Dialogue

Vocabulary

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Lesson Notes

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Lesson Transcript

INTRODUCTION
Brandon: How Long Have You Lived in this French City? Brandon here!
Yasmine: Bonjour. I'm Yasmine.
Brandon: In this lesson, you’ll learn to how to compare things in French. The conversation takes place in a restaurant.
Yasmine: It’s between Florent and Jérémy.
Brandon: The speakers are friends, so they’ll be using informal French. Okay, let's listen to the conversation.
DIALOGUE
Florent: Tu es de Nice ?
Jeremy: Oui, je suis né là-bas.
Florent: Quand es-tu venu à Paris ?
Jeremy: Quand j’avais 17 ans.
Florent: Mais tu connais Paris mieux que quiconque !
Jeremy: En vérité, j’ai étudié des guides de voyages pour touristes.
Brandon: Listen to the conversation one time slowly.
Florent: Tu es de Nice ?
Jeremy: Oui, je suis né là-bas.
Florent: Quand es-tu venu à Paris ?
Jeremy: Quand j’avais 17 ans.
Florent: Mais tu connais Paris mieux que quiconque !
Jeremy: En vérité, j’ai étudié des guides de voyages pour touristes.
Brandon: Listen to the conversation with an English translation.
Florent: Tu es de Nice ?
Florent: You're from Nice?
Jeremy: Oui, je suis né là-bas.
Jeremy: Yep, I was born there.
Florent: Quand es-tu venu à Paris ?
Florent: When did you move to Paris?
Jeremy: Quand j’avais 17 ans.
Jeremy: When I was 17 years old.
Florent: Mais tu connais Paris mieux que quiconque !
Florent: But you know Paris better than anyone!
Jeremy: En vérité, j’ai étudié des guides de voyages pour touristes.
Jeremy: Actually, I studied travel guides for tourists.
POST CONVERSATION BANTER
Brandon:Yasmine, how common is it for young people to move to a big city in France?
Yasmine: Well, there is an increasing number of young people from the countryside moving to cities.
Brandon: What cities do they usually move to?
Yasmine: I’d say Paris, Marseille and Lyon mainly.
Brandon: Like in other countries, it seems like the migration of young adults to urban areas is quite common, as they look for jobs and educational opportunities.
Yasmine: It’s so common that we have a French phrase for this trend, which is exode rural.
Brandon: That means "rural exodus." It makes sense, because many large companies and renowned universities are in the cities. And that provides career opportunities.
Yasmine: Exactly. I'm living in Lyon, which is a big city, so there is less unemployment compared to other cities. But living in a big city is not cheap.
Brandon: I’m sure the rent must be very expensive. Okay, now onto the vocab.
VOCAB LIST
Brandon: Let's take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson.The first word is..
Yasmine: là-bas [natural native speed]
Brandon: over there
Yasmine: là-bas [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Yasmine: là-bas [natural native speed]
Brandon: Next we have..
Yasmine: venir [natural native speed]
Brandon: to come
Yasmine: venir [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Yasmine: venir [natural native speed]
Brandon: Next we have..
Yasmine: connaître [natural native speed]
Brandon: to know
Yasmine: connaître [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Yasmine: connaître [natural native speed]
Brandon: Next we have..
Yasmine: quiconque [natural native speed]
Brandon: anyone
Yasmine: quiconque [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Yasmine: quiconque [natural native speed]
Brandon: Next we have..
Yasmine: vérité [natural native speed]
Brandon: truth
Yasmine: vérité [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Yasmine: vérité [natural native speed]
Brandon: Next we have..
Yasmine: étudier [natural native speed]
Brandon: to study
Yasmine: étudier [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Yasmine: étudier [natural native speed]
Brandon: Next we have..
Yasmine: guide de voyages [natural native speed]
Brandon: guide book
Yasmine: guide de voyages [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Yasmine: guide de voyages [natural native speed]
Brandon: and last we have..
Yasmine: touriste [natural native speed]
Brandon: tourist
Yasmine: touriste [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Yasmine: touriste [natural native speed]
KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES
Brandon: Let's have a closer look at the usage of some of the words and phrases from this lesson. The first word is..
Yasmine: être née
Brandon: meaning "to be born."
Yasmine: Etre is a verb meaning "to be." Né is an adjective meaning “born.” Née is the feminine form.
Brandon: If you want to explain where you were born in French, you have to use..
Yasmine: être + né + preposition + the place name.
Brandon: Can you give us an example?
Yasmine: Sure. Je suis né à Paris,
Brandon: meaning "I was born in Paris."
Yasmine: or Cette fille est née en Italie,
Brandon : meaning "This girl was born in Italy." You can also use the verb
Yasmine: venir
Brandon: to say which city or country you’re from, even if it's not your hometown.
Yasmine: For example.. Je viens de Lyon.
Brandon: "I'm from Lyon." Okay, what’s next?
Yasmine: Quiconque,
Brandon: meaning "anyone." It’s a formal French word that you find mainly in formal registers, such as law and other administrative jargon. It can be an indefinite relative pronoun or an indefinite pronoun.
Yasmine: That’s right. Its meaning is something like tous les gens qui... "all persons who...". Quiconque only refers to people.
Brandon: But for French people, it sounds too formal, right?
Yasmine: Yes, and it can be hard to pronounce, so you can replace it with qui or another indefinite pronoun.
Brandon: Okay, now onto the grammar.

Lesson focus

Brandon: In this lesson, you'll learn how to compare things in French
Yasmine: Let’s first look at the word meilleur..
Brandon: ..which means "better."
Yasmine: When comparing things using the adjectives bon,
Brandon: "good,"
Yasmine: and the adverb bien,
Brandon: "well,"
Yasmine: ...be aware that when you’re expressing a greater degree, the conjugation is not plus bon or plus bien, but meilleur for the adjective bon, and mieux for the adjective bien.
Brandon: We heard this word in the dialogue, right?
Yasmine: That’s right. In the dialogue we had Mais tu connais Paris mieux que quiconque !
Brandon: Which means "But you know Paris better than anyone!"
Yasmine: Note that we didn’t say something like plus bon, which is a common mistake that French learners make.
Brandon: Can you give us one more example?
Yasmine: Sure. Ce costume est mieux fait que l'autre.
Brandon: which means "This costume is made better than the other one." And there are some other words for making comparatives. When comparing qualities, you can also use an adjective, right?
Yasmine: That’s right. For example...ton costume est plus élaboré que le costume de Boris.
Brandon: meaning "...your costume is more elaborate than Boris's."
Yasmine: Or.. Tu es aussi bonne que moi,
Brandon: meaning "You are as good as I am." As you can see in these sentences, there are three degrees of comparison in French.
Yasmine: That’s right. First we have plus.
Brandon: This means “more” and shows a greater degree of something. You also have another word like “as,” as in “the same as”, right?
Yasmine: Yes. It’s aussi. You can show equality with aussi.
Brandon: And also, a lesser degree can be characterized with the word meaning “less,” which is..
Yasmine: moins in French. To sum it up, you can say moins, aussi, or plus + adjective + que, or qu' to compare things.
Brandon: Listeners, make sure to check the lesson notes for more examples and explanations.

Outro

Brandon: And that’s all for this lesson. Thank you for listening, everyone, and we’ll see you next time! Bye!
Yasmine: À bientôt!

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