jfacoustic

Awesome early Christmas surprise!

Specificity. "The" implies one specific subject. "A" implies that there are multiple instances of the subject, and in many cases such subjects are used to categorize things. "The dog is a golden retriever." --. "The dog" is the specific dog being mentioned, and "a golden retriever" is its category.

"He was the victim" implies he was the only victim. "He was a victim" implies that there were other victims.

What's your first language? All of the european languages that I've studied have this feature.

So... How many times can you fold it?

And if the media would stop writing alarmist articles, there would be far less panic. We're in the golden age of yellow journalism. I've learned, in general, panicking creates more problems than there were to begin with.

Mainly Lafayette for me. Vermillionville has French speakers as well. There are a couple of French meetups in the Baton Rouge area as well.

There are some mild differences in vocabulary and pronunciation (the Cajun 'R' is way more difficult) but they're mutually intelligible.

That's cool. Je parle un peu de francais, et vous? Parisien, pas cadien, malheursement.

Parts of East Baton Rouge Parish are liberal enough to be considered New France, but Livingston Parish doesn't deserve the title -- it's more like 50/50. The line may be determined by Catholic vs Protestant; New France consists of Catholic majority Parishes.

I'm a part of the French revival movement in South Louisiana to help preserve the culture. Most French speakers are 60+ years old, which is sad. Before about 1970, children suffered corporal punishment if they spoke French in school. Blame it on the Anglo-protestants.

There isn't much French spoken in Nouvelle Orleans anymore. Same goes for Baton Rouge. This largely happened after Reconstruction: some of the Yankee leadership who took over were just as xenophobic as Southern slave-owners. I'm not trying to defend this change in leadership having to occur, it was necessary to make sure the South didn't try to keep slavery alive. Unfortunately, nationalist leadership was much like today's conservatives in wanting the only official language of L'etats Unis to be Anglais.

South Louisiana is highly underrated though, especially the city of Baton Rouge. Weed is decriminalized, there's an incredible symphony orchestra, plenty of art museums, and damn good food. But it's much more "American" of a town than New Orleans or Acadiana.

Here's a hilarious article explaining the division between North and South Louisiana:

http://dailycrawfishnews.com/2018/05/07/despite-korea-unific...

Anyway, laissez les bons temps rouler, vous-autres!

That's real time? Awesome!