There are many words that are very similar in English and French. Thanks to William the Conqueror (or as the French call him: Guillaume le Conquerant) and his invasion of England nearly a millennia ago, French and English share tens of thousands of similar words. Some are identical in spelling and meaning (e.g., impossible); some have the same meaning and slightly different spelling (e.g., adresse /address) and some have slightly different spelling and a partially different meaning (e.g., porc/pork). These words are known as cognates. It is estimated that 29% of the words in modern English are from French (source Wikipedia). But, it also works in the other direction: a lot of French terms come from English. Another 29% of the English words come from Latin including many scientific words. Many are TRUE friends, or almost: they have the same or similar meaning, and are written in the same way. This dictionary contains these "True Friends" or cognates. But beware, there are many words which look similar in French and English, but they're FALSE Friends, because they do not have the same meaning. Finally, know that if the spelling is similar, pronunciation is almost always totally different ! This book contains 8990 words which are true cognates in French and English. Many of the words are also annotated. It also contains a list of false cognates, words which look the same, but have entirely different meanings.
The authors present first, an examination of the dynamics of first and second language acquisition from a developmental, psychological and semantic perspective, secondly, an analytical framework built from relevant literature within which the role of cognates in second language acquisition is assessed, and finally, a cognate instructional unit with which cognates as an efficient approach to French second language vocabulary acquisition by Anglophones is empirically tested.
From the language mastery era to today's focus on communicative proficiency, language teachers and learners in America and Europe have disregarded the importance of the Cognate Lexis and Syntax that English, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, and French, among other languages, share. What are Cognates? From the Latin cognatus (co- 'together' + gnatus, pp. of gnasci, 'to be born'), Cognates are words descended from a common ancestor; that is, words having the same linguistic family or derivation (English), la misma familia lingüística o derivación (Spanish), a mesma família lingüística ou derivação (Portuguese), la stessa famiglia linguistica o derivazione (Italian), la même famille linguistique ou dérivation (French). In other words, cognates are those foreign terms we easily understand because they resemble their equivalents in our mother tongues. As a result, we will find for example, that a thousand English -tion nouns have their exact equivalents as Spanish -ción, Portuguese -ção, Italian -zione, and French -tion. This large number of 'similar words and sounds', contrary to what some language learners and teachers think, is not limited to advantageous coincidences; and contrary to what some linguists think, it is not limited to Latin and Greek derivations present in scientific terms. The statistical data provided by our extensive research support the assertion that cognates represent at least 25% of the unique English written words met by Romance language speakers, and vice versa. One of the several outcomes of this research project is The Dictionary of Cognates (DOC), which features 20,000 English-Spanish cognate words + 25,000 frequent cognate collocations. All these words were selected manually from several renowned dictionaries keeping to a minimum infrequent technical, scientific or historical cognate terms. The development of both works, The Dictionary of Cognates and our introduction book on Cognate Linguistics, was based on practicality and frequency rather than on exhaustiveness. Although these books have been introduced in their English - Spanish versions, The Cognate Project as a whole also refers to and applies to Portuguese, Italian, French, Catalan and Romanian. Samples of Portuguese, Italian and French cognates are available at cognates.org, the project’s support site. While reading this book, you will realize that cognate words, collocations and phrases are not regarded as new or foreign by your mind given that they are immediately and effortlessly recognized and comprehended. Actually, our mind does not seem to read foreign words but their cognates in our mother tongue. Even before starting learning a new cognate language, or better said, even without the need of being engaged in the process of learning a new cognate language, the Immediate and Effortless Recognition of Cognates (IERC) is a pleasurable experience. In summary, we can claim that the Cognate Lexis and Syntax shared by certain related languages have not been clearly identified as one of the most important foundations for foreign language acquisition. The teaching and learning approaches and methods available may have overestimated for long the time and effort needed by cognate speakers to learn cognate languages. Additionally, cognates are innate motivators; there is nothing better than comprehensible language to encourage learning and language production. We have disregarded for too long this fantastic linguistic asset of ours; but that is over now. Welcome to the Cognate World.
Benny Lewis, who speaks over ten languages—all self-taught—runs the largest language-learning blog in the world, Fluent In 3 Months. Lewis is a full-time "language hacker," someone who devotes all of his time to finding better, faster, and more efficient ways to learn languages. Fluent in 3 Months: How Anyone at Any Age Can Learn to Speak Any Language from Anywhere in the World is a new blueprint for fast language learning. Lewis argues that you don't need a great memory or "the language gene" to learn a language quickly, and debunks a number of long-held beliefs, such as adults not being as good of language learners as children.
This practical, inexpensive volume features over 1,000 common French words, each accompanied by a French sentence demonstrating proper usage. Also included are definitions arranged by such categories as family, food, numbers, and more. (These words are not repeated in the alphabetical section.) A page of Vocabulary Tips explains how to easily recognize hundreds of French/English cognates.
This book is concerned primarily with the evidence for the validity of a genetic unit, Amerind, embracing the vast majority of New World languages. The only languages excluded are those belonging to the Na-Dene and Eskimo- Aleut families. It examines the now widely held view that Haida, the most distant language genetically, is not to be included in Na-Dene. It confined itself to Sapir's data, although the evidence could have been buttressed considerably by the use of more recent materials. What survives is a body of evidence superior to that which could be adduced under similar restrictions for the affinity of Albanian, Celtic, and Armenian, all three universally recognized as valid members of the Indo-European family of languages. A considerable number of historical hypotheses emerge from the present and the forthcoming volumes. Of these, the most fundamental bears on the question of the peopling of the Americas. If the results presented in this volume and in the companion volume on Eurasiatic are valid, the classification of the world's languages based on genetic criteria undergoes considerable simplification.
There is a buried treasure chest of Spanish vocabulary. In this treasure chest there are thousands of Spanish words that you already know. This treasure chest is the collection of Spanish English cognates. Spanish English cognates are words in both languages that share the same root and are are very similar. This book covers 3,465 pairs of the most frequently used Spanish English cognates. These cognates are organized into 40 lists for easy study. A handy index (by Spanish words) is provided at the end of the book.
