Français de nos régions by Mathieu Avanzi et al. (review)

Reviewed by: Français de nos régionsby Mathieu Avanzi et al. James Law A vanzi, M athieu, C écileB arbet, J ulieG likman, and A ndréT hibault. Français de nos régions, 309. 2023, www.francaisdenosregions.com. Accessed 27 October 2023. Perhaps the most accessible linguistic subfield is dialectology, as non-linguists are often aware of and interested in lexical and phonetic regionalisms. Since 2015, the blog Français de nos régionshas exploited this pop science accessibility to gather valuable data and promote acceptance of dialectal variation in a language notorious for its veneration of prescriptive norms. Ninety-one articles each present the regional distribution of a set of lexical or phonetic variants, for example, "Galette ou Gâteau des Rois," "Pneu ou peneu ?" "Le midi, vous déjeunez ou vous dînez?" Each includes dialect maps showing the distribution of the variable under consideration. These quality visualizations (some with interactive elements) make the blog not only interesting reading but a promising in-class teaching tool. The maps draw from the site's ongoing survey that has collected data from tens of thousands of French speakers to date. This data collection is facilitated by the accompanying mobile app (currently inaccessible for the most recent version of Android, unfortunately), which allows users to submit voice recordings along with their survey responses. The content of the articles strikes an appropriate balance between scientific rigor and accessibility to non-linguists. Those unfamiliar with dialectology or phonetics will easily understand the analyses while being introduced to foundational sociolinguistic concepts such as indexicality and prestige. Readers are encouraged to replace linguistic biases with curiosity, prescriptive norms with descriptive observation. The amount of detail that has been applied to European varieties of French is genuinely impressive, and Canadian varieties are represented quite well in the most recent articles. There are however no articles addressing other varieties of French, even though the site opened data collection for Pacific and North African varieties in 2019 (no surveys of other regions, such as West or Central Africa, have been initiated by the site). For this reason, the intended audience seems to primarily be European and Canadian French speakers curious about the dialectal variation they encounter in their own countries. This is not to say that the site cannot be useful for learners of French as a second language. Learners overly concerned about the "right" way to pronounce things will benefit from the perspective offered here. While some topics might seem frivolous (e.g., the pronunciation or silence of sin ananas), others have significant grammatical consequences (e.g., the regions in which speakers pronounce conditional -aisand future -aiverb endings differently). The [End Page 151]blog therefore offers valuable sociolinguistic context for many points that receive attention in language textbooks. One can hope that as future articles appear, the site will extend beyond its current focus, covering additional French varieties and explaining broader linguistic differences outside of individual lexical items. [End Page 152] James Law Brigham Young University (UT) Copyright © 2024 American Association of Teachers of French

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