Five typical mistakes when using French
- 2 days ago
- 2 min read
J'aime France
In English, you would say 'I love France', without using the definite article. That's why 99.9% of my English-speaking students don't think of using it in French! They expect French to have the same rules and, as I remind them on a daily basis, those two languages have different roots and are very different.
La Angleterre
One pattern which repeats all the time in French, is losing the vowel of the previous word if the following one starts with one too. That's why we say 'J'aime' and not 'Je aime'. This way, it flows better.
Tout les personnes (all the persons, i.e. everyone)
'Personne' is feminine and 'tout/toute/toutes' is an adjective taking the gender of the noun it describes, here 'personne'. To make things slightly harder, you have to think ahead and not wait to say the noun to decide which gender to apply, since it's the first word of the sentence. If I'd had a pound every time I've corrected this particular mistake at any level, I would long be retired!
Une actuelle chose
'Actuel/actuelle/actuels/actuelles' is an adjective which means 'current'.
'Les actualités' = the news
but 'vrai/vraie/vrais/vraies' = actual.
It is one of the many false friends we have between English and French.
A false friend is a word which looks like the one you know in English, but has an entirely different meaning in French. For example:
compréhensif = understanding
résumer = to summarise
un stage = an internship
la figure = the face
Not to mention the fact that most of the adjectives come after the noun!
Il est beau
Il est beau = he is beautiful (George Clooney, for example)
If you use the verb 'être', as in English, you're not talking about the weather, for that you need the verb 'faire', but about a man, a painting (un tableau), un jardin (a garden), etc.
The reason I keep correcting this mistake, is the same as the first one, i.e. my English-speaking students expect to use the same verb in French and - surprise, surprise - it does not work!
What I hope you will retain from this post, is that mistakes help you learn and, in the case of two very different languages, such as English and French, to compartmentalise the two. And sometimes, they're even funny!
Don't hesitate to get in touch if you have any questions.
