French thread

[JoB]

How is the French letter U pronounced?

In spelling and most cases where it appears within a word, quite similar to the German umlaut "Ü". However, it can easily combine with certain other letters so as to obtain a different pronunciation, like "jeu" (where "eu" is pronounced more like the German "Ö").

May I suggest that you look up the words you need in LEO and listen to the soundbites it (hopefully) offers for it? The round black-on-grey "play"-symbol buttons immediately to their left.

[Dane Murgen]

:france: Je suis désolé de revivre(?) ce thread (comment dit-on les mots d'Internet?), mais on m'a supris que personne n'avais abonné cette vidéo:
:newzealand: I am sorry for reviving this thread (I am also sorry for my bad French), but here:

I'm surprised no one shared this yet.

[Troposphère]

:france: Je suis désolé de revivre(?) ce thread (comment dit-on les mots d'Internet?), mais on m'a supris que personne n'avais abonné cette vidéo:

On dirait plutôt:
Je suis désolé de ressusciter ce thread, mais je suis surpris que personne n'ait partagé cette vidéo.

Thread est très bien. On pourrait dire topic, ou sujet, voir fil je pense, mais les mots anglais sont souvent utilisés.

Merci, je ne connaissais pas cette vidéo, je ne regarde pas souvent les vidéos de Norman!

[Vafhudr]

J'irais personellement pour "sujet de discussion". Ce n'est pas très gracieux, mais cela évite l'anglicisme. C'est aussi très générique. Une traduction litéralle sonne fausse. Fil pour thread, même si techniquement correcte, me laisserais dans le noir niveau signification. De plus, au niveau littéraire, ca manque pas mal de punch.



 

[Aki]

Je vais m'installer dans un coin par ici avec mon français de Suisse Romande o/ :switzerland:

Est-ce quelqu'un peut me dire pourquoi la France utilise "soixante-dix", "quatre-vingts", "quatre-vingt-dix" et autres bizzareries quand il y a "septante", "huitante" et "nonante"?

[Hrollo]

Well, it's because originally old French had two competing number systems:

One that followed the general romance model of having specific words for units of tens, so dix, vingt, trente, quarante, cinquante, soixante, septante, octante, nonante…

And one which was a simpler composite system in base 20, possibly influenced by celtic languages, so dix, vingt, vingt dix, deux vingt, deux vingt dix, trois vingt, trois vingt dix, quatre vingt, quatre vingt dix (it's simpler in the sense that it needs less words: once you've learned to count up to 20, you already know how to count up to 99, without having to learn additional words).

Swiss and Belgian French eventually completely settled on the first system, but the French of France settled on a hybrid system.

It's worth noting that people who count like this don't literally hear "quatre-vingt-dix" as "four twenty ten" — they treat the phrase as a unit that happens to mean "ninety" — in that sense either way to say it is no more or less arbitrary.

[Vafhudr]

Je vais m'installer dans un coin par ici avec mon français de Suisse Romande o/ :switzerland:

Est-ce quelqu'un peut me dire pourquoi la France utilise "soixante-dix", "quatre-vingts", "quatre-vingt-dix" et autres bizzareries quand il y a "septante", "huitante" et "nonante"?

Parle pour toi - je n'avais jamais entendu parler des termes septante, huitante et nonante avant de fréquenter l'internet et ce forum plus particulièrement.

[Mélusine]

Est-ce quelqu'un peut me dire pourquoi la France utilise "soixante-dix", "quatre-vingts", "quatre-vingt-dix" et autres bizzareries quand il y a "septante", "huitante" et "nonante"?

C'est tellement belge ! (Et suisse, semble-t-il.) C'est toujours très étrange à entendre.
*Va en apprendre plus en lisant ce qu'a dit Rollo parce qu'elle ne sait pas répondre à cette question*

[Aki]

And one which was a simpler composite system in base 20, possibly influenced by celtic languages, so dix, vingt, vingt dix, deux vingt, deux vingt dix, trois vingt, trois vingt dix, quatre vingt, quatre vingt dix (it's simpler in the sense that it needs less words: once you've learned to count up to 20, you already know how to count up to 99, without having to learn additional words).

It's worth noting that people who count like this don't literally hear "quatre-vingt-dix" as "four twenty ten" — they treat the phrase as a unit that happens to mean "ninety" — in that sense either way to say it is no more or less arbitrary.

Interesting, I didn't know that that was a celtic counting system! So instead of knowing numbers you gotta know math... idk if I'd call that easier but sure, that works too
I was sorta half-kidding because if there's one thing that my French teacher for French and I, only bilingual kid in a class full of Swiss-germans, could never agree on was the numbers so this was just poking me poking some fun.
We do understand it as a phrase rather than a composite of numbers here as well, because the quatre-vingt-dix and others are also often heard in Western Switzerland through French TV channels for example and so we kind of adopted the understanding but not the wide-spread use.

C'est tellement belge ! (Et suisse, semble-t-il.) C'est toujours très étrange à entendre.
*Va en apprendre plus en lisant ce qu'a dit Rollo parce qu'elle ne sait pas répondre à cette question*

Bon, les Belges ils utilisent octante (apparamment) et les Suisse utilisent huitante, donc il y a encore une petite différence entre les deux, en plus du chocolat

[Juniper]

So I studied French throughout high school and university, and two summers ago studies abroad in France for about 3 1/2 months. I really haven't used French in almost two years though, and I've been itching to use it again and have a good conversation in French.

Once I brush up on my French in my own time, is there anyone who would be willing to have a few good practice conversations with me in French ?

[Mélusine]

Once I brush up on my French in my own time, is there anyone who would be willing to have a few good practice conversations with me in French ?

Ask when you want

[Juniper]

Ask when you want

Ahhhh merci mon nouvel ami !!!

[ginger]

So I studied French throughout high school and university, and two summers ago studies abroad in France for about 3 1/2 months. I really haven't used French in almost two years though, and I've been itching to use it again and have a good conversation in French.

Once I brush up on my French in my own time, is there anyone who would be willing to have a few good practice conversations with me in French ?

Aww, yay French!

I've only three years of experience with French and am not native (since I am not three years old xD) but if you wanted to practice with another USian, I'm here! I am more or less conversational, depending upon whether or not I have the vocabulary for a given topic. And when I type in French, I most definitely use the dictionary, ehehehe.

Mélusine is a great person to practice! She's very kind and sweet with her grammatical tips. Now that I think about it, I don't think I've never had a negative interaction with any of the Francophones on the forum. They're a very kind bunch.

[Juniper]

Aww, yay French!

I've only three years of experience with French and am not native (since I am not three years old xD) but if you wanted to practice with another USian, I'm here! I am more or less conversational, depending upon whether or not I have the vocabulary for a given topic. And when I type in French, I most definitely use the dictionary, ehehehe.

Mélusine is a great person to practice! She's very kind and sweet with her grammatical tips. Now that I think about it, I don't think I've never had a negative interaction with any of the Francophones on the forum. They're a very kind bunch.

I just might take you up on that, I suppose I can't have too many French speaking practice partners !

[ginger]

Je voudrais poster ici encore parce-qu'il y a des mois depuis j'ai étudié le français xD

Peut-être, si des autres personnes sont intéressés, je peux parler sur Skype avec des autres Francophones? Maintenaint, j'aide Nimphy avec les points de grammaire élémentaires, mais je voudrais améliorer mon français, et pour ça, je dois pratiquer plus souvent.

Je peux partager mon pseudo sur Skype s'il y a des personnes qui voudraient chatter.

((désolée pour des erreurs--j'ai sommeil xP))