Learn some French homonyms
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 |
| Gabriella: Salut, chers auditeurs! Je m'appelle Gabriella. It’s Impossible to Find a Duck In The French Winter ! |
| Jeremy: Moi, c'est Jeremy. |
| Gabriella: Let's get started. Quel est le sujet de la leçon d'aujourd'hui ? |
| Jeremy: In this lesson, you’ll learn some French homonyms. The conversation is between Marc and Vincent. |
| Gabriella: Ok, donc c'est une conversation familière ? |
| Jeremy: Oui, et il fait très froid en ce moment. |
| Gabriella: Ok, let’s listen to the conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Marc : Je suis gelé, il fait un froid de canard ! |
| Vincent : Couvre-toi bien, c’est encore un coup à aller à l’hosto. Et ta mère va encore râler. |
| Marc : ‘sais pas. |
| Vincent : C’est pas quoi ? |
| Marc : Je sais pas. Maman trouve qu’il fait bon, plutôt. |
| Vincent : Plus tôt ? Mais quand ça ? |
| Marc : Ah mais non ! “Plutôt” ! Il fait encore beau, quoi. Mais j’ai froid. |
| Vincent : Je trouve qu’il fait un temps de chien. Allez, je mets une laine et au charbon ! |
| Gabriella: Now let's hear it with the English translation. |
| Marc : Je suis gelé, il fait un froid de canard ! |
| Marc: I'm frozen. It's like an arctic cold in there. |
| Vincent : Couvre-toi bien, c’est encore un coup à aller à l’hosto. Et ta mère va encore râler. |
| Vincent: Dress warmly, or you'll end up in the hospital once again, and your mom will moan again. |
| Marc : ‘sais pas. |
| Marc: I dunno. |
| Vincent : C’est pas quoi ? |
| Vincent: Don't know what? (lit., "It's not what?") |
| Marc : Je sais pas. Maman trouve qu’il fait bon, plutôt. |
| Marc: I don't know. Mom thinks it's rather warm. |
| Vincent : Plus tôt ? Mais quand ça ? |
| Vincent: Rather warm? (lit., "Earlier?") |
| Marc : Ah mais non ! “Plutôt” ! Il fait encore beau, quoi. Mais j’ai froid. |
| Marc: Hey, but not that "rather"! It's still nice outside, basically. But I'm cold. |
| Vincent : Je trouve qu’il fait un temps de chien. Allez, je mets une laine et au charbon ! |
| Vincent: I think it's wretched weather. I'm putting something warm on and going down the coal mine! |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Gabriella: Is it so cold in winter in France? |
| Jeremy: It’s not that bad, in my opinion. It’s just cold and dry. |
| Gabriella: They used a lot of idioms here! |
| Jeremy: Yes, the French use them a lot. Raconter des salades, par exemple. |
| Gabriella: "To tell salads?" But that’s total nonsense! |
| Jeremy: That’s the point! It’s used when someone is lying or talking nonsense! |
| Gabriella: Got it! What about un de ces quatre? |
| Jeremy: Literally “one of these four.” It means “soon,” and it can be used as “ see you” when parting. |
| Gabriella: Je t’appelle un de ces quatre. |
| Jeremy: "I call you soon." There is toucher du bois too. |
| Gabriella: It’s said to bring luck, right? |
| Jeremy: Oui, et les Français touchent un morceau de bois en même temps! |
| Gabriella: That’s funny, I like it! |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Gabriella: Let’s take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. |
| Gabriella: The first word we shall see is... |
| Jeremy: maman [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: mommy |
| Jeremy: maman [slowly - broken down by syllable] maman [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: Next |
| Jeremy: hosto [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: hospital (informal) |
| Jeremy: hosto [slowly - broken down by syllable] hosto [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: Next |
| Jeremy: se couvrir [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: to cover up |
| Jeremy: se couvrir [slowly - broken down by syllable] se couvrir [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: Next |
| Jeremy: râler [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: to complain, to grumble |
| Jeremy: râler [slowly - broken down by syllable] râler [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: Next |
| Jeremy: plutôt [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: rather |
| Jeremy: plutôt [slowly - broken down by syllable] plutôt [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: Next |
| Jeremy: aller au charbon [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: to go down the coal mine, to work hard |
| Jeremy: aller au charbon [slowly - broken down by syllable] aller au charbon [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: Next |
| Jeremy: froid de canard [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: arctic cold |
| Jeremy: froid de canard [slowly - broken down by syllable] froid de canard [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: Next |
| Jeremy: temps de chien [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: wretched weather |
| Jeremy: temps de chien [slowly - broken down by syllable] temps de chien [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: And last... |
| Jeremy: mettre une laine [natural native speed] |
| Gabriella: to put something warm on |
| Jeremy: mettre une laine [slowly - broken down by syllable] mettre une laine [natural native speed] |
| KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
| Gabriella Let's have a closer look at the usage for some of the words and phrases from this lesson. Jeremy, in this lesson, we’re learning idioms, right? |
| Jeremy: Oui, des expressions courantes, comme “aller au charbon” |
| Gabriella: “To go down the mine.” |
| Jeremy: C’est ça! It means "to go to work” but with the meaning of “working hard” and doing one’s best at work. |
| Gabriella: So in the dialogue, Vincent is saying he will work hard the whole day? |
| Jeremy: Yes, and that he is kind of unhappy with that! |
| Gabriella: Peut-être qu’il préférerait rester avec son fils? Même s’il fait un “froid de canard”! |
| Jeremy: (laughs) bien joué! This is our second idiom. It means ‘arctic cold”. |
| Gabriella: That’s strange… |
| Jeremy: Not that much, there are no ducks when it’s too cold outside! |
| Gabriella: Ok, je vois! And what about un temps de chien? “A dog weather” ? Doesn’t sound great... |
| Jeremy: En effet, ça veut dire "very bad weather”. It’s used when it’s raining a lot, for example. |
| Gabriella: I see. The French seem to like to compare weather and animals! |
| Jeremy: Haha, oui, c’est vrai. Notre dernière expression est “mettre une laine”. |
| Gabriella: "To put on some wool". I get the meaning: to put on something warm. |
| Jeremy: That’s right! It’s not used so often now, we would rather use se couvrir chaudement, meaning “to cover up warmly”. |
| Gabriella: I’ll definitely use them when I go to France! Okay now onto the grammar. |
| GRAMMAR POINT |
| Gabriella: In this lesson, you’ll learn about homonyms. |
| Jeremy: Yes, as in many languages, French has a lot of words that sound like others, but come with a different meaning. |
| Gabriella: There are some in the dialogue, such as “plutôt” and “plus tôt.” |
| Jeremy: They respectively mean “rather” and ‘“earlier”. Depending on the context, they can be mixed. |
| Gabriella: Je vois. C’est la même chose avec “bien tôt” et “bientôt”. |
| Jeremy: “quite early” and “soon”. Let’s see that with an example... C’est triste, tu sais. Il nous a quitté bien tôt… Et bientôt, ça sera notre tour. |
| Gabriella: "It’s sad, you know. He left us too early... and soon, it will be our turn." |
| Jeremy: Confusion can occur when writing too, for example, la and là with an accent grave |
| Gabriella: The first is a regular a, the second is an a with an accent. These mean “the” and “there” respectively. |
| Jeremy: For example... Où est-ce que je pose ma valise? And the answer can be Met la là. |
| Gabriella: "Where do I put my luggage?" " Put it there." |
| Jeremy: C’est ça. It’s the same for ou, and où with an accent grave. There is a tip with these! |
| Gabriella: They translate as “or” and “where”. And about the tip... the accent means it’s describing a place! |
| Jeremy: C’est tout à fait ça! “Je la pose où? Dans le salon ou dans la chambre?” |
| Gabriella: Where do I put it? In the living room, or in the bedroom? |
| Jeremy: Written or spoken, you can’t really mix them, but be careful about the accent! |
| Gabriella: Ok, je ferais attention, ce n’est pas très difficile! |
| Jeremy: Another one, quite tricky... “peut-être” and “peut être”. |
| Gabriella: “Maybe” and “might be”. |
| Jeremy: The only difference is the hyphen, actually! And they are supposed to be pronounced linked, but the French sometimes separate the second one. |
| Gabriella: peut-être (prononcer peutêtre) et peut être (prononcer peu-être). Je vois. |
| Jeremy: Il est peut-être perdu. |
| Gabriella: "Maybe he is lost." |
| Jeremy: Il peut être perdu. |
| Gabriella: "He might be lost. I think I got it." |
| Jeremy: With practice, you will get it very quickly. |
| Gabriella: Donc, n’hésitez pas à pratiquer dans les commentaires! |
| Jeremy: Bonne chance, et à la prochaine! |
Outro |
|---|
| Jeremy: Okay, that’s all for this lesson. |
| Gabriella: Thank you for listening everyone, and we’ll see you next time. |
| Jeremy: Salut! |
Comments
Hide