Circumflex in French and Sean Alvarez: Difference between pages

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{{MMAstatsbox
{{French language}}
|name = Sean Alvarez
The [[circumflex]] (^) is one of the five [[diacritic]]s used in the [[French language]]. It may be used atop the vowels [[a]], [[e]], [[i]], [[o]], and [[u]].
|height = {{height|ft=6|in=0}}
|weight = {{convert|235|lb|kg st|abbr=on|lk=on}}
|nationality = USA
|birthdate = {{birth date and age|mf=yes|1971|07|14}}
|fightteam = Renzo Gracie Jiu-Jitsu
|fightstyle = [[Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu]]
|hometown =
|wins = 4
|losses = 3
|ko = 0
|submissions = 3
|}}


In French, the circumflex has three primary functions:


'''Sean Alvarez''' (born July 14, 1971) born in USA is a [[mixed martial arts]] fighter. He competes in the [[Heavyweight (MMA)|Heavyweight]] division. He lost his last fight at UFC 42 - Sudden Impact against Wesley Correira on April 25, 2003.
*It affects the pronunciation of ''a'', ''e'', and ''o''; although used on ''i'' and ''u'' as well, it does not affect their pronunciation.
*It often indicates the historical presence of a letter (commonly ''s'') that has, over the course of linguistic evolution, become silent and fallen away in [[orthography]].
*Less frequently, it is used to distinguish between two [[homophone]]s.


__TOC__
In certain words, the circumflex is [[idiopathic]], and has no precise linguistic role.
{{-}}


== First usages ==
==Mixed martial arts record==
<!-- ALL THE HIDDEN SPANS ARE FOR PROPER TABLE SORTING. PLEASE DO NOT EDIT THEM UNLESS YOU KNOW WHAT YOU'RE DOING. -->
The circumflex first appeared in written French in the 16th century. It was borrowed from [[Ancient Greek]], and combines the [[acute accent]] and the [[grave accent]]. Grammarian [[Jacobus Sylvius|Jacques Dubois]] (known as '''Sylvius''') is the first writer known to have used the Greek symbol in his writing (although he wrote in [[Latin]]).
{{MMArecordbox
|wins=4
|losses=3
|ko-wins=0
|ko-losses=3
|sub-wins=3
|sub-losses=0
|dec-wins=1
|dec-losses=0
}}
{| style='font-size: 85%; text-align: left;' class='wikitable sortable' width='99%'
|-
!style='border-style: none none solid solid; background: #e3e3e3'|Result
!style='border-style: none none solid solid; background: #e3e3e3'|Record
!style='border-style: none none solid solid; background: #e3e3e3'|'''Opponent'''
!style='border-style: none none solid solid; background: #e3e3e3'|'''Method'''
!style='border-style: none none solid solid; background: #e3e3e3'|'''Event'''
!style='border-style: none none solid solid; background: #e3e3e3'|'''Date'''
!style='border-style: none none solid solid; background: #e3e3e3'|'''Round'''
!style='border-style: none none solid solid; background: #e3e3e3'|'''Time'''
!style='border-style: none none solid solid; background: #e3e3e3'|'''Location'''
|-
|-align=center
|{{no2}}Loss
|align='center'|4-3
|{{flagicon|USA}} [[Wesley Correira]]
|TKO (Strikes)
|[[UFC 42|UFC 42 - Sudden Impact]]
|{{dts|link=off|2003|April|25}}
|align='center'|2
|align='center'|1:46
|{{flagicon|USA}} [[Florida]], United States
|-
|-align=center
|{{yes2}}Win
|align='center'|4-2
|[[Mike Radnov]]
|Submission (Rear Naked Choke)
|UCC 10 - Battle for the Belts 2002
|{{dts|link=off|2002|June|15}}
|align='center'|2
|align='center'|2:02
|{{flagicon|Canada}} [[Quebec]], Canada
|-
|-align=center
|{{no2}}Loss
|align='center'|3-2
|{{flagicon|USA}} [[Eric Pele]]
|KO
|KOTC 9 - Showtime
|{{dts|link=off|2001|June|23}}
|align='center'|3
|align='center'|0:27
|{{flagicon|USA}} [[California]], United States
|-
|-align=center
|{{yes2}}Win
|align='center'|3-1
|{{flagicon|Japan}} [[Wataru Sakata]]
|Decision
|Rings - Final Capture
|{{dts|link=off|1999|February|21}}
|align='center'|3
|align='center'|5:00
|{{flagicon|Japan}} Japan
|-
|-align=center
|{{yes2}}Win
|align='center'|2-1
|{{flagicon|NLD}} [[Willie Peeters]]
|N/A
|Rings - Mega Battle Tournament 1997 Semifinal
|{{dts|link=off|1997|December|23}}
|align='center'|1
|align='center'|9:40
|{{flagicon|Japan}} Japan
|-
|-align=center
|{{no2}}Loss
|align='center'|1-1
|{{flagicon|Russia}} [[Oleg Taktarov]]
|KO (Punches)
|Pentagon Combat - Pentagon Combat
|{{dts|link=off|1997|September|27}}
|align='center'|1
|align='center'|0:52
|{{flagicon|Brazil}} [[Brazil]]
|-
|-align=center
|{{yes2}}Win
|align='center'|1-0
|{{flagicon|Japan}} [[Yoji Anjo]]
|Submission (Punches)
|U - Japan
|{{dts|link=off|1996|November|17}}
|align='center'|1
|align='center'|34:26
|{{flagicon|Japan}} Japan
|-
|}


Several grammarians of the French [[Renaissance]] attempted to prescribe a precise usage for the diacritic in their treatises on language. It would be the 18th century before the circumflex's usage would become standardized to the customary employment in modern French.


==External links==
=== Sylvius (1478 or 1489–1555) ===
*{{sherdog|id=1964}}


[[Image:Circonflexes de Sylvius.png|left]]


{{DEFAULTSORT:Alvarez, Sean}}
Sylvius used the circumflex to indicate so-called "false [[diphthongs]]." Early modern French as spoken in Sylvius' time had [[coalescence|coalesced]] all its true diphthongs into phonetic [[monophthongs]]. He justifies its usage in his work ''Iacobii Sylvii Ambiani In Linguam Gallicam Isagoge una, cum eiusdem Grammatica Latinogallica ex Hebraeis Graecis et Latinus authoribus'' (''An Introduction to the Gallic (French) Language, And Its Grammar With Regard to Hebrew, Latin and Greek Authors'') published by [[Robert Estienne]] in 1531. A kind of grammatical survey of French written in Latin, the book relies heavily on the comparison of ancient languages to his contemporary French and explained the specifics of his language. At that time, all [[linguistics|linguistic]] treatises used classical Latin and Greek as their models. Sylvius presents the circumflex in his list of typographic conventions, stating:
[[Category:1971 births]]

[[Category:Living people]]
:''aî'', ''eî'', ''oî'', ''oŷ'', ''aû'', ''eû'', ''oû'', diphthongorũ notæ, vt ''maî'', ''pleîn'', ''moî'', ''moŷ'', ''caûſe'', ''fleûr'', ''poûr'', id eſt ''maius'', ''plenus'', ''mihi'', ''mei'', ''cauſa'', ''flos'', ''pro''.
[[Category:American mixed martial artists]]

:''Translation :'' "''aî'', ''eî'', ''oî'', ''oŷ'', ''aû'', ''eû'', ''oû'', are representations of diphthongs, such as ''maî'', ''pleîn'', ''moî'', ''moŷ'', ''caûse'', ''fleûr'', ''poûr'', or, in Latin, ''maius'', ''plenus'', ''mihi'', ''mei'', ''causa'', ''flos'', ''pro''."

<small>Note : it is not possible given the limitations of Wikipedia and HTML to render properly the graphical conventions used by Sylvius. He placed the circumflex and dieresis (French ''tréma'') not ''atop'' the vowel, but ''between'' the two letters of the diphthong in question. Contrary also to this text, there were no [[italics]] to isolate the [[autonym]]s, and [[punctuation]] has been modernized to reflect current conventions.</small>

Sylvius was quite aware that the circumflex was purely a graphical convention. He showed that these diphthongs, even at that time, had been reduced to monophthongs, and used the circumflex to "join" the two letters that had historically been diphthongs into one [[phoneme]]. When two adjacent vowels were to be pronounced independently, Sylvius proposed using the [[dieresis]], called the ''tréma'' in French. Sylvius gives the example ''traî'' (pronounced {{IPA|/trɛ/}} for "je trais") as opposed to ''traï'' (pronounced {{IPA|/tra:i/}} for "je trahis"). Even these groups, however, did not represent true diphthongs (such as the English "try," {{IPA|/traj/}}), but rather adjacent vowels pronounced separately without an interposing [[consonant]]. As French no longer had any true diphthongs, the dieresis alone would have sufficed to distinguish between ambiguous vowel pairs. His circumflex was entirely unneeded. As such the ''tréma'' became standardized in French orthography, and Sylvius' circumflex usage never caught on. But the grammarian had pointed out an important orthographical problem of the time.

At that time, the combination ''eu'' had two pronunciations:
* {{IPA|/y/}} as in ''sûr'' and ''mûr'', written ''ſeur'', ''meur'' (or as ''ſeûr'' and ''meûr'' in Sylvius' work), or
* {{IPA|/œ/}} as in ''cœur'' and ''sœur'', written by Sylvius not only with a circumflex, but a circumflex topped with a [[macron]] (which cannot be produced here: the diacritics have been placed side-by-side for illustrative purposes), ''cêūr'' and ''ſêūr''.

Sylvius' proposals were never adopted ''per se'', but he opened the door for discussion among French grammarians to improve and disambiguate French orthography.

=== Étienne Dolet ===
[[Étienne Dolet]], in his ''Maniere de bien traduire d'une langue en aultre : d’aduantage de la punctuation de la langue Francoyse, plus des accents d’ycelle'' (1540), uses the circumflex (this time as a punctuation mark written between two letters) to show three [[metaplasm]]s:
* 1. '''Linguistic [[syncope]]''', or the disappearance of an interior syllable, shown by Dolet as: ''lai^rra'', ''pai^ra'', ''urai^ment'' (''vrai^ment''), ''don^ra'' for ''laiſſera'' (''laissera''), ''paiera'', ''uraiemẽt'' (''vraiment''), ''donnera''. It is worthy of note that before the 14th century, the so-called "mute ''e''" was always pronounced in French as a [[schwa]] ({{IPA|/ə/}}), regardless of position. For example, ''paiera'' was pronounced {{IPA|[pɛəra]}} instead of the modern {{IPA|[pɛra]}}. In the 1300s, however, this unaccented ''e'' began to silence altogether in [[hiatus (linguistics)|hiatus]] and fall away phonemically, although it remained in orthography. Some of the syncopes Dolet cites, however, had the mute ''e'' reintroduced later: his ''lai^rra'' {{IPA|/lɛra/}} is now {{IPA|/lɛsəra/}} or {{IPA|/lɛsra/}}, and ''don^ra'' {{IPA|/dɔ̃ra/}} is today {{IPA|/dɔnəra/}} or {{IPA|/dɔnra/}}.
* 2. '''Haplology''' (the suppression of repeated or close phonemes): Dolet cites forms which no longer exist: ''au^ous'' (''av^ous''), ''n^auous'' (''n^avous'') for ''auez uous'' (''avez-vous'') and ''n'auez uous'' (''n'avez-vous'').
* 3. '''Contraction''' of an ''é'' followed by a mute ''e'' in the feminine plural, possible in poetry, which was rendered as a long close mid-vowel {{IPA|/eː/}}. It is important to remember that mute "e" at the end of a word was pronounced as a schwa until the 17th century. Thus ''pense^es'' {{IPA|[pɑ̃seː]}}, ''ſuborne^es'' (''suborne^es'') for ''pensées'' {{IPA|[pɑ̃seə]}}, ''subornées''. Dolet specifies that the acute accent should be written in noting the contraction. This contraction of two like vowels into one long vowel is also seen in other words, such as ''a^age'' {{IPA|[aːʒə]}} for ''aage'' {{IPA|[aaʒə]}} (''âge'').

Thus Dolet renders the circumflex the sign of silent phonemes, which became one of the uses for which the diacritic is still used today. Although not all his suggested usages were adopted, his work has allowed insight into the historical [[phonetics]] of French. Dolet may have apprised his contribution best in his own words: ''“Ce ſont les preceptions” ''{{IPA|[préceptes]}}'', “que tu garderas quant aux accents de la langue Francoyse. Leſquels auſsi obſerueront tous diligents Imprimeurs : car telles choſes enrichiſſent fort l'impreſsion, & demõſtrent” ''{{IPA|[démontrent]}}'', “que ne faiſons rien par ignorance.''” Translation: ''“It is these precepts that you should follow concerning the accents of the French language. All diligent printers should also observe these rules, because such things greatly enrich printing and demonstrate that nothing is left to chance.”''

=== Thomas Sébillet ===
[[Thomas Sébillet]] included Dolet's treatise in his publication of ''Art Poétique'' in 1556. He adopted the usage of the circumflex atop the vowels to show syncope: ''laîra'', ''paîra'', ''vraîement'' [sic].

== Modification of the quality of vowels ==
Today, the circumflex affects the pronunciation of the letters ''a'', ''e'' and ''o'' in some dialects.{{Fact|date=June 2008}}

* ''â'' → {{IPA|/ɑ/}} ("velar" or [[back vowel|back]] ''a'') ;
* ''ê'' → {{IPA|/ɛ/}} (open ''e''; equivalent of ''è'' or ''e'' followed by two consonants) ;
* ''ô'' → {{IPA|/o/}} (equivalent to ''o'' at the end of a syllable)

This is sometimes the only reason for the presence of a circumflex within a word.{{Fact|date=June 2008}} The diacritic disappears in related words if the pronunciation changes. Witness:
* ''infâme'' {{IPA|/ɛ̃fɑm/}}, but ''infamie'' {{IPA|/ɛ̃fami/}},
* ''grâce'' {{IPA|/gʁɑs/}}, but ''gracieux'' {{IPA|/gʁasjø/}},
* ''fantôme'' {{IPA|/fɑ̃tom/}}, but ''fantomatique'' {{IPA|/fɑ̃tɔmatik/}}.

There are nonetheless notable exceptions : ''bêtise'' is pronounced {{IPA|/betiz/}} with a closed {{IPA|/e/}}, despite the presence of the circumflex and its formation from ''bête'' {{IPA|/bɛt/}}, One might expect ''*bétise''.

Many French speakers also [[long vowel|lengthen vowels]] displaying the circumflex when they speak.{{Fact|date=June 2008}}

In many varieties of French, the letters with and without circumflex do not change their [[vowel|vowel quality]], particularly in [[Provence]] and other regions of Southern France{{Fact|date=June 2008}}. Thus in these areas, it is not uncommon to hear ''dôme'' pronounced {{IPA|/dɔm/}} instead of the standard {{IPA|/dom/}}. Likewise, everywhere in France, certain persons don't make a difference between {{IPA|/ɑ/}} and {{IPA|/a/}}, so it is not uncommon, for example, to hear {{IPA|/am/}} instead of {{IPA|/ɑm/}} for the word ''âme''.

== Indication of historic Greek omega ==

In words derived from the Greek, the circumflex over ''o'' often indicates the presence of the Greek letter ''omega'' (ω) when the word is pronounced with the sound {{IPA|/o/}}:
''diplôme'' (δίπλωμα), ''cône'' (κῶνος). This rule is sporadic, because there are many words of Greek origin with the closed {{IPA|/o/}} pronunciation that are written without the circumflex, such as ''axiome'' (ἀξίωμα), {{IPA|/aksjom/}}. Likewise, if the former ''omega'' is no longer pronounced as {{IPA|/o/}} in the French, the circumflex is not used: ''comédie'' {{IPA|/kɔmedi/}} (κωμῳδία).

== Indication of a historical phoneme ==
In many cases, the circumflex indicates the historical presence of a phoneme which over the course of linguistic evolution has become silent, and then dropped in orthography altogether.

=== Disappearance of the "s" ===
This is by far the most common phenomenon involving the circumflex. Most incidences come from interposing /s/ before another consonant. Around the time of the [[Battle of Hastings]] in 1066, such post-vocalic /s/ sounds had begun to mute before hard consonants in many words, bringing with it a compensatory elongation of the preceding vowel, which had largely disappeared by the 18th century.

Orthography marked the presence of the muted /s/ for some time, and various attempts were made to distinguish the historical presence graphically, but without much success. Notably, playwright [[Pierre Corneille]], in printed editions of his plays, used the "long s" (ſ) to indicate silent "s" and the traditional form for the /s/ sound when pronounced (''tempeſte'', ''haſte'', ''teſte'' vs. ''peste'', ''funeste'', ''chaste'').

The circumflex was officially introduced into the 1740 edition of the dictionary of the [[Académie Française]]. In subsequently introduced [[neologism]]s, however, the French [[lexicon]] was enriched with Latin-based words which retained their /s/ both in pronunciation and orthography, although the historically evolved word may have let the /s/ drop in favor of a circumflex. Thus, many learned words, or words added to the French vocabulary since then often keep both the pronunciation and the presence of the /s/ from Latin. For example:

* ''feste'' (first appearing in 1080) → ''fête'', but:
** ''festin'': borrowed in the 16th century from the Italian ''festino'',
** ''festivité'': borrowed from the Latin ''festivitas'' in the 19th century, and
** ''festival'': borrowed from the English ''festival'' in the 19th century

have all retained their /s/, both written and pronounced. Likewise the related pairs ''tête''/''test'', ''fenêtre''/''défenestrer'', ''bête''/''bestiaire", etc.

=== Disappearance of other letters ===
The circumflex also serves as a vestige of other muted letters, particularly letters in [[hiatus (linguistics)|hiatus]] where two vowels have contracted into one phoneme, such as ''aage'' → ''âge''; ''baailler'' → ''bâiller'', etc.

Likewise, the former medieval diphthong "eu" when pronounced /y/ would often, in the 18th century, take a circumflex to distinguish them from [[homophones]], such as ''deu'' → ''dû'' (from ''devoir'' vs. ''du'' = ''de'' + ''le''); ''creu'' → ''crû'' (from ''croître'' vs. ''cru'' from ''croire'') ; ''seur'' → ''sûr'' (the adjective vs. the preposition ''sur''), etc.
* ''cruement'' → ''crûment'';
* ''meur'' → ''mûr''.

== Idiopathic cases ==
Some circumflexes appear for no known reason. It is thought to give words an air of prestige, like a crown (thus ''trône'', ''prône'', ''suprême'' and ''voûte'').

Linguistic [[interference]] sometimes accounts for the presence of a circumflex. This is the case in the [[grammatical person|first person]] [[plural]] of the [[preterite]] indicative (or ''passé simple''), which adds a circumflex by association with the [[grammatical person|second person]] plural, thus:

* Latin ''cantavistis'' → [[Old French|OF]] ''chantastes'' → ''chantâtes'' (after the muting of the interposing /s/)
* Latin ''cantavimus'' → OF ''chantames'' → ''chantâmes'' (by interference with ''chantâtes'').

All incidences of the first and second persons plural of the preterite take the circumflex in the [[Grammatical conjugation|conjugation]] ending except the verb ''haïr'', due to its necessary dieresis (''nous haïmes'', ''vous haïtes'').

== Distinguishing homographs ==

Although normally the [[grave accent]] serves the purpose of differentiating homographs in French (''là ~ la, où ~ ou, çà ~ ça, à ~ a, etc.''), the circumflex, for historic reasons, has come to serve a similar role. In fact, almost all the cases where the circumflex is used to distinguish homographs can be explained by the reasons above: it would therefore be false to declare that it is in certain words a sign placed solely to distinguish homographs, as with the grave accent. However, it does allow one to remove certain ambiguities, as noted in the monophthongization of ''ëu'' /y/, homographs were created which were distinguished with a circumflex.

The following are examples:
* ''sur'' ~ ''sûr(e)(s)'' (from ''seür'' → ''sëur''): the homography with the adjective ''sur(e)'', "sour", justifies maintaining the accent in the feminine and plural states, which stays in derived words such as ''sûreté'';
* ''du'' ~ ''dû'' (from ''deü''): as the homography disappears in the [[Inflection|inflected]] forms of the [[participe passé]], we have ''dû'' but ''dus'' / ''due(s)'';
* ''mur'' ~ ''mûr(e)(s)'' (from ''meür''): the maintaining of the accent in all the forms as well as derived words (''mûrir'', ''mûrissement'') must be taken into account.

== "New" orthography ==
[[Francophone]] experts, aware of the difficulty the circumflex represents and the inconsistency of its usage, proposed in 1990 a simplified orthography published in the ''Journal officiel de la République française'' and put forth that the circumflex over the letters ''u'' and ''i'' should be abolished except in cases where it would create ambiguities and homographs. These recommendations, widely criticized at the time of their introduction, have had no widespread adoption, but are encouraged by the Académie française. <ref>[http://www.orthographe-recommandee.info/ Site d'information sur la nouvelle orthographe française]</ref>

==References==
{{Reflist}}

== See also ==
* [[Diacritic]]
* [[Latin alphabet]]
* [[Reforms of French orthography]]

==Bibliography==
* [[Bernard Cerquiglini]], ''L'Accent du souvenir'', 165 pages, Éditions de Minuit, 1995, ISBN 2-7073-1536-2
*''This article draws heavily on the [[:fr:Accent circonflexe]] article in the French-language Wikipedia, which was accessed in the version of [[February 18]] [[2006]].

{{DEFAULTSORT:Circumflex in French}}
[[Category:Alphabetic diacritics]]
[[Category:French language]]

[[es:Uso del acento circunflejo en francés]]
[[fr:Accent circonflexe en français]]

Revision as of 07:43, 13 October 2008

Template:MMAstatsbox


Sean Alvarez (born July 14, 1971) born in USA is a mixed martial arts fighter. He competes in the Heavyweight division. He lost his last fight at UFC 42 - Sudden Impact against Wesley Correira on April 25, 2003.

Mixed martial arts record

Professional record breakdown
7 matches 4 wins 3 losses
By knockout 0 3
By submission 3 0
By decision 1 0
Result Record Opponent Method Event Date Round Time Location
Loss 4-3 United States Wesley Correira TKO (Strikes) UFC 42 - Sudden Impact April 25, 2003 2 1:46 United States Florida, United States
Win 4-2 Mike Radnov Submission (Rear Naked Choke) UCC 10 - Battle for the Belts 2002 June 15, 2002 2 2:02 Canada Quebec, Canada
Loss 3-2 United States Eric Pele KO KOTC 9 - Showtime June 23, 2001 3 0:27 United States California, United States
Win 3-1 Japan Wataru Sakata Decision Rings - Final Capture February 21, 1999 3 5:00 Japan Japan
Win 2-1 Netherlands Willie Peeters N/A Rings - Mega Battle Tournament 1997 Semifinal December 23, 1997 1 9:40 Japan Japan
Loss 1-1 Russia Oleg Taktarov KO (Punches) Pentagon Combat - Pentagon Combat September 27, 1997 1 0:52 Brazil Brazil
Win 1-0 Japan Yoji Anjo Submission (Punches) U - Japan November 17, 1996 1 34:26 Japan Japan


External links

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