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Leçon 7

Lesson 7

Sound [œ]

French sound Similar English sound French letters and letter combinations Notes

vowel [œ]

[ɜː] as in the word hurt

eu
œu

The letter combinations eu, œu are pronounced as [œ] before all pronounced consonants except for z.

Now that you know how articulate the French [ɔ], it won’t be too hard for you to learn the [œ] sound. “Take a breath” on an imaginary pair of glasses and freeze with this position of the lips; then, not changing the positions of the lips, pronounce the already known French sound [ɛ] — you will get [œ]! Simply put, [œ] is the rounded version of [ɛ].

Exercise 1. Read first, then listen and repeat.

[tɛ — tœ], [sɛ — sœ], [mɛ — mœ], [kɛ — kœ], [ɛ:r — œ:r], [lɛ:r — lœ:r], [mɛ:r — mœ:r], [tɛ:r — tœ:r].

Exercise 2. Read and memorize:

heure [œ:r] — hour
leur [lœr] — their
beurre [bœ:r] — butter
sœur [sœ:r] — sister
cœur [kœ:r] — heart
fleur [flœ:r] — flower
peur [pœ:r] — fear

elle a des amies [ɛladezami] — she has friends
il a peur [ilapœ:r] — he is afraid (literally: he has fear)
directeur [dirɛktœ:r] — director
il pleure [ilplœ:r] — he cries/is crying
il pleut [ilplœ] — it rains/is raining
a — has

Exercise 3. Read and translate:

Il a quatre filles.

La fleur est très belle.

Nana est malade. Elle a peur. Elle pleure.

Ma sœur travaille. Elle est directeur.

Key

Sound [ə]

French sound Similar English sound French letters and letter combinations Notes

vowel [ə] — is the same as [œ], but is never lengthened

e

One and the same sound is denoted by two symbols because it allows to distinguish the letter combinations eu, œu — [œ] and the letter e — [ə] in the transcription.

The letter е is pronounced as [ə], if it is:

  1. the last letter in a monosyllabic function word (article, preposition etc.).
  2. at the end of a word after two consonant sounds before another word starting in one consonant sound.
  3. at the end of an unstressed syllable in a polysyllabic word.

Exercise 4.

a) Read and memorize some monosyllabic function words where the letter е is pronounced [ə] at the end:

le [lə] — the, masculine definite article in singular form
ce [sə] — this (masculine, singular)
de [də] — of, from, for example: la malle de Pierre — Pierre’s trunk (literary: the trunk of Pierre)

b) Read and recall the meaning of the nouns. Memorize their gender:

le ciel   le détail
ce rêve   ce travail
le livre   le café
le cœur   ce guide
ce verre   le frère de Pierre
le stade   le père de Nana

Exercise 5. Read and translate:

le fils de ma sœur

le travail de ma fille

le cœur de la capitale

Fermez ce livre !

Apportez le café et le verre !

Quittez le stade !

Key

Exercise 6. Read and translate. Do not forget that the letter e is pronounced as [ə] at the end of words after two consonant sounds before another word starting in one consonant sound.

le livre de Pierre [ləlivrədəpjɛ:r]

il a quatre filles [ilakatrəfij]

les vestes sales [levɛstəsal]

Key

Exercise 7. Read and try to memorize new words. Do not forget that the letter e is pronounced as [ə] at the end of an unstressed syllable in a polysyllabic word.

première: pre-mière [prəmjɛ:r] — first (feminine)
petite: pe-tite [pətit] — small, little (fem.)
regarder: re-gar-der [rəgarde] — to watch, to look (at)
mercredi: mer-cre-di [mɛrkrədi] — Wednesday

Exercise 8. Fill in the gaps with the words on the right to get the complete sentences:

1. Répétez leur adresse !
2. La robe de votre est très belle.
3. La est petite: le père, la mère et leur fils.
4. Regardez ! La rivière là.

famille
est
vite
sœur

Clé

Unstable [ə]

In fast colloquial speech, the sound [ə] at the end of an unstressed syllable is often dropped out, as if swallowed. That is why such a sound is called unstable [ə] (French: e instable) But since you only begin to speak French, we recommend you to pronounce it.

Do not pronounce [ə] only if this sound appears between two consonants while these consonants are surrounded by vowels. Let’s look at the example where we mark consonants like this: , and vowels like this: .

samedi m — (on) Saturday:

You see that [ə] is between the consonants [m], [d], and these consonants, in turn, are surrounded by vowels. The sound [ə] is dropped out, and, therefore, the word samedi sounds like:

[samdi]

Exercise 9. Read:

le bracelet [ləbraslɛ] — the bracelet; la fenêtre [lafnɛ:tr] — the window; ma petite [maptit] — my little.

Exercise 10. Translate:

Le bracelet de ma petite sœur est ici.

Arrivez samedi et restez à Paris !

Il a peur de fermer sa fenêtre.

Key