Do you know the genders of common French nouns? Test yourself with this quiz or take a look at some vocabulary lists to review.
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Genders are probably the hardest part of French. Do you know how a gender is picked for any English word incorporated into French? To me it seems random. Why is it “le meeting” but it’s “la réunion” in French? If English words were always masculine that would make sense, but there are plenty that aren’t. For instance, they’ll say “la street”. Any ideas?
@Jon
As a general rule, borrowed word (so word taken from other languages) used in the French language tends toward the use of the masculine gender as opposed to the feminine gender. Some words that are feminine in the original language (like pizza) will maintain their feminine gender…but for the most part, use the masculine form and you<ll be right most of the time.
@Andre
Thanks for the comment. I know the default is supposed to be masculine, but I’ve found a lot of English words that are feminine in French, such as: “la street”, “la newsletter”, “la pop”, “la soul” So how can one know that these words will be feminine and not masculine?
@Jon
Well, all the exemple you shown -and I’m assuming that it was heard in France of in material from France- the reason for the use of the feminine seems to be that the French equivalent ‘Rue’ ; ‘lettre/nouvelle’ ; ‘la musique pop(ulaire)’ ; ‘âme/ la musique soul’ are feminine.
The Reason why I mention it’s probably from France is that in Québec/Canada where I’m from, those word are more then likely go with the default masculine, when used.
@Andre
Ok thanks, and yes it is in France where I’ve heard these. So in Québec the genders are sometimes different than in France? Very interesting. They also say “ma life”. I understand if the English word is feminine because it’s that in French “la vie”, but it’s not always the case, which is why I’m confused. One time, I wanted to say, “Je vais aller à la meeting,” since it’s “une réunion”, but apparently it’s “un meeting”. Any ideas why “meeting” is masculine but the others aren’t?
@Jon
Yes indeed, sometimes the gender of English borrowed words will be different depending on which side of the Atlantic you are.
As for the reason of why un meeting insted of une meeting (since réunion) is feminine, I have no clue why…probably just a simple matter of usage in which the basic rule is applied. In a quick glance -and I might be wrong here- but it would seem to me that ‘older’ borrowing tend to apply the basic rules more systematically, whereas more ‘recent’ one are more likely to use the gender of the French equivalent.
Personally, as a FSL teacher, I tend to encourage my student to use the French words instead of the English one. Mostly because, in Canada, the use of English words when a perfectly good French word exist is seen as a sign of lack of education or of a more ’slangish’ speech…which is not necessarely the impression they might wish to project.
@Andre
Thanks for the info. Good to know that in Québec, using English words is a sign of lack of education. In France, it’s exactly the opposite. Throwing in an English word is a sign of high education. The more you can throw in a conversation, the more you are perceived as being well educated. In general, however, I don’t like using a lot of English words like that. It’s just the genders that get me, which is what made me curious to see if there was a pattern.
@Jon
Well I’m glad I could help.
Now, without getting too off topic, that’s what happen when you are a linguistic minority within a country (despite the fact that about 80% of Québecois are Francophone, French is the mother language of only about 23% of the Canadian population (And maybe 2-5% of North American (Canada+USA+Mexico) population)). So we tend more toward a reflex of ‘linguistic preservation’ eg, trying to keep French as strong as possible. And thus why French Canadian and Frenchmen have a different relationship with English borrowed words.