I just installed one yesterday called Stanza. (Evidently, it’s been purchased by Am*zon. Maybe they want to kill it? So it doesn’t compete with the K*dle?) Anyway, Stanza lets you put your own ebooks on your iRead device. There’s also a cross-platform “epub” formatter called Sigil. The “epub” format evidently is a fairly universal way to set up your ebooks to be read on portable devices or even on your desktop/laptop computer.

Writers (unlike filmmakers, painters, and musicians) seem to have a hang up when it comes to publishing their own work. Vanity press has a bad name. Why? If you look at the history of writers writing, you’ll see that it was really only in the twentieth century that this prejudice developed. I wonder with ebooks and these hand held readers if writers are going to ditch the middle people, the editors, publishers, marketers, booksellers, agents, etc.

It’s an interesting time to be a writer. There’s a practical question here too. Without all the “middle people” how is the Reader going to find the Author? Or maybe the real questions is how will the Author find the Reader?

Put the dishes on the table, please.

We going to start learning some useful structures so that we can start saying things that we want with the vocabulary we will learn in this section. Imagine it’s evening and it’s time for supper, le souper (recall that le dîner, dinner, is the noon-time meal in Cajun French). My son might say, Papa, j’ai faim, Papa, I’m hungry. If I’m already making dinner I might ask my son to put the dishes on the table using the sentence above.

Note that s’il vous plaît is invariant and is used in most situations. The informal s’il te plaît is rarely used.

Here are some other useful constructions:

• Allons souper. - Let’s eat supper.
• Quoi tu veux? - What do you want?
• Je veux - I want
• Donne-moi donc - Give me (polite)
• Lave tes mains. - Wash your hands.
• Le souper est paré? - Is supper ready?
• J’ai besoin de - I need
• Prends le. - Take it.
• Quoi t’aimerais - What would you like?
• Tu veux une goûtée. - Do you want a taste?
• Tu t’as passé de ton souper? - Did you do without your supper?

Here is the Quizlet set for the above phrases.

Technorati Tags: cajun, francais, language, louisiana

To understand the answer you’d have to understand the dynamics of both places. In Canada there is an understanding of language as a political question. And in Louisiana, language is a cultural question.

À comprendre le réponse il faut comprendre les dynamiques de chaque place tout les deux. Au Canada il y a un compréhension de langue comme une question politique. Et en Louisiane, le langue est une question culturelle. [ma traduction]

Quoi tu pense?

Technorati Tags: cajun, culture, louisiana, canada, puppy

Un autre sens d’empêtrer est dans l’expression être empêtré, “to be overwhelmed” en anglais. E.g. Je suis empêtré dans mon ouvrage. Icitte, c’est “empêtré dans” pas “par ou avec” comme en anglais. J’connais pas si c’est l’usage typique ou si “empêtré par” ou “empêtré avec” sont ça va aussi. T’connais?

Quoi t’vas faire cette fin de semaine, hein? Peut-être j’vas brasser de la bière avec mon ami Joe. On veut à faire un Flanders Rouge, comme Rodenbach. J’aime un tas les bières de cette genre. Ils sont à mon goût. Et toi?

Un ‘tit brin: T’vois que le mot pour “weekend” en français louisianais est la phrase “la fin de semaine.” Bien sûr, un parleur de Cajin va savoir le mot “weekend” aussi. Mais, j’pense en France, les françaises va dire “ce weekend” pas “cette fin de semaine.” Non? Ou ils use tout les deux?

Technorati Tags: cajun, french, language, louisiana, francais

Essaye à trouver des exemples des ces verbes dans les phrases. Et demain, je te donne quoi je trouve.

Technorati Tags: cajun, french, language, louisiana

Un autres projet est à faire un logiciel pour le traduction des mots français louisianais en anglais. J’ai quelque chose que traduit presque 700 verbes de français louisianais en anglais. J’vas combiner ce traducteur avec le Verbulator tôt ou tard.

Si t’veux une vue d’avance du Verbulator, il est sur mon site d’Internet.

Comme toujours, vos corrections à mon français louisianais sont les bienvenus.

Technorati Tags: cajun, french, louisiana, language

Also, since the beginning of the year, I’ve been archiving my Cajun French studies on my web site. The point of this exercise is that if I’m going to be researching this and developing study materials for myself and my son, I might as well share the fruits of my labor with the world (just in case anyone is interested). Ça fait… I was driving home in the rain yesterday and I wondered why I wasn’t putting all these examples of how Cajun French is used into a TiddlyWiki. The advantage of doing this is that the TiddlyWiki has a built-in search engine so any term in the Wiki can be called up easily. Also, each lexia (or “tiddler”) can be tagged, so that groups of lexia with the same tags can be displayed with a click of the mouse. Also, a student could download the entire Wiki and take it with them, use it, annotate it, all without having to rely on an Internet connection (after the original download, bien sûr).

Ça fait I created a Louisiana French TiddlyWiki. Obviously, it’s not anywhere close to being done, but as a long term project, it seems like something potentially useful. Tu d’accord?

Technorati Tags: cajun, french

Quoi faire on veut apprendre le français Louisianais? Je pense que il y a un tas des réponses à cette question. Comme la France dans le dix-neuvieme siècle, la Louisiane moderne est devenu une idée avec laquelle le monde a tombé en amour. C’est un fait que la Louisiane, dans l’esprit populaire, elle est devenu associé à “le Cajin.” Ce Cajin est une idée que incarne le joie de vivre, bon cuisine, le relâchement, etc. Asteur le monde a besoin de ces choses. Et ils vont être après chercher ces choses dans la Louisiane. Peut-être le monde va être après vouloir à apprendre le français louisianais aussi? Je souhaite!

Give me some cheese (please).

When we first started learning French at home, one of our goals was to be able to pass our time at the dinner table speaking French, so the first words we tried to learn where those related to the kitchen, dining room, and the process of having dinner together.

My son loves cheese. Today’s phrase gives one way of asking for some cheese. Notice the addition of the word donc, which usually means therefore, so, then, or hence, makes this demand more polite.

If the cheese is already on the table add you can’t reach it, you could say, Passe-moi donc le fromage and someone would hand you the cheese plate.

To build our vocabulary, I asked my son to come up with a set of words he wanted to know how to say in French. This is what he came up with:

• une tomate, a tomato
• une fourchette, a fork
• un couteau, a knife
• un plat, a platter
• une cuiller, a spoon
• une assiette, a plate
• le fromage, the cheese
• du poulet, some chicken
• manger, to eat
• le manger, the food
• le sel, the salt
• le poivre, the pepper

I put together a Quizlet set so he could practice these words.