Learn trends toward using more English in France and ways to endear yourself to your French-speaking hosts
Now Playing: Lesson Audio
Get a breakdown of the dialogue and translations instantly with the Premium line-by-line Audio. Sign up for your Free Lifetime Account Now and get 7 Days of Premium Access including this feature.
Get this lesson’s key vocab, their translations and pronunciations. Sign up for your Free Lifetime Account Now and get 7 Days of Premium Access including this feature.
Unlock Lesson Notes and Transcripts for every single lesson. Sign Up for a Free Lifetime Account and Get 7 Days of Premium Access.
| INTRODUCTION |
| Virginie: Bonjour à tous! Hello everyone. |
| Eric: Hello, Eric here. That Is So Cliche…You Did Not Just Say That! |
| Virginie: Hello everyone, I am Virginie and welcome back. So Eric, what are we going to see in this lesson? |
| Eric: Today we are going to be looking at Joe’s conversation as it revolves on the plane. |
| Virginie: Right. Joe is still sitting by Manon and they are still talking, which is a good sign I guess for Joe. |
| Eric: Things are looking well for Joe. Let’s begin the conversation. |
Lesson conversation |
|---|
| Manon : (à l'hôtesse de l'air) Excusez-moi, de l'eau s'il vous plaît. |
| Joe : Pour moi aussi, s'il vous plaît. |
| Stewart : Oui Madame, oui Monsieur. |
| Manon : Désolée. Donc, la Californie c'est bien. Tout le monde est heureux. |
| Joe : (il rit) Lyon est bien aussi. Et qu'est-ce que tu fais à Lyon? |
| Manon : Je suis ingénieur. |
| Joe : Tu peux répéter? |
| Manon : Je suis ingénieur. |
| Joe : Je ne comprends pas, désolé. |
| Manon : "Ingénieur", en anglais, c'est Engineer. |
| Joe : Tu peux parler anglais? |
| Manon : Oui, un peu. |
| Eric: One more time, a little more slowly. |
| Virginie: Encore une fois, plus lentement. |
| Manon : (à l'hôtesse de l'air) Excusez-moi, de l'eau s'il vous plaît. |
| Joe : Pour moi aussi, s'il vous plaît. |
| Stewart : Oui Madame, oui Monsieur. |
| Manon : Désolée. Donc, la Californie c'est bien. Tout le monde est heureux. |
| Joe : (il rit) Lyon est bien aussi. Et qu'est-ce que tu fais à Lyon? |
| Manon : Je suis ingénieur. |
| Joe : Tu peux répéter? |
| Manon : Je suis ingénieur. |
| Joe : Je ne comprends pas, désolé. |
| Manon : "Ingénieur", en anglais, c'est Engineer. |
| Joe : Tu peux parler anglais? |
| Manon : Oui, un peu. (On peut se dire ‘tu'.) |
| Eric: One more time, with the translation. |
| Virginie: Encore une fois, avec la traduction. |
| Manon : (à l'hôtesse de l'air) Excusez-moi, de l'eau s'il vous plaît. |
| Eric: (to flight attendant) Excuse me, some water, please. |
| Joe : Pour moi aussi, s'il vous plaît. |
| Eric: Me too, please. |
| Stewart : Oui Madame, oui Monsieur. |
| Eric: Yes ma'am, sir. |
| Manon : Désolée. Donc, la Californie c'est bien. Tout le monde est heureux. |
| Eric: Sorry. So, California is nice. Everybody is happy. |
| Joe : (il rit) Lyon est bien aussi. Et qu'est-ce que tu fais à Lyon? |
| Eric: (laughs) Lyon is nice too. And what do you do in Lyon? |
| Manon : Je suis ingénieur. |
| Eric: I'm an engineer. |
| Joe : Tu peux répéter? |
| Eric: Can you repeat? |
| Manon : Je suis ingénieur. |
| Eric: I'm an engineer. |
| Joe : Je ne comprends pas, désolé. |
| Eric: I don't understand. Sorry. |
| Manon : "Ingénieur", en anglais, c'est Engineer. |
| Eric: "Ingénieur," in English, is "engineer." |
| Joe : Tu peux parler anglais? |
| Eric: You can speak English? |
| Manon : Oui, un peu. (On peut se dire ‘tu'.) |
| Eric: Yes, a bit. (We can say 'tu' to each other.) |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Virginie: So English is pretty popular in France. |
| Virginie: Well, yes among young people, yes it is. |
| Eric: A lot of English words are used in French too. |
| Virginie: Oh we like to say a parking lot, so you will say "parking" in French. |
| Eric: Parking. That’s interesting. I noticed that they will kind of chop off parts of the English phrase to make them more easy to say, more French. |
| Virginie: Do you have another example? |
| Eric: Well, for example, instead of saying an email, you can just say "email." |
| Virginie: That’s because a lot of people don’t want to give us any English words. So they turn all the English words into French words and that’s really funny. It’s true. And English is also used in French for marketing purposes. |
| Eric: Right, for example, a new supermarket chain is called Simply Market. |
| Virginie: Oh yes, that’s true. That’s because you know, English words sound way cooler, more trendy or something. |
| Eric: I know. Even there are catch phrases in English. Be happy, be simply. |
| Virginie: Oh so catchy. On the other hand, many French people are not very good at foreign languages, especially in English. |
| Eric: Right. French people can be a little reluctant to speak it. |
| Virginie: Yes especially if you are in France. |
| Eric: So a good way to avoid an icy greeting is to start in French and then maybe see if they want to warm up just some English. |
| Virginie: Oui. Absolutely. |
| Eric: So what vocabulary do we have? |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Virginie: l'eau [natural native speed] |
| Eric: water |
| Virginie: l'eau [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Virginie: l'eau [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Virginie: madame [natural native speed] |
| Eric: ma'am, Mrs. |
| Virginie: madame [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Virginie: madame [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Virginie: monsieur [natural native speed] |
| Eric: sir, Mr. |
| Virginie: monsieur [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Virginie: monsieur [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Virginie: être [natural native speed] |
| Eric: to be |
| Virginie: être [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Virginie: être [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Virginie: heureux/heureuse [natural native speed] |
| Eric: happy |
| Virginie: heureux/heureuse [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Virginie: heureux/heureuse [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Virginie: tout le monde [natural native speed] |
| Eric: everybody |
| Virginie: tout le monde [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Virginie: tout le monde [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Virginie: qu'est-ce que / qu'est-ce qu' [natural native speed] |
| Eric: what |
| Virginie: qu'est-ce que / qu'est-ce qu' [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Virginie: qu'est-ce que / qu'est-ce qu' [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Virginie: faire [natural native speed] |
| Eric: to do, to make |
| Virginie: faire [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Virginie: faire [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Virginie: vous [natural native speed] |
| Eric: you (formal) |
| Virginie: vous [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Virginie: vous [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Virginie: ingénieur [natural native speed] |
| Eric: engineer |
| Virginie: ingénieur [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Virginie: ingénieur [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Virginie: comprendre [natural native speed] |
| Eric: to understand |
| Virginie: comprendre [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Virginie: comprendre [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Virginie: anglais(e) [natural native speed] |
| Eric: English |
| Virginie: anglais(e) [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Virginie: anglais(e) [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Virginie: savoir [natural native speed] |
| Eric: to know |
| Virginie: savoir [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Virginie: savoir[natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Virginie: parler [natural native speed] |
| Eric: to speak, to talk |
| Virginie: parler [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Virginie: parler [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Virginie: un peu [natural native speed] |
| Eric: a little |
| Virginie: un peu [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Virginie: un peu [natural native speed] |
| : Next: |
| Virginie: moi aussi [natural native speed] |
| Eric: me too |
| Virginie: moi aussi [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Virginie: moi aussi [natural native speed] |
| KEY VOCABULARY AND PHRASES |
| Virginie: What do we have here? |
| Eric: Well, our first word is heureux. |
| Virginie: That means "happy." |
| Eric: It's little bit difficult to pronounce though, isn't it? |
| Virginie: Yes, let's see, heureux. |
| Eric: And that is the male adjective for “happy.” Let me give it a try, heureux. |
| Virginie: Yes, perfect! Heureux. |
| Eric: What about the female version? |
| Virginie: Well, a happy lady would be a heureuse lady! Heureuse. |
| Eric: Ok, so it's heureuse. Pretty close to the male heureux. |
| Virginie: Yes, but it ends with the sound "z", heureuse. |
| Eric: Ok, now what is our next word? |
| Virginie: Tout le monde! |
| Eric: Everybody |
| Virginie: Oui, let me break it down "tout-le-monde" |
| Eric: Literally it is "all the world," |
| Virginie: Yes. tout |
| Eric: "All" |
| Virginie: Le |
| Eric: "The" |
| Virginie: and monde |
| Eric: "World." Tout le monde. |
| Virginie: Yes so to say "everybody is happy", you will say |
| Eric: Tout le monde est heureux. |
| Virginie: Voila! Tout le monde est heureux! |
| Eric: And now we have un peu. |
| Virginie: Un peu is important, it's good to nuance your speech. Un peu is "a little." |
| Eric: That would be very handy if you want to say you only speak a little French. |
| Virginie: Right, if someone asks you if you speak French, you can answer "un peu." Now, let's get ready for grammar, Eric! |
Lesson focus |
| Eric: Right, this lesson is about asking someone their profession. |
| Virginie: Yes, in our dialog, Joe says - qu'est-ce que tu fais a Lyon? |
| Eric: So, what do you do in Lyon? |
| Virginie: The words "Qu'est-ce que" at the beginning of question stand for "what" |
| Eric: And the second part of the question is "tu fais" |
| Virginie: Which means "you do". Tu is "you" and fais is "do." |
| Eric: So literally, this is "what you do?" |
| Virginie: Qu'est-ce que tu fais? |
| Eric: And if Virginie actually asks me |
| Virginie: Qu'est-ce que tu fais Eric? |
| Eric: I will answer, Je suis professeur de francais, I am a French teacher. |
| Virginie: Now, je is "I" and suis is "am." "I am," je suis. |
| Eric: Ok a quick recap. Virginie, qu'est-ce que tu fqis? |
| Virginie: Je suis professeur de francais. |
| Eric: Ok, now is time to introduce the verb etre, "to be." |
| Virginie: Yes, it is used twice in our dialog so it's important. |
| Eric: The first time is in the phrase we talked about earlier |
| Virginie: Remember, tout le monde is "everybody," and our sentence is - tout le monde est heureux. |
| Eric: "Everybody is happy." |
| Virginie: Oui, here our verbe etre, to be, is conjugated with tout le monde, which could be replaced easily by il or elle. |
| Eric: Il and elle are "he" and "she." |
| Virginie: So to say he is/she is, you will say - il est/elle est. |
| Eric: And est is spelled EST. |
| Virginie: Right, so remember, il est / elle est / tout le monde est. |
| Virginie: And a little later in the dialog etre is conjugated with je. |
| Eric: As we actually just saw, je suis , "I am." |
| Virginie: Oui. Manon says - je suis ingenieur, "I am an engineer." |
| Eric: Just like Virginie and I earlier said, je suis professeur de francais, "I am a French teacher." One other interesting point is, if you want to say professions, you don't have to say "a engineer" or "a French teacher," you just say je suis ingenieur, je suis professeur. |
| Virginie: Exactly! That's a good point. Yeah, forget about the article in French when you say your profession. Je suis, and then directly professeur de francais. |
| Virginie: So, to recap real quick, Eric. Je suis is "I am." |
| Eric: And il est is "he is," elle est is "she is." |
Outro |
| Virginie: Ouf! I think we're done for this lesson!! |
| Eric: That was a workout. |
| Virginie: That was intense. Ok! Thank you all for listening. |
| Eric: See you soon. |
Comments
Hide