Journal of Linguistics and Language Teaching
Volume 1 (2010) Issue 1
pp. 75 - 110
Pronominalization in French:
Bridging the Gap between Research and Practice
Valerie A. Wust (Raleigh, North Carolina, USA)
Abstract
This article examines reasons for which the two complementary French pronominal systems are so difficult to teach and learn. The first part of the article synthesizes the findings of empirical studies on pronoun acquisition by learners of French in a variety of contexts. The second part examines specific learnability issues (e.g., Ellis 2006) that contribute to the developmental difficulties experienced by instructed second language learners in particular. In the final section suggestions for an informed pedagogy of French object pronouns are offered, moving from beginning to advanced levels of development.
Key words: French as a second language, pronouns, input processing, pedagogy
Résumé
L’objectif de cet article est d’examiner les raisons pour lesquelles les deux systèmes pronominaux en français, dites complémentaires, sont tellement difficiles à enseigner et à apprendre. Une synthèse des résultats d’études empiriques sur l’acquisition des pronoms par des apprenants de français permettra d’examiner les problèmes précis d’apprentissage (p. ex., Ellis 2006) auxquels font face les apprenants scolarisés dans diverses langues secondes. Cette analyse permettra de mettre en avant des suggestions pédagogiques relatives aux pronoms objets en français et rangeant des niveaux débutants à avancés.
Mots-clé : Français langue étrangère, didactique, pronoms, problèmes d’apprentissage
1 Introduction
Pre- and in-service French teachers often ask about research on the acquisition of object pronouns by anglophone learners of French. Whether presented with an abridged or detailed account of previous findings, they invariably respond that object pronouns are indeed difficult to learn and teach. Reasons for which object pronouns remain unaffected by instruction, which will be discussed later, are often offered. The next question goes straight to the point, asking if there is a magic formula for teaching pronouns. While seemingly innocent, this question is an important one as it emphasizes a clear disconnect between second language acquisition (SLA) research and pedagogical practice. The crux of the problem is that SLA researchers tend to limit the dissemination of their findings to their academic peers, a practice which excludes the very classroom teachers and learners on whom it has the potential to make the greatest impact. In an effort to bridge the gap between research and practice, this article synthesizes the findings of empirical studies on pronoun acquisition, examines learnability issues that contribute to the developmental difficulties experienced by instructed second language (L2) learners and, finally, proposes classroom applications for overcoming the identified learnability issues when teaching object pronouns.
2 Empirical Research on the Acquisition of the French
Pronominal Systems
Teachers and students of French frequently refer to the complementary preverbal and postverbal pronominal paradigms as problematic. Teachers, however, are often surprised that what they perceive as a problem specific to L2 learners may very well be a developmental issue stemming from the inherent complexity of the French pronominal systems in and of themselves. That is to say that acquiring the French pronominal systems is also challenging for monolingual and bilingual child learners. In fact, acquisition research shows that when it comes to comprehending and producing pronouns, both monolingual and bilingual child learners of French experience similar difficulties to L2 learners. Moreover, these similarities hold true for L2 learners in both natural and instructed settings, and of varying ages. This notion of pronominalization as being problematic, regardless of age or context of acquisition, is supported by commonly documented traits, as is illustrated in Table 1:
| Trait | Example | Monolingual | Bilingual | L2 |
| Delayed productive usage of object pronouns | - Monolingual productive use: end of third year - Bilingual productive use: starting at the beginning of the third year - Child L2 productive use: After 25 months of instruction in a French-language elementary school (White 1996) | e.g., Hamann, Rizzi & Frauen-felder 1996; Jakubowicz, Müller, Kang, Riemer & Rigaut 1996 | e.g, Belletti & Hamann 2004; Hulk 2000; Kaiser 1994 | e.g., Adiv 1984; Trévisse, Perdue & Deulofeu 1991; White 1996 |
| Overgeneralization of subject pronouns to object contexts | -*Je elle parle ‘(I she talk’) | e.g., Jakubowicz 1991; Lima & Bianco 2002 | Not reported. | e.g. Naiman 1974; Selinker Swain & Dumas1975 |
| Errors with respect to the person, number and/or gender of object pronouns | - Person error: Il me frappe. (‘He is hitting me.’); intended meaningIl le frappe.) ‘He it is hitting.)’ - Number error: Donne-le-moi! (‘Give it to me.’); intended meaning Donne-les-moi! (‘Givethem to me.’) - Gender error: Je le veux ‘(I it: want’), co-reference to the feminine singular noun phrase la poupée( ‘the doll’). | e.g., Chillier et al. 2001; Connors & Nuckle 1986; Jakubowicz 1991 | e.g., Meisel 1986 | e.g., Author 2009; Andersen 1986; Bautier-Castaing 1977; Paradis 2004 |
| Use of deleted pronouns, strong pronouns and lexical objects in clitic contexts (i.e., contexts in which the use of a preverbal pronoun is permissible or required) | - Deleted pronoun: La balle, il Øfrappe. (‘The ball, he Ø hits.’). -Strong pronoun: La balle, il frappe ça. (‘The ball, he hitsthat.’) -Lexical object: La balle, il frappela balle. (‘The ball, he hits the ball.’) | e.g, Chillier et al, 2001; Paradis 2004 | e.g., Hulk 2000; Meisel 1986; Müller Hulk & Jakubowicz 1999 | e.g., Wust 2009; Paradis 2004; Schlyter 1997; White 1996 |
Tab. 1. Common Traits in the Acquisition of French Pronominalization
While the characteristics of pronoun acquisition presented in Table 1 have been documented among monolingual, bilingual and L2 learners of French, their frequency and duration in production are variable across the individual learner populations. Even though these developmental issues resolve themselves relatively quickly in the case of child language learners living in the target-language culture, who are able to benefit from abundant input, students learning French in a classroom setting are not so fortunate. For example, L1 learners consistently produce syntactically correct object pronouns from the age of four onwards (e.g. Chillier et al. 2001). In contrast, even advanced-level L2 learners in content-based (immersion) programs who have limited access to form-focused instruction may never show productive object pronoun mastery (e.g. Harley 1986).
To summarize, the acquisition of pronominalization in French is characterized by the following traits, independent of the learner type or of the context of learning:
1) a delayed appearance of object clitics;
2) a tendency to overgeneralize subject pronouns to object contexts;
3) errors with respect to the person, number and/or gender of object pronouns; and
4) the use of null pronouns, tonic (strong) pronouns and lexical objects in pronominalization contexts.
Despite these commonalities in L1/L2 pronoun acquisition, word order is an area in which differences have been documented. Monolingual and bilingual child learners of French rarely make object-placement errors in subject-object-verb (Je le vois (‘I it see’)) or subject-verb-object (Je vois ça (‘I see that’)) contexts, even from early production (Chillier et al. 2001; Jakubowicz & Rigaut 2000). Subject-object-verb word order, however, is difficult for anglophone learners, who typically move through four stages as they acquire preverbal object pronouns:
1) pronoun incorrectly placed after the verb (*J’ai reconnu le);
2) pronoun omitted (*J’ai reconnu Ø);
3) pronoun placed between auxiliary verb and past participle (*J’ai le reconnu); and
4) target-like preverbal placement (Je l’ai reconnu) (Towell & Hawkins, 1994; Herschensohn, 2004).
The same sequence of acquisition has been documented among Swedish-speaking learners (Schlyter 1997; Granfeldt & Schlyter 2004). According to Granfeldt and Schlyter (2004), at least one year of frequent input in French is required to move from stage 1 to stage 4 of the pronoun placement developmental sequence.
When L2 learners use preverbal object pronouns forms (e.g., me, te, le, la, les etc.), relatively low misplacement rates of 13%, 15% and 18% have been reported (in Adiv 1984; Herschensohn 2004; and Naiman 1974, respectively). Despite the fact that L2 learners appear to know which slot a pronoun occupies (preverbal vs. postverbal), their oral and written production is nonetheless characterized by infrequent preverbal object pronoun usage (e.g. Harley 1986; Kenemer 1982; White 1996). In fact, students learning French appear to be highly-skilled at avoiding the use of preverbal object pronouns outside of controlled (‘drill and kill’) exercises, which makes it difficult to examine the acquisition of these forms. Researchers have had some success studying preverbal object pronoun use via play-based interviews (e.g. acting out a scenario with toys and asking ‘What is X doing to Y?’) with young child L2 learners (Paradis 2004, White 1996). In the case of adolescent and adult L2 learners, the research, that has been most revealing of their IL representations of preverbal object pronouns, consisted of comprehension-based tasks, with a written or oral production component designed to elicit these forms (e.g. dictogloss: Wust 2009; elicited imitation: Naiman 1974; picture-matching: Grüter 2005; translation: Wust 2010). To date, however, research has not provided conclusive answers as to whether failure to use preverbal object pronouns is reflective of a competence or a performance problem.
3 Learnability Issues in the Acquisition of Object
Pronominalization by Instructed Learners of French
What, then, is so special about preverbal pronouns that makes these forms so difficult for English speaking students? Why are object pronouns underused in L2 learners’ oral and written production, despite their wide-spread use by native speakers? Using R. Ellis’ (2002, 2006, 2008) criteria that influence the level of difficulty learners have when acquiring knowledge about grammatical features, this study proposes that L2 learner avoidance is at least partially a reflection of issues related to the relative learnability of pronouns. To this end, I will discuss certain criteria that are pertinent to the acquisition of knowledge about French pronouns, namely:
1) linguistic complexity
2) L1/L2 contrast
3) redundancy and
4) saliency.
3.1 Linguistic Complexity
Both the structural and functional complexity of object pronouns contribute to difficulties L2 learners experience in understanding and using them. Object pronouns are structurally complex because a multiplicity of individual forms must be learned in order to master the use of the preverbal and tonic pronominal systems. Table 2 shows the eleven distinct preverbal and tonic pronouns in French:
Person | Preverbal pronouns – direct object (indirect object) | Preverbal pronouns – other | Tonic pronouns | Tonic pronouns - other |
I | me (me) | moi | ||
II | te (te) | toi | ||
III | le/la (lui) | y, en | lui/elle | ça,à ça, là, de ça |
IV | nous (nous) | nous | ||
V | vous (vous) | vous | ||
VI | les (leur) | eux/elles |
Tab. 2. Preverbal and Tonic Pronouns in French.
Essentially, preverbal object pronouns alternate with tonic pronoun forms that occur postverbally, as in Je le vois (‘I itsee’) vs. Je vois ça (‘I see that’). Additional competition comes from lexical objects, as in Je vois le chien (‘I see the dog’) and deleted/null pronouns, as in Je vois ø (‘I see ø’). Choosing between a preverbal object pronoun, a postverbal tonic form, a lexical object or a deleted/null pronoun is a question of discourse-pragmatics, or a question of knowing which type of representation is most appropriate in the context of a given utterance. Constructions requiring (or permitting) object pronominalization in French are referred to as the clitic context (e.g. Cummins & Roberge 2005; Pirvulescu 2006). In clitic contexts, the referent can be definite, the topic of (or active in) the discussion and contained in the immediately preceding discourse, as in (1):
(1) A: Tu veux la poupée? (‘Do you want the doll?’)
B: Oui, je lacl veux. (‘Yes, I itcl want.’)
Alternatively, the referent may be a salient entity from the extralinguistic context, which has not been mentioned in the preceding discourse, as in (2):
(2) (A gentleman hands a newspaper to his wife and says:)
Est-ce que tu lecl veux? (‘Do you itcl want?’)
From a prescriptive standpoint, the preferred form in the clitic context is a pronominal clitic which immediately precedes the conjugated verb, as in Examples (1) and (2). From a descriptive standpoint, however, researchers rely on the production of adult native speakers of French to serve as a litmus test of appropriate use against which to measure the production of child and L2 learners of French (e.g. Wust 2009; Paradis 2004; Pirvulescu & Roberge 2004). Adult native speakers of French do indeed use preverbal and postverbal object pronouns, as well as lexical objects and deleted/null objects in clitic contexts. Their form choice, however, appears to be stylistically or pragmatically motivated in an effort to achieve the desired effect. This is particularly true in their use of deleted/null pronouns, as in (3), which is cited in Pirvulescu 2006:
(3) A: Maîtrisez vos interviews? C’est capital, les interviews. ‘Do you master your
interviews? Interviews are very important.’
B: Je ø maîtrise. ‘I master ø.’
Given that classroom L2 learners of French do not have a grammar comparable to that of an educated adult native speaker and most certainly possess significantly less evolved language resources, it seems unlikely that they would be able to manipulate object representation for stylistic effect.
In language production, the learner is faced not only with the task of identifying contexts in which the use of a pronoun is felicitous, but also in choosing the appropriate pronoun (as a function of gender, number, person and case of the antecedent). This, in and of itself, is a complex task as a single mistake on any of these features ultimately results in the selection of the wrong pronoun. Inappropriate case selection is unique to L2 learners, for whom knowing which French prepositions co-occur with specific verbs, even high frequency ones like penser (to think), parler (to talk) and boire (to drink), can be problematic (e.g. Wust 2009; Kenemer 1982).
Another important form related issue that has been virtually ignored by researchers and is undertreated in pedagogical materials is animacy (e.g., human = +animate; non-human = -animate). Most preverbal object pronoun forms provide cues to their animacy by their very nature. For example, the direct object pronouns me, te, nous, vous and the indirect object pronouns me, te, lui, nous, vous, leur can refer solely to human antecedents. In the same vein, the indirect object pronouns y, en and ‘other’ pronouns (locative y, partitive en) can – systematically - only refer to -animates. A difficulty could be anticipated with third person direct object pronoun forms (e.g. le, la and les) which, as a function of the co-referenced antecedent, can be either +animate or –animate as:
(4) Elle le voit.
The third person singular direct object pronoun le translates either as ‘She it sees’ or ‘She him’ sees, depending on the animacy of the masculine antecedent.
For fluent language users, linking pronouns to their appropriate antecedents in contextualized discourse can be a relatively straightforward linguistic task given that there are rules governing the use of pronominal reference (e.g. the presence of an activated linguistic antecedent in near discourse or of an extralinguistic antecedent in the physical context of the exchange). These language users rely upon the functional features of any given pronoun (gender, number, case and animacy) in identifying its antecedent. However, Wust (2009) found that intermediate-level adult L2 learners of French failed to use animacy cues to resolve pronominal reference on a dictogloss task. In this study, 110 students worked in dyads to reconstruct a written version of a short, dense French text containing multiple preverbal object pronouns after listening to the text three times. The results showed a general lack of sensitivity to the –animacy feature. In their written texts, students frequently replaced the object pronouns y (locative ‘there’ or indirect ‘about/of it’) and en (partitive ‘some’ or indirect ‘about/of it’) with +animate forms referring to the two human protagonists. Students appeared to have expected the two protagonists to remain activated as referents and focused their attention on any cues that were consistent with this pattern, instead of processing y and en. This substitution pattern was particularly striking in conjunction with verbs like parler (‘to speak’) and penser (‘to think’), which take both animate and inanimate complements. These results showed that when students do not use object pronoun animacy cues as an indicator for resolving pronominal reference, they may be playing a comprehension guessing game. For this reason, animacy is an important component of form-focussed instruction on French pronouns.
In addition to the structural learnability issues described above, object pronouns are also functionally complex. French object pronouns have multiple meanings in that they carry out the dual function of pronoun and definite article (e.g., les, laand les are both definite articles and preverbal object pronouns, as in Je vois le biscuit et je lecl prends (‘I see thecookie and I itcl take’)). The two French pronominal systems, in particular, are comprised of numerous pronouns that arehomophonous with other grammatical forms[1].
The multiple linguistic functions carried out by many French object pronouns have clear consequences for their relative learnability. N. Ellis (2002) argues that for transparent form-meaning mappings (i.e., one form = one meaning), minimal exposure should be sufficient for acquisition. For nontransparent mappings, however, acquisition is more difficult and possibly may never occur. Empirical research from L2 French offers support for this assertion. In a study conducted by Wust (2010), using an orally-delivered French-English translation task, 152 adult L2 learners of French mistranslated the feminine lui parler (‘to talk to her’), using masculine forms or other forms on which gender is not marked: ‘to them’, ‘to him/her’ and ‘to him’. Correct translation of lui as ‘to her’ increased in accordance with the students’ proficiency level. Further data supporting the problematic nature of linguistic forms with multiple meanings in the acquisition of L2 French came from students who translated feminine lui as ‘to him/her’, showing that they clearly recognized multiple meanings of the French lui. Wust (2010) suggested that the ambiguity of pronominal forms in standard French that have multiple form/meaning mappings negatively impacts upon adult L2 learners’ understanding of their meaning, even in well-contextualized sentences.
3.2 L1 / L2 Contrast
Object pronominalization in English is rather different from French. English direct and indirect object pronouns (e.g. (to) me, (to) you) appear in postverbal position, just like their lexical (nominal) counterparts as in, ‘I am eating the sandwich’ vs. ‘I am eating it’. The canonical word order in English is subject-verb-object whereas French also allows for subject-object-verb sentences. For example, French object pronouns appear preverbally in affirmative statements (e.g. Elle luiparle. (‘She to him talks.)’ and in negative imperatives (e.g. Ne lui parle pas! (‘Don’t talk to him’)). These same object pronoun forms, however, are also placed postverbally in affirmative imperative utterances (e.g. Parle-lui-en! (‘Talk to himabout it’)). As a result of word order variations, L2 learners are already getting conflicting input as to target-like object pronoun placement when exposed to weak French pronouns only.
To further complicate matters, the French tonic pronouns (moi, toi, lui/elle, nous, vous, eux/elles) behave like lexical noun phrases and can appear postverbally in object of the preposition constructions. There is clearly congruence between the English system and the French strong object pronoun system while English pronouns contrast with those in the French preverbal object system. Given the crosslinguistic differences in direct object pronouns, transfer from English to French has been predicted and documented by researchers (e.g. Herschensohn, 2004; Selinker, Swain & Dumas 1975; White 1996; Zobl 1980).
3.3 Redundancy / Co-Reference
Grammatical features are frequently analyzed for the amount of meaning they contribute to a message, with individual classifications of ‘more meaningful’, ‘less meaningful’ or ‘non-meaningful’ (VanPatten 1996 and 2004). A meaningful grammatical form contains essential information, such as the preterit form of the verb aller (‘to go’) in the following example: Il est allé en France. (‘He went to France.’) Since no temporal marker (i.e. hier (‘yesterday’), en 2000 (‘in 2000’), il y a un an (‘a year ago’), etc.) is used, the only way to situate the utterance in the past is through verb morphology. In contrast, redundant or co-referential forms, such as object pronouns, contribute little or no meaning to an utterance. This is the case in the following sentences: Nathalie adore le chocolat. Elle en mange tous les jours. (‘Nathalie loves chocolate. She eats some every day.’) The listener infers co-reference between the lexical objectchocolat in the first sentence and the partitive clitic en in the second sentence, rendering en redundant. Precisely because they replicate the meaning of their antecedent, object pronouns are classified as less meaningful from a comprehension standpoint. In fact, input processing research shows that anglophone learners of Romance languages, in particular, tend to bypass object pronoun forms in listening comprehension activities (VanPatten, 2004).
3.4 Saliency
Saliency is determined by how easy a grammatical feature is to perceive in the input. Learners tend to notice perceptually salient features, making them available for intake (Schmidt 1995). The phonological form and preverbal placement of object pronouns contribute to their reduced saliency. Object pronouns are acoustically brief, meaning that they have little phonetic substance due to their monosyllabicity (e.g. me, le, les). They become even more phonetically reduced when they undergo changes, such as eliding with a verb (e.g. te parler vs. t’aimer). Research has shown that elided forms like these are problematic for L2 learners, who will often process such structures as unanalyzed chunks (Harley 1986; Harley & Swain 1984). The perceptual saliency of preverbal object pronouns is further decreased by their sentence-medial placement, which is considered to be the least salient position in sentence processing (VanPatten 2004). Given the reduced saliency of object pronouns, it is not surprising that L2 learners are often inaccurate in comprehending their meaning (e.g. Wust 2009, Wust 2010; Erlam 2003).
3.5 Can Learnability Issues Be Overcome?
Learnability issues (namely linguistic complexity, L1/L2 contrast, redundancy, and saliency) certainly contribute to difficulties that L1 English learners experience in trying to master the French pronominal systems. As highlighted in the earlier discussion, acquisition of the preverbal pronominal system is a developmental question, regardless of age or learning context. The good news for teachers and learners is that, precisely because of these learnability issues, pronouns are ideal targets for instruction. In the final section of this article, expectations for learners’ ability to comprehend and produce object pronouns as a function of proficiency level, along with guidelines for form-focussed instructional activities, are discussed.
4 Informed Pedagogical Practice
An informed pedagogy of the dual pronominal systems in French derives from a thorough understanding of the learning difficulties that instructed L2 learners face. Teachers must also consider under what conditions (e.g., planned vs. unplanned language use), in which contexts (e.g. pedagogically-derived vs. real-world) and with which type of focus (form accuracy vs. meaning conveyance) students should be able to comprehend and produce pronouns. Here are some suggestions for teaching pronominalization to instructed L2 learners of French that respond to the learnability issues identified in this article. Unless specifically indicated as being reprinted from another source, the following pedagogical techniques and examples have been created by the author of the present article.
4.1 Beginners
From beginning through advanced levels it is essential to integrate instruction about the characteristics of transitive and intransitive verbs and, in the case of transitive verbs, the potential type(s) of complements with which they are used. For example, presenting learners with apporter (‘to bring’) tells little about this particular verb and its use. Learners’ attention should be drawn to the multiple uses through examples: apporter quelque chose (‘to bring something’) with the optional indirect complement à quelqu’un (‘to someone’) or location quelque part (‘somewhere’). The importance of knowing this information increases when there are mismatches in the types of complement(s) associated with a particular verb in French and English. In French for example, écouter (‘to listen’) is used with a direct complement quelqu’un (‘someone’) or quelque chose (‘something’). In English, ‘to listen’ is used with an indirect complement, such as ‘to someone’ or ‘to something’. Interlanguage forms like *J’écoute à la musique (‘I listen to the music’) or *Je leur écoute (‘I listen to them’) are common in learner production. Whether L2 learners cultivate information about verbs and their potential complements through explicit information provided by the teacher and/or pedagogical materials or implicitly from the input to which they are exposed, this information is critical for accurate pronoun use.
For learners in their first semester of study, pronoun instruction focuses on comprehension rather than production. This is first done by giving students opportunities to understand meaning through an inductive approach. As an example, the direct object pronouns le, la and les are introduced, using articles of clothing. The names of all of the items are reviewed in conjunction with their definite articles (e.g. la jupe (‘the skirt’)). Clothing articles are distributed to students who are asked to put them on, and the teacher makes statements or asks questions about the specific articles of clothing in conjunction with a variety of verb forms, first using the complete lexical items and then preverbal object pronouns (e.g.Qui porte la jupe verte? Tiens! C’est Véro qui la porte. (‘Who is wearing the green skirt? Oh look! It is Veronica who is wearing it.’)). Examples produced by the teacher are provided in written form, with graphic enhancement (color and underlining). Students use the input to generate explicit rules for third person direct object pronoun use.
The graphically enhanced input on the board can be further used to train students to listen for object pronouns preverbally to facilitate auditory detection (i.e. to make sure that students are listening for object pronouns before verbs and not after them). One strategy that works well with first-semester learners is that the teacher marks Xs to denote points in sentences in which there is typically intervening material in French (i.e. object pronouns, negation etc.). It is here suggested to begin with a simple subject-verb sentence from your input, such as Elle porte (‘She is wearing.’) From there, mark an X before the verb (Elle X porte) and model examples of sentences with object pronouns on the board:
· Le pantalon bleu? Luc le porte.
· La jupe verte? Véro la porte.
· Les souliers jaunes? Anne les porte.
With more advanced learners, the same technique can be applied to compound tenses in which the X precedes the auxiliary verb (Elle X a porté), which subsequently results in Elle ’a porté(e) or Elle les a porté(e)s. This technique serves to raise students’ awareness of the placement of specific linguistic forms in sentences and prepares the way for both comprehension and production tasks at more advanced levels.
After the phase of highlighting the preverbal placement of object pronouns, it is necessary to sensitize students to their phonological forms. This can be done via aural tasks requiring students to differentiate between le, la and les, as in Example A from the introductory French textbook A vous! (Anover & Antes 2008: 355). The following activities are based upon the principles of Bill VanPatten’s Processing Instruction (2004) whereby learners participate in comprehension-based activities which require them to concurrently pay attention to both form and meaning in order to arrive at the correct response. In Activity A, learners listen to sentences containing direct object pronouns and check off the appropriate noun to which the pronoun refers. In order to choose the correct answer, the learner is required to pay attention to the acoustic features of the pronoun. In this preliminary activity, there is minimal processing for meaning:
Example A
Listening Comprehension Activity: Direct Object Pronouns
Écoutez les phrases suivantes et indiquez le nom que le complément d’objet direct représente.
MODÈLE : Vous entendez: Je les lis souvent.
Vous indiquez: ___ le journal √ les magazines
1. ___ le film ___ les films
2. ___ le chocolat ___ les oranges
3. ___ le riz ___ la soupe
4. ___ les actualités ___ le téléfilm
5. ___ le fruit ___ les fruits
6. ___ la pomme ___ les pommes
Teacher’s script:
1.Tu l’as beaucoup aimé? 2. Il le préfère. 3. Nous la détestons! 4. Elle les regardait souvent. 5. Ils les ont achetés. 6. Vous l’avez mangée.
Another comprehension-based activity featuring the direct object pronouns le, la, les is presented in Example B. In this case, the students are presented with a series of simple, orally delivered sentences and asked to choose which of a set of paired pictures best conveys the meaning.
Example B
Listening Comprehension Activity: Direct Object Pronouns
Julie LaPierre is grocery shopping, but she is very indecisive. In each case, she has to decide between two items. Listen carefully to the pronoun in each of the following sentences and check off (√) the item she ultimately chooses (A or B).
1. ___ A ___B
2. ___ A ___B
3. ___ A ___B
4. ___ A ___B
5. ___ A ___B
6. ___ A ___B
Teacher’s script and instructions:
Before doing the activity, review the images to make sure that students know the gender and number of each item (using C’est un/e orCe sont des). Then read each sentence aloud once and hold up a picture of item A and item B. After each sentence, ask for an answer. Do not wait until the end to review answers. Students do not repeat or otherwise produce the structure.
1. Elle la prend. (A = la pomme; B = le citron)
2. Elle les met dans son panier. (A = le poisson; B = les crevettes)
3. Elle le sent. (A = la viande; B = le pain).
4. Elle les touche. (A = les fleurs; B = la rose).
5. Elle la sélectionne. (A = le gâteau au chocolat; B = la tarte aux pommes).
6. Elle le choisit. (A = le poivron vert; B = la poire).
In addition to taking part in comprehension tasks that require them to discriminate between object pronouns as a function of their acoustic features, students also benefit from written comprehension activities which force them to pay attention to the graphic representations of the gender and/or number of object pronouns (le vs. la vs. les or lui vs. leur). From both the L2 object pronoun acquisition research and anecdotal experience in the classroom, we know that these two functional features pose processing problems, particularly for anglophone learners. Example C is taken from the second Canadian edition of the introductory French textbook Chez nous: Branché sur le monde francophone(Valdman, Pons, Scullen, Mueller & Bouffard 2010: 234). In the context of a game of hide-and-seek, the learners’ task is to determine whether Cécile is looking for (or finds) her sister, her brother or her cats. Students demonstrate comprehension of the direct object pronoun in each sentence by checking off the person or animal to which it refers.
Example C
Written Comprehension Activity: Direct Object Pronouns
On joue à cache-cache. Cécile joue à cache-cache (hide-and-seek) avec sa sœur, son frère et ses chats. Pour chaque phrase, décidez si elle cherche (ou trouve) sa sœur, son frère ou ses chats.
Je… | sa sœur | son frère | ses chats | |
MODÈLE | …la cherche dans la cour. | √ | ||
1. …les cherche dans le séjour. | ||||
2. …le cherche dans la cuisine. | ||||
3. …la cherche sur la terrasse. | ||||
4. …le cherche partout (everywhere). | ||||
5. …les trouve sur le balcon. | ||||
6. …la trouve dans sa chambre. | ||||
7. …le cherche encore. |
Another specific pronoun learnability issue presented earlier in this article was the difficulty L2 learners of French have in understanding grammatical forms with multiple form-meaning mappings. One form that has been shown to be especially problematic is the animate third-person singular direct object pronoun lui, which can be co-referenced with both masculine and feminine antecedents (Wust 2010). In its other functions, however, lui only refers to animate masculine forms. As a result, L2 learners may interpret lui as being exclusively masculine. In order to help them move away from this tendency, it is imperative to give learners opportunities to make a connection between lui and animate feminine nouns. In Example D (Valdman, Pons, Scullen, Mueller & Bouffard, 2010: 241), learners must identify whether Romain is talking to his girlfriend (lui = à sa copine) or to his parents (leur = à ses parents) by checking off the person or persons to whom the indirect object pronoun in each statement refers.
Example D
Written Comprehension Activity: Indirect Object Pronouns
A qui est-ce qu’on parle? Romain parle de ses habitudes. Pour chaque phrase, décidez s’il parle à sa copine ou à ses parents.
Normalement, je… | à sa copine | à ses parents | |
MODÈLE | …lui téléphone une ou deux fois par jour. | √ | |
1. …leur téléphone la fin de semaine. | |||
2. …lui parle quand je suis frustré. | |||
3. …lui parle quand je me lève le matin. | |||
4. …lui téléphone quand j’ai des problèmes. | |||
5. …leur parle quand j’ai besoin d’argent. | |||
6. …lui téléphone quand je veux sortir. | |||
7. …leur parle quand c’est bientôt les vacances. |
To make learning more meaningful for students, comprehension-based activities can also be personalized. Example E illustrates an activity in which students are shown a picture of a personally meaningful item and asked to check off the written sentences which apply to it.
Example E
Written Comprehension Activity: Direct Object Pronouns
The typical university student cannot live without his/her cell phone. Read each sentence about your phone and indicate with a check mark (√) if it is applicable.
Mon portable….
___ Je l’adore. ___ Je le déteste. ___ Je l’utilise tous les jours. ___ Je l’apporte en classe. ___ Je le recharge souvent. ___ Je ne l’oublie jamais dans ma chambre. ___ Je l’utilise pour envoyer des SMS à mes amis.
It is important to note that in the five activities that have been presented thus far, students are not required to produce direct object pronouns, but rather to show comprehension of their meanings. The exercises are structured to help students to attend to form and meaning. Examples A-D are referential activities, because they have a right or wrong answer. This allows the teacher to determine if students are processing preverbal object pronoun forms correctly and creates teachable moments in which feedback on responses can be given and explanations/clarifications provided, as needed. This is an important opportunity to draw attention to the functional features (gender, number) that allow third-person object pronouns to be distinguished from one another[2]. Example E is an affective activity, for which there is no right or wrong answer. Affective activities should follow referential activities in the instructional sequence as a means of reinforcing correct form-meaning connections.
Given the importance of chunks or prefabricated sequences (i.e. words that co-occur such as coup de foudre (‘love at first sight’) or multiword strings, such as Je m’appelle (‘My name is’) and J’ai X ans (‘I am X years old’)) as building blocks in early L2 acquisition, beginning-level learners also benefit from an exposure to high frequency object pronoun collocations. Teachers should focus first on pronominal collocations that are important in practical classroom discourse like imperatives, as in Allons-y! (‘Let’s go!’) or questions, as in Qui en a besoin? (‘Who needs it?’) or statements, as inJe ne vous comprends pas (‘I don’t understand you’). Students need not be able to deconstruct these types of utterances into individual forms to which meaning is assigned. Rather, the goal is general comprehension, and perhaps even the use of specific chunks in their own speech.
4.2 Second- and Third-Semester Learners
Beginning level learners in a first semester language course typically receive instruction on only a small subset of the preverbal object pronoun system in French: partitive en, locative y, direct object pronouns, such as le, la and les and the third-person indirect object pronouns lui and leur. During their second and third semesters of language study, students are usually exposed to additional indirect object pronouns (both animates and inanimates), as well as the postverbal tonic pronoun system[3]. A variety of techniques are useful for focusing students’ attention on these forms in the input. As an example, new object pronoun forms can be presented in contextualized discourse, with typographical enhancement. Students identify the person, place or thing which each pronoun refers to in the text (e.g. link the pronouns to their antecedents), hypothesize the meanings of these newly introduced pronouns and even debate the choice between antecedents with similar functional features. Example F contains an illustrative example of this technique taken fromPanorama 2 (Girardet & Cridlig, 1996: 14).
Example F
Chapter Opener: Revendications
Lundi 10h, au commissariat de police.
Le commissaire: Séverine, je m’en vais. Si le directeur régional appelle, dites-lui que je suis à la préfecture… Tendez, je vous laisse ces fiches.
Séverine: Qu’est-ce que j’en fais ?
Le commissaire: Eh bien, vous les entrez dans l’ordinateur.
Séverine: Monsieur le commissaire, je peux vous dire un mot ?
Le commissaire: Oui, mais dites-le vite. Je suis pressé.
Séverine: Écoutez, commissaire. Je travaille dans votre service depuis six mois. Et depuis six mois vous ne m’avez pas donné un seul travaille intéressant. Les enquêtes, ce sont les autres qui les font. Quand il y a une urgence, ce sont les autres qui y vont. Et comme par hasard, les autres, ce sont toujours les hommes. J’en ai assez ! Je n’ai pas fait l’école de police pour être secrétaire.
Le commissaire: Dites-moi! C’est une révolte ça !
Séverine: Prenez-le comme vous voulez !
Le commissaire: Bon. Vous voulez une enquête ? Vous allez en avoir une. Occupez-vous de cette affaire de vandalisme au musée. Le dossier est sur mon bureau. Lisez-le! On en parle à mon retour.
Relevez les pronoms du dialogue. Trouvez les mots qu’ils remplacent. Classez-les.
Exemple: « dites-lui » → lui remplace « le directeur régional ».
Construction: dire au directeur général.
As learners are brought to notice object pronouns and understand their meanings in contextualized discourse, as in Example F, it is important that teachers address two major learnability issues:
l the redundancy/co-reference of pronouns (they replace a linguistic or extralinguistic antecedent) and
l the importance of markings (gender, number, person, animacy, case) in determining their appropriate antecedents.
When recycling object pronouns at the second- and third-semester level, teachers should give students multiple opportunities to experience the progression of pronoun use from the sentence level to the discourse level. One activity that works well for bringing learners to understand why it is important for them to use preverbal pronouns is the redundant story task (see Example G). The teacher constructs a story which contains a few nouns and/or noun phrases that are continuously repeated throughout. It is particularly effective when read aloud. Students laugh at how silly the story sounds, which makes the take-home message all the more effective. In the culminating phase of the task, students rewrite the text, using pronouns where appropriate. Students might try to replace every noun or noun phrase in the story with a pronoun, regardless of whether it is newly introduced or currently activated. This provides further opportunities to focus on contexts in which pronouns are permissible, or what has been referred to earlier in this article as the clitic context.
Example G
Redundant Story Task: Direct and Indirect Object Pronouns
Rewrite the following story of a chance encounter, avoiding the repetition of the names of people, places and things. Use le, la, l’, les, yor en.
Guy a rencontré Julie un soir au Festival de jazz à Montréal. Guy a parlé à Julie. Guy a invité Julie à prendre une bière. Guy a laissé son numéro de téléphone à Julie. Le lendemain, Julie a appelé Guy et c’est ainsi que débute leur relation. Julie a présenté Guy à ses amis. Guy a apprécié les amis de Julie. Il a parlé aux amis de Julie de sa carrière en tant que musicien. C’est une carrière fascinante. La meilleure amie de Julie s’intéresse beaucoup à la musique. Elle possède de nombreux disques compacts de jazz. Elle a prêté deux disques compacts à Guy.
Exemple: « Guy a rencontré Julie. Il lui a parlé… »
Materials for the second and third semester, to the detriment of comprehension skills, often focus on production skills. The assumption is that when learners are brought to produce a structure correctly and repeatedly, they will learn it. While students may still benefit from remedial practice involving pronoun replacement and cloze texts for homework, class time is better spent on communicative activities whose successful completion requires a real time exchange of information, such as the mystery boxes game[4]. Each student is given an object in a box, with its gender and number written on top. Group members then ask questions, using direct object pronouns in an attempt to discover the identity of the object: Est-ce qu’on le fume? Est-ce qu’on le mange? Est-ce qu’on le porte? (‘Do you smoke it? eat it? wear it?’).
Another contextualized, real-world activity that offers a natural context for direct object pronoun use is a conversation between a person who is relocating and the movers, as is shown in Example H.
Example H
Moving Day
You have hired a moving company to help you relocate to your dream home. When the movers arrive, you are there to oversee the delivery. Using the floor plan you have prepared of your dream home and the list of furniture/boxes provided below, tell the movers (your partner/s) where to put each item. Use command forms (l’impératif) and the direct object pronouns le, la, les to refer to the objects you mention. Suggested verbs: mettre, placer, laisser, déposer, apporter, installer.
Meubles et boîtes | |
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Modèle
Déménageur: Où est-ce qu’on met le grand lit?
Vous: Mettez-le au deuxième étage, dans la grande chambre à coucher.
Advanced-beginner and early-intermediate learners also enjoy People Find/Mixer activities where they circulate around the classroom, asking specific questions designed to elicit a variety of object pronoun forms from the respondent, who then signs the task sheet. While second-semester students might be guided to ask questions, using preference verbs with food items (Est-ce que tu aimes le chocolat? Est-ce que tu détestes le poisson? (‘Do you like chocolate? Do you hate fish ?’)), third-semester students might focus on verbs which take more than one complement (Prêtes-tu tes vêtements à ton/ta camarade de chambre? Offres-tu des cadeaux à ton/ta petit/e-ami/e? (‘Do you lend your clothes to your room-mate? Do you give presents to your boyfriend/girlfriend?’)). Debriefing this type of mixer activity allows for additional questions and summary statements that enlarge the range of object pronouns being understood and produced. A sample People Find/Mixer activity, targeting the use of both direct and indirect object pronouns, is provided in Example I.
Example I
Direct and Indirect Object Pronoun Mixer Activity
Circulate around the classroom to find classmates who respond affirmatively to each question. In cases where you receive a positive response, have them sign your task sheet. Don’t forget to use direct and indirect object pronouns in your responses!
MODÈLE: quelqu’un qui prête ses vêtements à sa/son camarade de chambre
Est-ce que tu prêtes tes vêtements à ta/ton camarade de chambre?
Oui, je les lui prête OU Non, je ne les lui prête pas.
quelqu’un qui écrit des SMS à son/sa petit/e ami/e | quelqu’un qui dit toujours bonjour au professeur | quelqu’un qui parle souvent à ses frères et sœurs | quelqu’un qui demande souvent de l’argent à ses parents |
quelqu’un qui offre des cadeaux à ses amis | quelqu’un qui emprunte souvent des vêtements à ses amis | quelqu’un qui achète des boissons pour ses camarades de classe | quelqu’un qui emprunte de l’argent à ses amis |
4.3 The Fourth Semester and Beyond
In advanced language classes that prepare students for the study of content via the target language, the latter are capable of participating in metalinguistic talk and carrying out structural analysis. As the instructor moves to pronoun usage in larger discursive contexts, it is useful to focus on the complementary nature of the preverbal and postverbal pronoun systems. An effective technique is to contrast the two systems, highlighting where there are overlaps in meaning (or two different ways of communicating the same idea). To demonstrate alternate realizations of sentences using preverbal and postverbal pronominals, it is suggested to provide examples like: En France…j’y vais (preverbal locative) vs. …je vais là (strong locative) (‘To France…I go there’) or Le Coca, elle l’aime (preverbal third person object pronoun) vs. Le Coca, elle aime ça (strong third person object pronoun) (‘Coca Cola, she likes it’). This is an opportunity to help students develop their sociolinguistic competence by making them aware of the frequent use of postverbal object pronouns in the informal oral register of certain varieties of French, such as those spoken in Canada (e.g. Auger 1995; Nadasdi 1995). Instructors, however, may choose to encourage students to use preverbal object pronouns in formal academic contexts.
While examining the two pronominal systems, students are guided to make observations about specific pronoun features that make them difficult to learn. Within and across the two pronominal systems, students identify cases in which a single form has multiple meanings (e.g. lui as third person singular direct object pronoun and as third person singular masculine tonic pronoun). Students then classify the functions of multiple occurrences of a single form, as in Je lui parle(‘I to him/to her talk’) (preverbal object pronoun) vs. Je pars sans lui (‘I leave without him’) (postverbal tonic pronoun). To focus students’ attention on the animacy cues which are present in object pronoun forms in and of themselves (e.g. lui = +animate; y = -animate), competition-style games requiring students to separate animate forms from inanimate ones work well.
In the fourth semester and beyond, discussion of object pronouns focusing on their form requires the use of metalanguage. In doing so, it is best to avoid overly technical linguistic jargon, while at the same time describing object pronouns and their features both accurately and reliably. The goal is for students to appropriate this metalanguage so they can also apply it during more analytical exercises. One effective tool for helping advanced-level students to analyze the use of French object pronouns is through mapping activities using authentic French language texts, as in Example J. In mapping activities, students are prompted to:
1) highlight each individual verb;
2) note and explain the presence or absence of a preposition linked to a verb;
3) identify the transitivity of the verb (e.g. transitive vs. intransitive) and
4) underline preverbal direct and indirect objects, using an arrow to indirect their linguistic antecedents or an annotation in the case of extralinguistic antecedents.
Example J
Object Pronoun Mapping Exercise
Albert Camus, L’Étranger
Il m’a regardé de ses yeux clairs. Puis il m’a serré la main qu’il a gardée si longtemps que je ne savais trop comment la retirer. Il a consulté un dossier et m’a dit : « Mme Meursault est entrée ici il y a trois ans. Vous étiez son seul soutien. » J’ai cru qu’il mereprochait quelque chose et j’ai commancé à lui expliquer. Mais il m’a interrompu : « Vous n’avez pas à vous justifier, mon cher enfant. J’ai lu le dossier de votre mère. Vous ne pouviez subvenir à ses besoins. Il lui fallait une garde. Vos salaires sont modestes. Et tout compte fait, elle était plus heureuse ici. » J’ai dit : « Oui, monsieur le Directeur.» Il a ajouté : « Vous savez, elle avait des amis, des gens de son âge. Elle pouvait partager avec eux des intérêts qui sont d’un autre temps. Vous êtes jeune et elle devait s’ennuyer avec vous. »
Example: « Il m’a regardé… »
Preposition : none
Verb transitivity : transitive → regarder quelqu’un; regarder quelque chose
Antecedent : (direct object complement) m’ → Meursault
Example: « …la main qu’il a gardée si longtemps que je ne savais trop comment la retirer. »
Preposition : none
Verb transivity : transitive → garder quelque chose ; garder quelqu’un
Antecedent : (direct object complement) la → la main
Example: « J’ai cru qu’il me reprochait quelque chose»
Preposition : à (not present in text, but indicated by choice of preverbal pronoun)
Verb transivity : transitive → reprocher quelque chose à quelqu’un
Antecedent : (indirect object complement) me → Meursault
Teachers can further promote the advanced learner’s language awareness via a research tool which doubles as a pedagogical task: dictogloss. Dictogloss is an activity which is particularly effective for making learners aware of key form-meaning relationships (Wajnryb 1990). Teachers create a short, dense text containing the target forms, in this case object pronouns, to which students’ attention is to be drawn (see Example K). The text is read at a normal rate of speech two or more times, while the students take notes on key content and structural elements. Students then work in small groups or pairs to reconstruct the text, which causes them to reflect upon and negotiate their form choices. This results in a sort of collaborative meta-talk in which students may share representations of what was heard or even of their understanding of the workings of the French pronominal systems. Afterwards, and in a whole-class setting, the student versions of the text are compared to the original, and the teacher is able to draw students’ attention to object pronoun choices in context and to help students correct any erroneous hypotheses.
Example K
Object Pronoun Dictogloss
Teacher’s script
To be read by the teacher to the students two or more times at a normal rate of speech.
Part I
1 Bruno et Marianne se sont vus pour la première fois dans un bar.
2 Bruno y allait tous les jours après le travail pour prendre une bière.
3 En effet, il en buvait une quand elle a attiré son attention.
4 Marianne était tellement belle qu’il a eu un coup de foudre pour elle.
5 Il a eu envie de le lui dire et de l’embrasser sur-le-champ.
6 Mais Bruno n’avait pas le courage de lui parler ce soir-là.
Part II
7 Cependant, en sortant du bar, Marianne lui a fait au revoir de la main.
8 Bruno en était ravi.
9 Une fois rentré à la maison, Bruno n’arrêtait pas d’y penser et n’a pas pu s’empêcher d’en parler.
10 Et Marianne, pour sa part, a appelé ses meilleures amies pour leur raconter son histoire et leur demander ce qu’ellesen pensaient.
11 Est-ce que cet homme du bar pourrait l’aimer ?
5 Conclusion
Teaching and learning the French preverbal and postverbal pronominal systems in an instructed L2 setting will always be difficult because of their inherent complexity. The degree of difficulty, however, can be lessened when concentrated efforts are made to bridge the gap between SLA research and pedagogical practice as a means of improving student learning outcomes. Empirical studies on the acquisition of pronominalization by L2 learners of French have identified common patterns which teachers should be aware of, including frequent errors related to the functional features of pronouns (person, number, gender, animacy), underdeveloped knowledge of verb transitivity, and overuse of lexical objects, postverbal pronouns and deleted/null pronouns in object pronominalization contexts. Based on an understanding of the nature of pronoun acquisition and an analysis of the learnability issues which L2 learners of French are faced with(linguistic complexity, L1/L2 contrast, redundancy, saliency), some suggestions have been offered for an informed pedagogy of pronominalization. An argument is made for a focus on comprehension in the beginning levels of study, followed by opportunities for time-pressured, unplanned production activities at intermediate levels. It is suggested that advanced-level learners need opportunities to decode complex texts through mapping exercises and to take part in cognitively demanding tasks, like the dictogloss, which require them to process and recreate the meaning of object pronouns. As the relatively small body of research on the acquisition of pronominalization in L2 French continues to grow, so will our understanding of the input and instructional activities that facilitate the mastery of this inherently complex system.
Acknowledgements
This article is dedicated to the most amazing teacher I have ever known: my deceased mentor, friend and colleague Diane Fagin Adler. I would also like to thank Mark Darhower, Geneviève Maheux-Pelletier, Leila Ranta, Yvonne Rollins, Jessica Sturm and members of the editorial board of JLLT who commented on earlier drafts of this article.
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Author:
Assistant Professor of French Applied Linguistics
Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures
Campus Box 8106
North Carolina State University
Raleigh, NC,
27695-8106,
United States
E-mail: vawust@gw.ncsu.edu
[1] There are many object pronoun forms in French that have multiple functions/meanings, as is the case for me, te, le, la, nous, vous, lui, leur,elle(s), y and en. For example, vous is a second person plural subject, a second person singular formal subject, a direct object, the indirect object and a tonic, post-posed pronoun.
[2] For a detailed explanation of how L2 learners can be brought to link form and meaning through Processing Instruction, as well as excellent models of instructional materials in French that can be used in communicative language teaching classrooms, see the VanPatten (2004) volume.
[3] The information about the division of the French object pronoun across first-, second- and third-semester courses is based upon a sampling of ten introductory textbooks from Houghton Mifflin, McGraw Hill and Pearson Prentice Hall.
[4] As is the case for first-semester courses, newly introduced pronoun forms in the subsequent semesters should be treated, using a standard pedagogical sequence: input processing, receptive activities, mechanical and meaningful production in controlled contexts, and, finally,communicative practice.