque of the German...
s in joual although they have been stigmatised since the 1960s:
- Bécosse: From backhouse, used generally in the sense of a bathroom. Unlike most borrowing, this one can sometimes be seen written, usually as shown here.
- Bicycle or bécik: Bicycle
- Bike or bécik: Motorbike
- Blood: Compliment, as in "Té Blood" (You're all right). Rarely used today.
- Braker: or . Verb meaning "to brake".
- Breaker: . Circuit breaker (disjoncteur). Still very often used nowadays.
- Caller: . Verb meaning to phone someone.
- Checker or chequé: Verb meaning to check something (out), as in "Check ben ça" ("Check this out.")
- Coat: Winter jacket (only for the clothing item), never in the sense of "layer".
- Chum: Most often in the sense of boyfriend, often simply as a male friend of a male.
- Dumper: . To throw in the trash, to deposit something, or to break up with someone. --Usually actually spelled and pronounced "domper".
- Enfirouaper: To cheat someone. This comes from "in fur wrap". Centuries ago, fur traders would sell a ballot of fur, actually filled with cardboard in the middle.
- Frencher: . To French-kiss.
- Fucker (or fourrer) le chien: . Can be used to imply that something is difficult to do, or to cause a problem (similar to "to mess up")
- Fuse
- Fuser: To fart.
- Gas: . In the sense of fuel or in the sense of flatulence.
- Lift: Only used in the sense of giving a lift to someone in one's vehicle.
- Mossel: Muscle.
- Peppermint, usually pronounced like pepper men
- Pinotte: Peanuts. Unlike most other borrowings, this one is sometimes seen written, usually spelled like here. (also a street slang for amphetamines)
- les States: . Used when referring to the USA.
- Tinque : Usually . Used in the sense of "container": Tinque à gaz [fuel tank]
- Toaster: Grille-pain
- Tough
- Truck
- Suit: Coat.
- Ski-doo: Snowmobile (name of a Bombardier
Bombardier Recreational Products or BRP is a Canadian company that traces its roots back to the year 1942 when Joseph-Armand Bombardier founded L'Auto-Neige Bombardier Limitée in Valcourt in the Eastern Townships, Quebec. In 2003, Bombardier Inc...
trademark that meant ski-dog).
Some words were also previously thought to be of English origin, although modern research has shown them to be from regional French dialects:
- Pitoune (log, cute girl, loose girl): previously thought to come from "happy town" although the word "pitchoune" exists in dialects from southern France and means "cute girl".
- Poutine
Poutine is a dish consisting of French fries topped with fresh cheese curds, covered with brown gravy and sometimes additional ingredients....
: was thought to come from "pudding", but some have drawn a parallel with the LanguedocianOccitan , known also as Lenga d'òc in Occitan or Langue d'oc in French is a Romance language spoken in Occitania, that is, Southern France, the Occitan Valleys of Italy, Monaco and in the Aran Valley of Spain...
word "poudingo", a stew made of scraps, which was (in MontrealMontreal is the second-largest city in Canada and the largest city in the province of Quebec. Originally called Ville-Marie , the city takes its present name from Mont-Royal, the triple-peaked hill located in the heart of the city, whose name was also initially given to the island on which the...
) the previous use of the term.
See also
- Quebec French
Quebec French , or less often Québécois French, is the predominant variety of the French language in Canada, in its formal and informal registers...
- Magoua
Magoua, which may derive from a word in an Algonkian language which means loon, is a particular dialect of basilectal Quebec French spoken in the Trois-Rivières area, between Trois-Rivières and Maskinongé...
- Chaouin
- Quebec French lexicon
There are various lexical differences between Quebec French and Metropolitan French in France. These are distributed throughout the registers, from slang to formal usage....
- Quebec French profanity
The literal translation of the French verb sacrer is "to consecrate". However, in Quebec it is the proper word for the form of profanity used in Quebec French. The noun form is sacre....
- French language
French is a Romance language globally spoken by about 65 million people as a first language , by 50 million as a second language, and by about another 200 million people as an acquired foreign language, with significant speakers in 57 countries. Most native speakers of the language live in France,...
- English language
English is a West Germanic language that developed in England during the Anglo-Saxon era. As a result of the military, economic, scientific, political, and cultural influence of the British Empire during the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries, and of the United States since the mid 20th century,...
- Chiac
- Quebec
Quebec is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking identity and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....
- Canada
Canada is a country occupying most of northern North America, extending from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
External links