CFCF (the call letters apparently stand for “Canada’s First, Canada’s Finest), a Montreal TV station, has the following banner ads on its TV site:
It’s funny what those rules about French use in public signs will produce. With these ones it’s almost as if they’re only using French words because they have to — the puns make almost no semantic sense. These phrases wouldn’t make any sense whatsoever to most American English-speakers, but one presumes the average English-speaking Montreal resident knows enough French to get these clichés? I’m presuming this is aimed at an English-speaking audience, because “Canada’s Un Deux Watch” doesn’t mean much in French.
Food for thought: Will we ever see Spanish-patois ads akin to these ones aimed at English speakers in the US?
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Ah, yes, an ad for (as I call it), the “Stupid News” with Pat and Nancy. It is indeed choad time.
I thought that Bill 101’s EXPRESS PURPOSE was to prevent the “Louisianafication” of Joual culture. CTV is an English-language national network. They show basically the “best of” the American networks. These ads are weeeeeeird.
And if you want to see the spanglish ads, I have seen them intermittently in Washington Heights, and on the subway. If I find one soon I’ll let you know. Also Univision- I’ve seen spanglish ads for McDonalds, among other things.
Also, when I was on the “C” train yesterday, someone replaced all the door stickers that read “do not lean against doors” with “Do Not Bomb Iraq” in the exact same size, color, and font. Totally ineffective- it took me upwards of 15 minutes to realize anything was amiss.
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