Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2008 September 4

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September 4

French translation

In music, what would the word dehors mean, as in trés en dehors or fort et trés en dehors? 220.244.104.23 (talk) 10:11, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

A google search for "en dehors" suggests it means "emphasised". Fribbler (talk) 11:19, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Our article Musical terminology says en dehors means "prominently" (Musical terminology#E). DuncanHill (talk) 12:39, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

I believe it means "outside". In a musical context, a line or part marked "en dehors" should stand outside of the the other parts, which should be inside, or in the background. Thomprod (talk) 02:22, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

learning french

does anyone know a good teach yourself course/book or anything for learning french from scratch that is based on learning and understanding the grammatical structure of the language as opposed to the seemingly popular system of just rote learning? thank you. Philc 0780 20:20, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure if I know what you mean by "rote learning," but the best French program I've ever encountered is French in Action. It's all in French—no English comparisons, but it's clear and thorough and rarely gets frustrating. The workbook of the program discusses grammar in detail, and there is no rote memorization because each lessons expands off of the last and there is enough repetition that you memorize words naturally..--El aprendelenguas (talk) 00:28, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Rote learning is often used where I come from to describe learning from repetition as opposed to learning from understanding. Sorry, I didn't realise it may not be in common circulation. 92.21.120.224 (talk) 10:23, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

People learn in different ways, and often misjudge the difficulty of learning another language, especially after adolescence. One issue is what you mean by "learn a language." Learn to read it? Learn to write it? Understand it when spoken? Speak it? And for each of those: in what context?

So I'll respond to the question with a question: what do you want to learn French for? Do you want to read literature? Understand French films without subtitles? Feel comfortable on vacation? Get a job in a francophone environment?

You might take a look at online offerings like Frenchpod or Coffee Break French. If you already speak some French but don't have much chance to practice, my original research suggests you can get a lot more practice in an immersive online environment like Second Life; I've used more French there (both in text and in voice chat) during the past eight months than in the previous eight years. --- OtherDave (talk) 11:46, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

I have been to France a few times and I love it, though I speak next to no French and have relied heavily on friends who are bilingual, I prefer it there to the UK and would probably want to be able to stay there for extended periods of time, so really the full whack, learn to read and speak the language in both formal and informal contexts. Philc 0780 13:29, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

You might seek out textbooks used in courses to teach French reading comprehension to graduate students. In such courses, the students are mainly interested in learning just enough of the language to be able to read French-language technical articles in their own academic area -- and the corresponding textbooks make little pretense to teaching conversational skills, and have a higher proportion of grammatical analysis, and a much lower proportion of drill than texts aimed at ordinary undergrauate-level language classes... AnonMoos (talk) 13:06, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Any college text should be helpful in this regard.` The Jade Knight (talk) 09:21, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia actually has significant grammatical information available in its articles, there is also a Wikibook on French, and Wikiversity also has a French Department. The Jade Knight (talk) 09:21, 8 September 2008 (UTC)