Silas, a 10th-grader in Madison, Wisconsin, is working on his own conlang, or constructed language. He wonders how and why the French uvular R sound, as in the French word rouge, came about, as opposed to the rolled Spanish R in carro. As Trask’s Historical Linguistics (Bookshop|Amazon) notes, this sound continues to spread throughout eight European languages in what’s called a phonemic shift. Western European languages have a coronal R formed along the alveolar ridge at the front of the mouth. Around the 17th or 18th century, this uvular R developed as a characteristic of the speech of the elite, and as such, was increasingly imitated. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “The French R in Rouge vs. The English R in Red vs. The Spanish R in Carro”
Hello, you have A Way with Words.
Hi, Martha. Hi, Grant.
Hi, who’s this?
My name is Silas Grant.
I’m a high schooler in Madison, Wisconsin.
A high schooler? What year?
Going into sophomore.
Going into sophomore. All right. Good years. Good years of your life.
But what’s on your mind today?
So I was wondering, how did the French R sound, like the trill all the way back in your throat, how did that develop? Because most languages descended from Latin use like a trill towards the front of your mouth, like in Spanish, carro, right? Yeah. Okay. So you got to tell me why is a sophomore in high school wondering about this? So I was reading Tolkien a while back and I kept turning to the parts of where he embedded his own languages and stuff. I was writing that stuff down because I thought it was cool. And then I started making my own languages.
And so I’m making a language right now, and I’m trying to incorporate this sound, but I’d be interested to know, like, the history and how it gets into a language.
Oh, Silas, how cool. You are a kindred spirit.
Yeah, absolutely. And Tolkien has so many people who’ve inspired them to invent their own languages. He’s got those wonderful appendices in the back where he talks about the languages that he’s invented for his people, the elves and the orcs and so forth.
And so you want to include this French R sound in the language you’re making.
Yeah.
It’s interesting that you should pick this sound out, this uvular R. And the uvula is that little dangly thing in the back of the throat. Because there’s a really well-known book, Trask’s Historical Linguistics. It notes that this particular sound has spread, continues to spread, throughout the European languages. It says that three centuries ago, the Western European languages has what’s known as some kind of coronal R. That’s more like the R that happens on the very front of the mouth, where the R happens on the uvular ridge. That’s that hard bony ridge behind your teeth.
But today, that uvular R that happens in the back of the mouth, with that little dangly bit, happens in eight languages, in Basque, in French, in Italian, German, Dutch, Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish.
And so this is a really interesting language phenomenon, isn’t it?
Yeah.
It’s a phonemic shift is what they call it. And so it’s not just French that has had this happen. Part of what happens here is that we have this concept known as prestige languages. And French typically has been a prestige language where something happens in French and other people who admire the French and their culture, particularly for their fashion and their food and their literature, might imitate the high class and the well-known and the important people in France and borrow their French words or learn to speak French and high-class French. And perhaps they’ve borrowed some of the sounds from the language as well.
And that’s exactly how this particular R came to be in French itself. In the 9th and the 14th centuries in Old French, they didn’t have this R sound. It sounded more like the modern R that we have in Italian and Spanish today, which was like the Latin R back in the day. But around the 17th or 18th century in Paris, we got this R sound that is like, I’m exaggerating it here so it’s a little easier to hear on the radio and in the podcast. And this new uvular R was a characteristic of posh speech. And the other thing they had was this, to make that R, they didn’t open their mouth very much. They tried to avoid opening their mouth wide, and that really forms that R whole.
Anyway, suffice to say, by the end of the 18th century, that R sound, that new R sound, the one that we know today, was firmly established in Parisian French, and then spread to lots of other parts of the French-speaking world. But it by no means is standard now. That R isn’t standard even in France. And other parts of the French-speaking world don’t necessarily have that R. And even in places in Paris and France where they use that R, there are other R’s still in use. It just depends on the word and where it appears in the sentence and what’s being said and by whom and to whom.
That’s very interesting.
Yeah.
It’s very interesting. And Canadian French, of course, their R’s are different. They’re a little more like they used to be than the modern French are.
Silas, do you have a name for your conlang?
You know, not yet. I don’t know. I kind of settle on the name later on.
Can you say hello to us in your new language?
Sure.
Alakwa.
Alakwa.
Alakwa.
I like that.
Nice.
And what about goodbye?
Goodbye.
Ami.
Ami.
And yes and no?
Ma and Naya.
And Ma and Naya.
Okay.
Very good.
Alakwa.
Ma and Naya.
Those are all very good. I like the sound of that language. I think you’re going places with this guy. Send us a little email with an update to your language, all right?
Yeah.
All right.
Thank you so much.
Take care.
Good luck in school.
Bye-bye.
Bye-bye, Silas.
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