French language--Phonology

The French language is characterized by its many ambiguities.
These peculiarities of the language constitute pitfalls for the
learner who does not know how to disambiguate them. These ambiguities
illustrate the need for teaching orthography along with the
discrimination of sounds.
Many examples are given. The causes of ambiguities, such
as ignorance of phonetic contrasts, intonation, correct capitalization,
or linking and juncture are discussed, as are problems arising
from homophony, the mute e, and the "faux amis."
For the past fifteen years programming of foreign languages,
mostly based on B. F. Skinner's theory of learning, endorsed by
many linguists, emphasized varieties of the audio-lingual method. A
survey of methods, materials, experiments, and opinions of authorities
in the field of linguistics indicates that this method, although
often employing the most modern electronic material has failed to
produce meaningful results.
All of the above factors support the evidence for the need of
teaching orthography along with the study of sound, and the necessity
of continued research in theory and methods of teaching, particularly
in French.

This thesis explores differences of opinion in the
descriptions of French phonology. Chapter I pursues
reasons for existing differences of opinion, Chapter II
investigates the articulation and phonemic status of
sounds, while Chapter III presents a critical examination
of currently used pronunciation textbooks.
It was found that linguists tend to disagree about
both the articulation as well as the phonemic classification
of certain consonants, vowels, and semi-vowels. Because of
this, two distinct styles had to be described for standard
French, an informal style with a minimum number of phonemic
contrasts, and a formal style with a maximum number of phonemic
contrasts. Only by describing these two styles could
some of the widely divergent viewpoints be reconciled.