Understanding Core French Grammar (Vernon Series in Language and Linguistics) - Softcover

Betts, Andrew J

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1622730690 ISBN 13: 9781622730698

Publisher: Vernon Press, 2017

Synopsis

This book contains an explanatory treatment of the core areas of difficulty for the English speaking learner of French. It deals with the key issues in tense formation and use and verbal structures and processes such as negation, passives and subjunctives along with a highly exemplified treatment of pronouns and a section dealing with adjectives and other elements of the grammar.

It fills a gap between general text books of French in which grammatical issues are frequently treated piecemeal and scattered throughout the book in between more communicative information on one hand and exhaustive reference grammars aimed at graduate and research students on the other which would be beyond the level of intellectual maturity of most school children and some non-specialist undergraduates.

It has the advantage of treating each grammatical issue in detail but without being too long-winded, explaining the systems and processes which underlie the facts of the language.  The emphasis is on explanation and not merely the listing of facts, enabling the learner to master the system and become an independent user of the language. It could be used highly successfully either as a classroom aid alongside the more usual textbooks which are organized typically around topics and themes in society or for self-study for the committed individual learner of any age. There are extensive exercises and answers for all topics covered.
 

About this title

About the Author

Andrew Betts is currently Registrar at Lancing College, England. He holds a BA in English Language with Medieval Literature from Durham University, a Postgraduate Diploma in Linguistics from UCL, a Postgraduate Diploma in French translation from the Institute of Linguists and a PhD in German Linguistics, German Impersonal Passives from UCL. He lectured part-time in Historical Linguistics and Communications Studies at the Polytechnic of Central London and at Goldsmiths' College London and then became Research Officer at the University of Essex working on the EUROTRA Machine Translation project from 1986 to 1990. Since 1990 he has been teaching French and German to University scholarship and entrance level at Lancing College and was latterly Head of the French Department there.

Edition details

• Publisher: Vernon Press
• Publication date: 2017
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1622730690
• ISBN 13: 9781622730698
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 165