FALSE FRIENDS | These French & English Words Do NOT Mean the Same Thing
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 16 ก.ย. 2024
- Almost every single one of these has thrown me off before...some more times than others... 😂
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Hi, I'm Andrea! I'm an American expat currently living in Paris, France. I make videos about writing and creativity, living abroad, traveling, and all the wonderfully nerdy things I love. Also...I'm a bit of an unashamed coffee addict ☕️
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There is one that bothered me a lot when I was a kid learning English as French native : issue. In French, une issue is a solution, an escape to dangerous situation but in English it is the complete opposite, it is a problem. The fact the words are the exact same but mean the exact opposite makes them the perfect false friends in my opinion :)
That's such a great one to add!
@@AndreaHeckler I was actually (here's another one!) expecting issue to be on the list and to me some you consider asfalse friends were not much of a problem like library or medicine; but issue ... Was an issue :D
Mentioned above, 'actually' is I think the most common false friend mistakenly said by French wanting to say 'Actuellement' which is 'currently'. Ah, in the end, with practice we eventually get over it, don't we? :)
That is a very good one
As a french guy, the best (worst?) false friend I've encountered would be the word "actually" (fr: au fait), which meaning is totally different from "actuellement" (en: currently) in french.
that's the most common mistake done by French students in high school!
Yes, that one is really tricky!
@JEbLC currently / nowadays
@JEbLC "les actualités" can be translated as " the news" and the origin of the word comes from the fact that "actuel" in French means something happening now/ at this precise moment, hence the idea of "breaking news"
"Actually" is actually not "au fait" but "en fait".
Decade in french means 10 days (as in latin) not 10 years! 10 years in french is décennie.
introduire is a little bit specific. You can use it : "introduire une pièce dans un appareil ou un distributeur" If you mean to add an ingredient in a recipe you will say "incorporer" not introduire - introduire quelqu'un is to give or grant access to someone, a little more than "présenter" someone to someone else, it's like "recommander" vouch for - sorry I'm kind of finical or pernickety
Just wanna point out a misproncounciation for the french word "ancien", you seem to pronouce it like "anccien" or "anxien". In french, c sounds like s in front of an e, i or y (hope I don't forget any...) so basically it would be pronounce "anssien".
As for the false friend, one that is very common for french speakers is actually / actuellement, which means at this moment.
Another one, less common is furniture / fourniture which means supply.
There's also eventually / éventuellement that means potentially. This one is very tricky because they have opposite meaning, when eventually means that something will happen at some point, éventuellement means that this thing may happen, but not necessarely.
Thanks for letting me know about the mispronunciation - I hadn't even noticed I was saying it that way! That's my anglophone accent creeping in 😜
For spanish speakers french makes way more sense than english. I remember struggling to remember the meaning of sensible in english, because in spanish it means sensitive too. I learned a little bit of french in school and the hardest thing for me were gendered words, when you speak a gendered language it's the weirdest thing to use feminine pronouns with a word you've known all your life to be masculine!
I can imagine that would be so strange 😅 The first word I noticed like that was the word for "video" (masculine in Spanish, feminine in French), because I used TH-cam so much to practice both languages!
"Origen" and "orden" trip me up; I tend to use the Spanish words with the gender they have in French. Then there are -sis, -ma, and descendants of Greek feminine nouns in -ος (e.g. méthode/método). I feel that all the -sis nouns should be feminine and all -ma nouns masculine (with some exceptions, like "paloma", which is from Vulgar Latin, and "oasis", where the Greek word is from Egyptian). Why people say "el análisis" and "la diadema" baffles me.
La sal en el mar es más que en la sangre.
Le sel dans la mer est plus que dans le sang.
My most recent mistake was saying éventuellement for eventually. Not the same, though. It means "possibly". :/
I make that mistake sometimes too :/
I know someone already told about "preservative-conservateur/préservatif-condom", but there are also "proposer/to propose" and caractère as in "typographic sign".
About "introduire"/"introduce", a common joke is to make a word-to-word (+ false friend) translation of "allow me introduce myself" which gives "permettez-moi de m'introduire" which is... sexually explicit.
About "ancien", it's actually more complex than that. Ancien can mean both "former, ex" or "old, ancient". The meaning depends on where you put it in the sentence : if it's before the noun it means former, if it's after it means ancient. Example : Une prison ancienne = an ancient prison; une ancienne prison = a former prison (in case the building is now used for something else).
So in case you want to say "my past job" you actually have to say "mon ancien travail", not "mon travail ancien" (which sounds weird).
And there are a few other adjectives like this. Check out this page for more info (section "Adjectives with a different meaning before and after the noun") : www.french-linguistics.co.uk/grammar/adjectives_position.shtml
Very interesting Andrea. You explained them very well, I'd love to hear more of your adventures in learning French.
great video Andrea, thank you for that!!! As a French person who happens to be teaching English, this is one of my favourite types of videos!! I love this list!! I am such a literary nerd that before you even mentioned Jane Austen, I had already started writing my comment refering to "Sense and Sensibility" when you were explaining what "sensible" meant lol! My favourite false friend is "eventually" vs "éventuellement" => It took me ages to stop making mistakes about this one! Do you think you could do a video someday about French words that you still struggle to pronounce even now that you're fluent?
I've thought about doing that, especially since the last time I did a video on that subject I was such a French newb! So much has changed since then. I'll make a note to keep that video idea in mind 😊
Connected to the location thing, a common false friend is the word "place" which only refers to a big crossroad between many streets in french (place de l'etoile). Lots of my students want to start a description with "c'est une place ou" (it's a place where) but this "place" is translated by lieux/endroit in french.
Ah yes, I've made that mistake before too!
I remember the biggest false friend I learnt in school is coke/coca. Drug versus soda.
Another one false friend came to my mind: physician (English)/physicien (French). The later translates in English as physicist, whereas the English physician is a french médecin/docteur.
We use "mail" as e-mail in Danish too, though "e-mail" is also correct. I haven't thought about how difficult that would be for native English speakers before.
Another false friend I like in Danish/English is "false friend" itself. In Danish we say "falsk ven", which literally means "fake friend".
Languages are interesting!
Great video! It’s so confusing sometimes. Especially when it’s the first time you come across a word and you think you know what it means but you actually don’t.
I definitely thought this video was going to be about "fake friends" or "fake people" 😂
Definitely found the video interesting either way!
Hahahaa,glad it wasn't just me x
Hahaha oops - I guess I'm so much of a language nerd that "false friends" just means one thing to me now 😂 I'm glad you enjoyed the video!
@@AndreaHeckler haha it's okay! My fault for not reading the entire title 😂 We love your nerdiness 😁
I love expressions that are said in different ways in different countries. For example:
English: The grass is always greener on the other side.
German: The neighbour's garden is always greener.
Chinese: That mountain is taller than this one.
Japanese: The neighbour's flowers are redder.
How is it said in France? Can you make a video on French expressions like this?
Like german ! L'herbe est toujours plus verte chez le voisin.
You missed preservative and préservatif ..I can tell you it was not fun making that mistake .. ughh
Didina Ben never thought about this one haha
@@manonbtravels6343 I'm glad you didn't find out the hard way like me lol
Didina Ben haha I’m french and I lived in the USA for a while. I asked for a coke but I pronounced it “cock” so I mean that’s a little embarrassing too
Yes, that one can lead to some very awkward miscommunications 😅 It's the same false friend between English and Spanish too!
@@manonbtravels6343 Ahahah I feel for you my friend 😂
Definitely love your voice, even more in french ! You should try the radio as a new job !!
Thank you, that was instructive, I learned some new false friends grace to you ! Keep on !
About raisin/prune, you get a similar pattern with beef/mutton which come from the French name of the animal. All these words are imported from French cuisine :)
Yes, good point!
Location in english is localisation in french.
Hi Andrea,
For the record, mail is also a french word (nothing related to e-mail and the pronociation is totally different) with several meanings www.larousse.fr/dictionnaires/francais/mail/48666, especially "public thoroughfare" or walking lane in a mall.
French Canadian use courriel and not mail and fun fact if you check all the English words French uses , Canadian French use the translation , as for shopping in France against magasiner in French Canada :)) also they translate all English titles (movies and stuff ) when French keep the original titles
I'm late to the party but I got a few comments anyway !
Ancien is actually even more tricky. If you use it before the noun as in "mon ancien travail", you probably mean previous. If you use it after the noun, as in "un meuble ancien", it probably means ancient, or at least old as we use that to qualify old cars, which I guess you'd never call "ancient". Unfortunately, as with other french adjectives that can change meaning depending if they are before or after the noun (the most common one being "grand" I guess), it's not a bulletproof rule, but I'd guess it works most of the time.
The sad depressing movie you watched probably was what we would call a "comédie dramatique" more than a straight comédie. Basically we have "drames", sad from start to finish, "comédie dramatique", with jokes but probably a downer ending, and "comédie" which has to have a happy ending (and usually a lot of terrible humor).
"Caractérisation" in the same sense as in English exists in French, so that's one you don't have to be afraid to use.
I'd never call a person "délicieux/se", that actually sounds gross to me...
I guess in that list "sensible" is the mistake I make the most, though now that I think about it, I probably often used "mail" meaning e-mail, but I'll join some other comments to say that the one I heard the most during English class or whenever I heard French people speaking English are "Eventually/Eventuellement" and "Actually/Actuellement".
I definitely thought excited/excité would make this list. After a year of living in Belgium and trying to apologize to people when my dogs get excited in public someone finally explained to me why I kept getting a combination of dirty looks and giggles.
Hahaha, I completely forgot about that one!
another one i can think of is gentle and gentil/gentille. I used to confuse these. gentil ou gentille means kind or nice. Not gentle like we have in english
I legit thought this video was you calling out backstabbing, asshole friends in France and the US. I was like "Damn, that's bold!" Had no idea until i clicked and watched.
😂
The word Ancien can also mean the same thing as Ancient. "Il est ancien !" could be the same as "He is ancient!". Also in terms of very old, we would use Ancien like Grèce ancienne for ancient Greece and the like. I feel English took the French meaning, but only part of it.
Also you would say "ma voiture de location" and "mon ancien boulot". 😉
I'm pretty sure it was the Australian PM's wife. 😉
"Grece ancienne" isn't accurately correct, "Grece antique" sounds better. "Antique" has the same meaning that "Ancient" (it can be used only if something is very old). But in fact, you could use "Ancien" on something/someone very old too.
i don't think you can say "he is ancient" = "il est ancien" because here "ancient" means "venerable" ==> "il est vénérable" ou "c'est un ancien"
"il est ancien" = he's (very)old" / it's (very)old
"ancienne Grèce" may have or not the same meaning of "ancient Greece" but "Ancient Greece" = "Grèce antique"
Thanks for adding those tips!
Also you shouldn't mistake "hazard" (danger) with "hasard" (chance, coincidence).
Just my 2 cents about "location" and the reason why you can't see any lineage.
Actualy, there is one, thete is a very similar french word for the english location with the same roots: "localisation". It's not really used in the same way in french but basically means the same thing.
For the french "location" it's nothing else that another evolution of the langage coming from the verb "louer" which happens to be the same as the location english word :)
So
Localiser -> localisation = to locate -> location
Louer -> location = to rent -> rental
Hope it's interesting :)
C'était vraiment intéressant et tu m'as fait beaucoup rire ( oui, je parle des films français et pour la voiture) merci pour la vidéo.
Speaking of embarrassing mistakes, a well-known Spanish false friend is "embarazada". The word "encinta" does exist in Spanish but is less common. And only if you're talking about pipefish and seahorses, or using the perfect tense, would you say "embarazado". Portuguese "grávida" is used of humans, whereas English "gravid" is used mainly of egg-laying animals.
Spanish "compromiso" does not mean "compromise" (which seems to be "transigir"). It means "commitment".
My fear of making the mistake of using "embarazada" in Spanish has actually made me scared of using "embarrassée" in French, even though "embarrassée" really does mean embarrassed! 😂 I have that Spanish false friend so engrained in my brain haha
Le mot introduire peut aussi être utilisé quand tu présentes 2 personnes, même si l'expression à un peu vieillie. Par exemple, les diplomates se présentaient avec des lettres d'introduction.
ojalá no te importe que te escriba en castellano.
bella como siempre!
otro tema que siempre me da lata es que las preposiciones siempre cambien en CADA idioma jajaja
saludos de Chicago!!
when I was young, I had an american friend. He was 15 and had been living in france for 14 years but his parents were americans and his mother tongue was english. Each time I pronunced the word "promiscuité" in french he used to hush me. He was pretty puritan.
groin is another false friend. It means snout in french.
"Prune" also is a mild slang word for a fine (in Paris only I think, though) 😂
I live in Provence and I say "prune" as well to refer to a fine!
@@alfinou_13targaryen Oh, interesting. I'm from (and live in) Toulouse, and I don't think I've ever heard anyone from here use prune to mention a fine, the only times I did it was from people from Paris or its surroundings. I barely know anyone from South-East France though, so there's that.^^
I had no idea!!
Andrea Heckler haha, we all learn everyday^^
Even in Switzerland we can use "prune" this way too
I've only heard them called false cognates, but I notice that in Spanish they're called falsos amigos!
sensible in english is sensé in french
That's a sensible answer. :)
By the way, ta prononciation du mot librairie étais vraiment très superbe!
Merci beaucoup ! J'ai dû concentrer - c'est pas le mot le plus facile ! 😂
@@AndreaHeckler de me concentrer--> reflexive verb 💞
In the UK we would be more likely to say "post" as opposed to "mail".For example " I will post it out to you" My French friends use "mail" to refer to Messenger.If something has happened and they update their status and they only want certain people knowing more details, they say "MAIL!" Or,sometimes,"Im at work,I will mail you later" Confusing for a few people lol My problem is,I then say "I will mail you" to people who aren't French and have to correct myself!
😂 Got to love when language expressions creep over into the wrong language... I do that too!
Ton accent français est parfait !!
Sweet heart, in ancien there is no K sound just before the C, just replace the C by S in your head :)
I was constantly thinking of the meaning of these words in my languages Dutch and Swedish. Many of the words you mentioned exist in these two languages too! It's confusing. Karakter in Danish means grade, how odd! Mail is definitely an email in Dutch and Swedish, not a brief or brev (of paper). Locatie in Dutch is location in English, but plaats (location) in Dutch is not place (square) in French. It does mean place in English. Rozijn in dutch and russin in Swedish means raisin in English, druif/druva means grape. And a "grap" in Dutch is a joke! This topic is endless!
Haha mail!!! I see that in Spanish a lot. My French is very very Canadian and at work I deal with clients from Quebec via email and phone, and they just use "courriel" to refer to emails. If referring to snail mail, I usually hear and say "par la poste". Ie "Je t'ai envoyé un cadeau par la poste."
I'll be visiting France in two weeks and although I speak well I am prepared to understand absolutely nothing 🤣🤣 I never hear "Francy French" as a I call it.
Furniture/fourniture , eventually/éventuellement
cave/cave
Please make another video about Spanish words which is used in English.
I just might sometime! 😊
Another very common false friend is Eventually/Éventuellement. Éventuellement in french has the meaning of "may be" or "possibility" whereas "eventually" doesn't have these meanings. There is "certainty" in "eventually" in English. I , and many others, tend to confuse both terms every easily. "tot ou tard je finis par me tromper sur ce faux-amis" / "(sooner or later) I eventually get wrong about that false-friend.
oops: It has already been reported. Sorry for the duplicates. Posting with a big delay eventually leads to this mistake. :*)
Courrier électronique is more commonly used in Québec 😎.
I didn't know about delicious et macron! Mdr ça a dû etre hyoer akward!
" bite " " coin"
Definitely ones to watch out for!
Just spent 10 days in NY.
And, as a french dude, reading "Best bites in Hell's Kitchen" off a front of a restaurant was just so hilarious :D
Here's something... fun...
The Japanese word for "die" (as in death, not dice) is spelled exactly the same as the English word "shine".
It's pronounced differently, of course.
For mail, Au Québec on va dire tu as de la poste, y'as-tu dla poste? ou du courrier sinon en québeçois on peut aussi entendre avoir dla ''malle'', y'as-tu d'la malle? De la boîte à malle, boîte aux lettres. Je sais pas si tu as déjà ecouté la vidéo de Solange te parle, parler le québeçois, sinon vas vite écouter ça. Je pense que t'aimerais ça le Québec :D le email ici on va dire un courriel et aussi email
Ouiii, j'ai regardé Solange Te Parle ! J'aimerais bien regarder plus de vidéos de créateurs québécois, donc si tu as des recommendations n'hésites pas 😃 Je trouve l'accent beaucoup plus difficile (vu que je suis habituée à celle de la France), mais je l'adore !
Hello, I've been in France for 15 years now and am still looking for a word that corresponds with
'mind', particularly without the religious component, do you have any ideas?
The closest would be "esprit" but there is a bit of a religious component to it. Just a bit though, because "esprit" can also mean ghost or spirit. I only see the connection if I really try to make the connection though. Context is key. It's more of an namesake. As an example "un esprit étriqué" would mean "a narrow-minded" which have nothing to do with "esprit" as ghost in my mind. But I guess if you are a religious person you can always find a connection.
I my point of view, "esprit" is like "quatre-vingts" (80). You don't picture 4x20 in your mind when you say it, you picture 80. You would picture 4x20 if you wanted to though. Well, I can picture "esprit" as spirit or soul in my mind if I use it in a sentence, but if I use it as "mind", I will picture it as mind without any connection to religious stuff. Like if it was a namesake.
Anyway, I'm rambling.
I would like to add that in some contexts, "mind" can be translated by "mentalité" too, especially when you want to say something about society or things like that. It can also be translated by "avis" when you say "I've changed my mind". This is actually a very versatile word in English so there will be many different possibilities to translate it in French.
I'm not sure, but it looks like you have some great responses here in the comments :D
indeed, there is also the verb!!
Question bête : est-ce que "delightful" fonctionne mieux pour une personne ?
it definitely does!
thanks :)
Il n'existe pas de questions bêtes :D Et oui, "delightful" fonctionne parfaitement pour une personne !
Andrea I think you mistaken about those french words because ancien means old and ancient like ancienne maison or ancien garage and then also medicine for this one the closer french word is not médecin but rather médecine it is about healing process and treatments for science studies to apply on people in theory and in practical experiments
she actually said the same thing about "ancient" vs "ancien". She's right, in French, we usually say "ancien" when we talk of something old of course but also when we want to refer to a "former" or "previous" thing/person. That's what she very cleverly explained. In English, "ancient" is mainly translated in French by "antique".
alfinou_13 targaryen you mean like Ancient Greece? Yeah you are right I didn’t get it my bad but it looks so closely similar cause again you can say Ancienne Égypte and Égypte antique which is the same meaning but in English I guess you will rather put ancient Egypt = Égypte antique after it is not a huge mistake I guess and I didn’t say that previous comment to be only right but no not at all I accept my misunderstanding sorry🤗 peace ✌️ and rock ’n’ roll 🤘 kidding have a nice viewing
Was I a bit rough in my comment? If I really was, I'm so sorry!! I am teaching languages and sometimes I don't realize it when I am a bit "pushy" with people! "Déformation professionnelle" comme on dit chez nous!
je comprends tout à fait ça ;) mais il n'y a pas de soucis
Ancien is pronounced anssien
Alors "false friend" n'est pas au faux ami
Thank you for noticing the french president mistake in his previous speech facing the people it was lame and umbearable and quite awkward for his old wife and us the french people and I can’t imagine your reaction when you heard him speaking in English it is awful I want to push his face in the face!!! Lol #tomska check his channel if you want on TH-cam about his asdfmovie videos 😉👍
Haha - it was funny coming from Macron since he's usually so professional/composed, but no judgment from my end of course! I'm sure I've made mistakes just as awkward in French 😂 Thankfully my mistakes aren't recorded and aired on TV though!
I'm not better also LOL but from time to time we learn from our own mistakes right? so it is still good if the dialogue goes really cool ;)
by the way did you already celebrated the 20th anniversary of Harry Potter released books?
Before we all criticise Macron for this, we should pause to think how many native English speaking leaders could give a speech in a foreign language. Having said that, he should not have gone off script.