In our previous lesson on nouns referring to humans, we learned that many nouns have dual genders that often end in -e in the feminine, which is especially useful for the feminization of job titles. In this lesson, we’ll focus on the many ways to feminize a job title and discuss what happens when there is no feminine equivalent.
Most profession names are masculine in French, regardless of whether they refer to men or women:
On a donc un kit de montage complet opérationnel à la portée d'un bon bricoleur ou d'un plombier
So we have a completely operational mounting kit within the capability of a good handyman or a plumber
Captions 30-31, Salon Eco Habitat: Primacalc, système anti-calcaire
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When no feminine title is available, we default to masculine. So, when referring to a woman pilot, for instance, we would simply say un pilote or une femme pilote (a woman pilot). (You may come across the feminine title une pilote, but it's relatively rare.)
Deux femmes pilotes parlent de leurs parcours : sexisme et regard des passagers.
Two female pilots talk about their journeys: sexism and passengers’ stares.
We also resort to the masculine when referring to a profession in general, as in les enseignants (teachers), or when we don’t know the gender of the person in question:
Parce que je dispose d'excellents liens avec les enseignants de mon master,
Because I have excellent connections with my master's degree instructors
Caption 66, QuestionEntretien: Pourquoi vous et pas un autre ? - Part 3
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For all that, many job titles do have a feminine equivalent, which often ends in -e, as in une députée (a female deputy):
Madame George Pau-Langevin, la députée de la quinzième circonscription
Ms. George Pau-Langevin, the deputy for the fifteenth constituency
Caption 92, Actu Vingtième: Le bleu dans les yeux, recyclerie de Belleville
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Note that you can only add an extra -e to an accented -é (-ée). Nouns that already end in -e (no accent) don’t change in the feminine form, as in un/une dentiste (a male/female dentist), the profession chosen by the girl’s schoolmate in the following video from Côte d'Ivoire:
Je veux être une dentiste.
I want to be a dentist.
Caption 96, Nader Fakhry: L'école pour tous
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(Bear in mind that usually, you would omit the article un/une when the job title comes directly after the verb être, but this may vary from one French-speaking country to another.)
In many cases, though, feminizing a job title is not as simple as adding an -e and requires making changes to the noun.
Sometimes switching to feminine will cause a change in pronunciation for words ending with a consonant, as in un enseignant/une enseignante (teacher). The t in enseignante (female teacher) is sounded, but the t in enseignant (male teacher) is not:
Je suis enseignante de français langue étrangère, à l'Université Nancy Deux
I am an instructor of French as a foreign language at the University of Nancy Two
Caption 2, Yabla à Nancy: Université Nancy 2
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Other times, you will need to add a grave accent (è) and an extra -e to nouns ending in -er, as in infirmier/infirmière (male/female nurse). The suffix -er becomes -ère:
Je voulais être médecin. -C'est vrai? -Ouais, et je suis infirmière.
I wanted to be a doctor. -Is that true? -Yeah, and I am a nurse.
Caption 55, Micro-Trottoirs: Rêves d’enfants
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Nouns ending in -en often change to -enne in the feminine, as in chirurgien/chirurgienne (male/female surgeon). In the following example, we have the masculine version, un chirurgien, with a silent -n:
Françoise Artigues accuse son chirurgien, le docteur Cujasse
Françoise Artigues is accusing her surgeon, Doctor Cujasse
Caption 1, Le Jour où tout a basculé - À l'audience: Mon chirurgien était ivre - Part 1
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Nouns ending with the suffix -eur in the masculine form are a little bit more complicated, as they can take on different endings in the feminine.
Un professeur (a male professor) simply becomes une professeur in the feminine or, less often, une professeure:
Et j'ai pris sa suite avec la même professeur [or professeure] en fait.
And I followed in her footsteps with the same teacher, actually.
Caption 42, LCM Concert: La Folia à l'abbaye Saint-Victor
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Un auteur (a male author) can be feminized in two different ways. You can call a female author une auteure, a term borrowed from Canada, or you can say une autrice, the suffix -trice being more popular in France:
Enfin, en 2012, l’Académie française propose à son tour l’adoption du mot « auteure ».
Finally in 2012, the Académie Française in turn proposes the adoption of the word “auteure” (female author).
Indeed, in Canada, they use the -eure suffix, as in traducteure (female translator), more frequently than in France, where they say traductrice instead:
Euh, ça m'a permis beaucoup de voyager et d'être parfois même la traducteure pour mon père ou ma mère
Uh, it's allowed me to travel a lot and to sometimes even be the translator for my dad or my mom
Captions 21-22, Annie Chartrand: Grandir bilingue
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The French usually prefer to use the suffix -trice, as in un acteur/une actrice. In the example below, Melissa Mars introduces herself as une actrice (an actress), among other things:
Bonjour! Je suis Melissa Mars. Je suis actrice, chanteuse, française ou martienne.
Hello! I am Melissa Mars. I'm an actress, singer, French or Martian.
Caption 1, Melissa Mars: Melissa et son premier album
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She also introduces herself as a singer, une chanteuse. Here we have yet another feminine form of -eur: -euse. So une chanteuse is un chanteur in the masculine, and une serveuse (a waitress) is un serveur (a waiter):
La serveuse t'aime bien Nico.
The waitress likes you, Nico.
Caption 16, Extr@ Ep. 6 - Le jour du loto - Part 5
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You might also see the suffix -esse, as in docteur/doctoresse (male/female doctor) and maître/maîtresse (school master/schoolmistress), but it's pretty dated.
The Académie Française, the French authority on language, has introduced many new feminine job titles, but it’s up to people to adopt them. Sometimes, women themselves don’t systematically adopt newly feminized titles. In the following video, the female judge introduces herself as le juge Beaulieu (Judge Beaulieu) even though she could have introduced herself as la juge:
Bonjour, je suis le juge Beaulieu.
Hello, I am Judge Beaulieu.
Caption 31, Le Jour où tout a basculé: À l'audience - Arnaque en couple ? - Part 1
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As you can see, the feminization of job titles is a work in progress, fraught with ambiguity and, sometimes, controversy. Just be sure to follow the correct grammatical rules applying to both masculine and feminine titles, as they are not negotiable in most cases.
Thanks for reading! Stay tuned for our next lesson on the gender of nouns referring to animals.
The preposition dans can mean "in," "inside," or "into," depending on context. For example, elle est dans la maison could either be "she is in the house" or "she is inside the house," and elle va dans la maison could be "she goes inside the house" or "she goes into the house." In this lesson, we'll focus on "inside" (and its opposite, "outside"), which has a few other translations besides dans.
The first is dedans. Unlike dans, which is a preposition, dedans usually functions as an adverb. It can either mean "inside" or "indoors":
Là y'a nouveau jeu. Ils doivent deviner combien il y a de bonbons dedans.
There's a new game. They have to guess how many candies there are inside.
Caption 49, Actu Vingtième - Fête du quartier Python-Duvernois
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Je n'aime pas rester dedans toute la journée.
I don't like staying indoors all day.
Like "inside," dedans can also be used as a noun:
Le dedans de l'église est très sombre.
The inside of the church is very dark.
We could also say l'intérieur de l'église est très sombre (the interior of the church is very dark), or simply il fait très sombre dans l'église (it's very dark inside the church). In fact, l'intérieur is the other word for "inside" in French. You'll often see it in the phrase à l'intérieur (de), which can also mean "within":
Maintenant, on va la laisser reposer
Now we are going to let it rest
pour que les levures à l'intérieur puissent permettre à notre pâte d'être aérée.
so that the yeast inside can allow our dough to be airy.
Captions 32-33, Alsace 20 - Grain de Sel: le Lycée hôtelier Alexandre Dumas
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Alors des maisons, c'est très rare d'en trouver, euh...
So [standalone] houses, it's very rare to find them, uh...
à l'intérieur de Paris, je vous le promets.
within Paris, I promise you.
Captions 19-20, Antoine - La Butte-aux-Cailles
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We could easily rewrite these two examples using dedans and dans: les levures dedans (the yeast inside), en trouver dans Paris (find them in Paris).
Now let's move "outside." Though French has a general word for "in" (dans), it doesn't have one for "out." However, dedans and à l'intérieur (de) do have direct opposites: dehors and à l'extérieur (de).
Dehors functions in the exact same way as dedans, as an adverb or noun:
Dois-je payer pour ce qu'ils font dehors?
Should I pay for what they do outside?
Caption 20, Alain Etoundi - Allez tous vous faire enfilmer!
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Le dehors de la maison est plus joli que le dedans.
The outside of the house is nicer than the inside.
There's also the phrase en dehors de, which means "outside of" in both a literal and figurative sense:
Parce qu'il y a énormément de personnes qui vont travailler en dehors de Paris.
Because there are so many people who go to work outside of Paris.
Captions 47-48, Adrien - Le métro parisien
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En dehors de ça, je ne vois aucune autre solution.
Outside of that, I don't see any other solution.
Sometimes you'll see hors de rather than dehors de:
J'aurais du mal à vivre hors de Paris maintenant.
I'd have trouble living outside of Paris now.
Captions 38-39, Elisa et sa maman - Comment vas-tu?
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But hors (de) usually means "outside" figuratively, along the lines of "beyond," "without," or "excluding":
C'est hors de question!
That's out of the question!
Le loyer est de 600 euros hors charges.
The rent is 600 euros excluding utilities.
Finally, there's à l'extérieur, the opposite of à l'intérieur:
Ce quartier-là, à l'extérieur, il a quand même une certaine réputation...
This neighborhood, on the outside, it has a certain reputation, nevertheless...
Caption 52, Actus Quartier - Fête de quartier Python-Duvernois
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Ça m'a permis d'aller travailler à l'extérieur de ce pays.
It's allowed me to work outside of this country.
Caption 24, Annie Chartrand - Grandir bilingue
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Il y a des gargouilles sur l'extérieur de la cathédrale.
There are gargoyles on the cathedral's exterior.
Now you know all the ways of saying "inside" and "outside" inside and out!
"Only" might seem like a pretty lonely word, but there are actually several different ways of saying it in French: the adjectives seul(e) and unique, the adverb seulement and uniquement, and the verb phrase ne... que.
First let’s take a look at the words seul(e) and seulement:
Parce que le mardi, c'est le seul jour où je ne travaille pas.
Because Tuesday is the only day when I don't work.
Caption 10, Fred et Miami Catamarans - Fred et sa vie à Miami
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Aussi je vais dire seulement trois choses.
Also I am only going to say three things.
Caption 10, Le Journal - Joëlle Aubron libérée
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Seulement is the adverbial form of the adjective seul(e), which has another similar (and sadder!) meaning as well:
Alors je me retrouve un petit peu seul en ce moment.
So I find myself a little alone right now.
Caption 5, Hugo Bonneville - Gagner sa vie
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Some other ways of saying "alone" or "lonely" are solitaire and isolé(e).
And seulement has some additional meanings of its own. It can be used to express a regret ("if only...") and to mean "however":
Si seulement je l'avais su avant.
If only I had known before.
Il veut venir, seulement il ne peut pas.
He wants to come, however he can't.
Although unique and uniquement are most directly translated as "unique" and "uniquely," they can also mean "only":
Je suis un enfant unique.
I am an only child.
Ce que l'on demande, c'est d'avoir uniquement la photo de l'animal.
What we're asking is to have only the photo of the animal.
Caption 17, Grand Lille TV - Des photos contre l'abandon des animaux
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Now let’s look at a bit more complicated way of saying "only": the verb phrase ne... que. As you might have guessed, ne... que is a negative construction, as in ne... pas (not), ne... personne (no one), and ne... rien (nothing). In these constructions, the two components go on either side of the verb:
Il ne mesure que soixante-dix mètres carrés,
It only measures seventy square meters,
Caption 8, Voyage dans Paris - Saint-Germain-des-Prés
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Moi je ne parlais que français.
Me, I spoke only French.
Caption 10, Annie Chartrand - Grandir bilingue
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Most of the time, ne... que can be replaced with seulement:
Il mesure seulement soixante-dix mètres carrés.
It only measures seventy square meters.
Moi, je parlais seulement français.
Me, I spoke only French.
Sometimes, que can mean "only" outside of the ne... que construction. For example, in an interview with Le Figaro, A-lister Ashton Kutcher laments being typecast as a jokester, declaring: "Je ne suis pas qu’un clown!" (I’m not only a clown!)
The ne in this sentence goes with pas (not), while the que stands on its own to mean "only." Ashton (or his translator) could just as well have said, Je ne suis pas seulement un clown!
Maybe the former "Punk’d" star can shed his clownish reputation by undertaking some serious French studies at Yabla French! Since he’s known to be an avid tweeter, he might want to start by following us on Twitter @Yabla. And you should follow us too!
Give up? Start thinking in French. Do you see it now? They're all French homophones! So what are the tricks to distinguishing between mère, maire, and mer.
Let’s start off where life itself does—with our proud moms. In French, your mother is your mère.
Annie Chartrand, from Quebec, recalls the limited English ability of her own mère (as well as her père, her father).
Si je pense à mes parents, à mon père et ma mère,
If I think of my parents, my dad or my mom,
ils parlent anglais, mais c'est un peu plus,
they speak English, but it's a bit more like,
comme on dit en bon québécois, "baragouiné".
as we say in good Quebecois French, "baragouiné."
Captions 14-16, Annie Chartrand - Grandir bilingue
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Charles Baptiste, from Paris, sings of something nobody wants their mother to do (nobody nice anyway) in the song Je sais:
Tandis que ma mère se met à pleurer
Whereas my mother starts crying
Caption 21, Charles-Baptiste - Je sais
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Let's move away from such sadness (we hope Charles's mère is feeling better) to our second homophone: maire (mayor).
One way to distinguish this word from its homophones: maire (mayor) is a masculine noun and so is preceded by the masculine article le. But la mère (the mother) and la mer (the sea) are both feminine. Note that more people nowadays are using la maire to refer to a female mayor (see our lesson about the feminization of professions in French), although the officially correct term is la mairesse.
The mayor of Groslay, a town north of Paris, is not very popular… He banned chicken in municipal lunchrooms because of fears of avian flu.
L'interdiction du maire a également déclenché la colère des agriculteurs.
The mayor's ban has also triggered the anger of the farmers.
Caption 9, Le Journal - Le poulet dans les cantines
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However, some mayors are less cautious than others. The mayor of Lille, for example, not only supported protesters who recklessly (and illegally) switched off street lighting in the city center, she joined their rally, French flag in hand!
Et c'est toujours au nom du service public
And it is still in the name of the public service
que la maire de Lille soutient les agents d'EDF en grève.
that the mayor of Lille supports the EDF agents on strike.
Captions 22-23, Le Journal - Grève de l'EDF à Lille
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Let's move on to our last homophone: la mer (the sea).
La mer is often a romantic image in popular songs. (Who doesn't love a little Charles Trenet?) Lyon-based ska band Babylon Circus sings about the sea in a song about dreams and lost hopes:
Les rames étaient trop courtes pour atteindre le niveau de la mer
The oars were too short to reach sea level
Caption 12, Babylon Circus - J'aurais bien voulu
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So now, no more confusion between la mère (the mother), le maire (the mayor), and la mer (the sea)!
You've no doubt noticed the difference in accent between the French and the Québécois. But have you noticed that the vocabulary, and even the grammar, is different? There are a lot of words that are unique to Québécois French—for example, the word blonde in the band name Ma blonde est une chanteuse (see the video of the same name) means "girlfriend"—the French would say copine or, more informally, nana.
These linguistic distinctions are simple enough, but sometimes there's something even trickier at play.
Annie Chartrand says that she spoke good enough English as a kid to act as la traducteure (the translator) for her mom or dad:
Ça m'a permis beaucoup de voyager
It's allowed me to travel a lot
et d'être parfois même la traducteure pour mon père ou ma mère
and to sometimes even be the translator for my dad or my mom
lorsqu'on on partait en vacances dans le sud.
when we went on vacation in the south.
Captions 21-23, Annie Chartrand - Grandir bilingue
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But if we look in the dictionary, the "correct" feminine form of the masculine traducteur is traductrice—and this in fact is the form you will find used both in Quebec and in France. So where would Annie have gotten this other form (which, as far as we know, is not in common use anywhere)?
Annie's use of the phrase la traducteure is probably related to the fact that Quebec, historically, has been in the vanguard of the movement to feminize professional titles in the French language. In fact, the period Annie is talking about in the video was not long after the election of the progressive Parti Québécois in the provincial election of 1976. What does this have to do with anything? To make a long story short, a lot of women were elected to positions of power that used to be held by men, and they wanted feminine titles in cases where traditional French lacked them. They petitioned the Office de la langue française, Quebec's authority on all things linguistic, and got official approval. Specifically, the OLF decreed that feminine titles (in those cases where none previously existed) could be created by "spontaneously creating a feminine form that respects French morphology." Thereafter, the Québécois got in the habit of feminizing titles when appropriate.
Ingénieur (engineer), for example, had no feminine form, so, respecting French morphology, we get une ingénieure. Or we get une professeure from un professeur (professor) as well as une auteure from un auteur (author).
And this, we speculate, is why Annie came up with la traducteure. Even though traducteur already has a traditional feminine form in traductrice, Annie applied the logic behind the many "modern" feminizations that she grew up with to produce this novel alternative.
Examples of other modern feminizations of professions which traditionally had no feminine counterpart include these:
Un député/une députée (deputy)
Un chirurgien/une chirurgienne (surgeon)
Un praticien/une praticienne (medical practitioner)
Un pilote/une pilote (pilot)
Un juge/une juge (judge)
Un guitariste/une guitariste (guitarist)
Though the tradition-bound French have been slow to keep up with the progressive Québécois in this aspect of the language, the term la ministre is now common in French politics. The French generally agree that the issue is all very confusing, and they sometimes aren't even sure how to feminize a title. A good rule of thumb: say it in Québécois!
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