In Le Journal's video on chalets, we're treated to a fascinating description of a modern cabin entirely built of ancient wood. And speaking of modernity, the speaker's story includes quite a few instances of neuf and nouveau. Both adjectives mean "new," but each corresponds to a different meaning of the word "new."
Before we talk about the trick to distinguishing between neuf and nouveau, we should point out the feminine forms, which are irregular, of each adjective: the feminine of neuf is neuve, and the feminine of nouveau is nouvelle (though nouvel is used as the masculine form before words beginning with vowels or the silent letter h. For example: un nouvel album).
We see an instance of nouvelle right at the beginning of the chalet video.
Ce tronc d'arbre a été coupé il y a plus de deux cents ans.
This log was cut more than two hundred years ago.
Aujourd'hui Michel Ferrari lui redonne une nouvelle vie.
Today, Michel Ferrari gives it back a new life.
Captions 1-2, Le Journal - Le chalet
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Here, nouvelle vie denotes a life different from before. Notice that the qualifying adjective nouvelle precedes the noun vie.
A little further, we see nouveaux (the plural form of nouveau):
La Pologne fait par exemple partie des nouveaux fournisseurs.
Poland, for example, is among the new suppliers.
Caption 14, Le Journal - Le chalet
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Again, the adjective here indicates a change; the list of suppliers is now different from the previous one. And, once again, the adjective nouveaux is placed before the substantive fournisseurs.
Now, the following captions give us some examples of an entirely different meaning of "new."
Le vieux bois, un matériau très recherché
Old timber, a much sought-after material
pour les constructions de montagne,
for building in the mountains,
même s'il coûte deux fois plus cher que le bois neuf.
even if it costs twice as much as new wood.
Captions 3-4, Le Journal - Le chalet
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Here, bois neuf means wood that was recently produced. Notice that neuf is placed after the substantive bois.
We see the same primary meaning for neuf below:
Aujourd'hui pour construire, comme ici, du neuf avec du vieux.
Nowadays, to build, like here, the new with the old.
Caption 12, Le Journal - Le chalet
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The speaker is talking about the recent construction of these houses. (And note that neuf is a substantive here: "the new.")
Want some more examples of objects with which you could use neuf? You could have un manteau neuf (a new coat) or un livre neuf (a new book). And don't forget about the ironically named Pont-Neuf, which is actually the oldest bridge in Paris!
And what other types of changes would you describe with the word nouveau? You could use it to talk about une nouvelle amie (a new friend) or un nouveau numéro de téléphone (a new phone number).
If you look at all the examples above, you'll see that neuf is used for recent creations: objects, like wood, constructions, etc., that were recently manufactured and are thus "new to the world." Nouveau, however, is used to indicate a change: either something different or the most recent example of something (a change from before).
Now that we've explored the linguistic subtleties of these two adjectives, let’s look at a few more ways to use the words neuf and nouveau.
La Nouvelle Vague is the name of the post-WWII cinematic trend in France of shooting movies in a different, more realistic way and using modern, spontaneous young actors rather than handsome, classical movie stars. In English, we call this type of cinema "French New Wave." Nouvelle vague also became a cultural term, applying to the youth of the time, who aspired to change their lives, to have freedom without convention.
There is also the term nouvelle cuisine, which refers to a French cooking approach that uses light ingredients and emphasizes presentation—a change from the previous heavy classical cuisine.
So what about other ways to use neuf?
You probably know that neuf also means the number nine.
Neuf is also used in some common expressions, like peau neuve, which we can also see in the chalet video.
Nous voici dans une ancienne ferme proche de Megève.
Here we are in an old farmhouse near Megève.
C'est l'heure pour elle de faire peau neuve.
It's time for it to get a face-lift.
Captions 5-6, Le Journal - Le chalet
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This old farm is in need of a "new skin" to look better.
And speaking of old, our curious readers may be interested to know that the opposite of neuf/neuve is vieux/vieil/vieille; (vieil, like nouvel, is the masculine adjective for preceding vowel sounds), and the opposite of nouveau/nouvel/nouvelle is ancien/ancienne. Hard to believe there are five different options for such a simple word as "old"!
Stay tuned for a lesson that further discusses the placement of adjectives in French, which will help you solve that pesky "before or after?" dilemma.
You may have noticed the difference a little accent mark can make. Take the words côté, cote, and côte, for example. It’s the same four letters, but depending on the accents, both the meaning and the pronunciation can change.
Côté is a two-syllable word, while côte and cote are one-syllable words, each with its own unique pronunciation (though in some regions of France there may be little distinction in pronunciation).
In its most straightforward definition, côté means “side.”
Que je suis assis en face, et pas à tes côtés
Over the fact that I'm sitting across from you and not by your side
Caption 23, Babylon Circus - J'aurais bien voulu
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It may seem a bit odd that "by your side" is à tes côtés (plural) and not à ton côté (singular), but this is just how it's done in French.
When getting directions, you will often hear du côté droit (on the right hand side) or du côté gauche (on the left hand side). “Next to” (which, if you think about it, could be said “on the side of”) is expressed as à côté:
C'est juste à côté de la voiture.
It's right next to the car.
Côté can also be used to describe an aspect, a quality, or a “side” of something:
Je dirais les ingrédients qu'on a dans cette farce
I would say the ingredients in this stuffing
va [sic] donner ce côté savoureux et moelleux à la volaille.
will give the bird a savory and tender quality.
Captions 33-34, Le Journal - Gourmet en Bretagne
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But the word côté is not only used literally. It also appears in expressions like:
D’un côté... D’un autre côté...
On one hand... On the other hand...
Côté can also be used to show someone’s opinion, their “side” on an issue, or their perspective.
De son côté, Nicolas Sarkozy annonce sa volonté
For his part, Nicolas Sarkozy announces his desire
de rupture avec la politique africaine de la France.
to break away from France's African policies.
Caption 17, Le Journal - Sarkozy en Afrique du Sud - Part 1
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And we see the same sort of côté in the video on the marché in Rennes:
Bon, du côté de Cocotte, secret défense.
OK, as for Cocotte, it's top secret.
Caption 14, Le Journal - Gourmet en Bretagne
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But côté is not only used to express the perspective of a person. It can also be translated as “about” or “on the subject of” or “as for.” In the following example, it’s used to distinguish between the main and secondary railway lines:
Côté grandes lignes, la SNCF
As for the main lines, the SNCF
a depuis longtemps pensé aux voyageurs handicapés.
has kept handicapped travelers in mind for a long time.
Caption 12, Le Journal - Manifestation de paralysés
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Just in case that’s not enough to satisfy your curiosity, keep in mind the word côté’s similarly spelled (and hence easy to confuse) counterparts...
For starters, there's côte, one of the primary meanings of which is very similar-sounding to its English equivalent: “coast” (as in "the Pacific coast"). Actually, en français, the French Riviera is called the “Côte d'Azur.”
Venu de sa Côte d'Azur natale,
Having come from his native French Riviera,
il est tombé amoureux de l'île et de ses fonds marins.
he fell in love with the island and its sea depths.
Caption 7, Le Journal - L'île de Pâques
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Côte can also mean “rib,” as in côte d’Adam or côte d’agneau (what we call a “lamb chop”).
And last but not least, the second video in the series on Sarkozy’s trip to South Africa gives us an example of an entirely different kind of cote, which means “stock.” This can be in the literal sense (stock market) or refer to the general worth/esteem of something or someone, as below.
Alors que sa cote continue de chuter,
As his stock continues to tumble,
Nicolas Sarkozy tente un quitte ou double vis-à-vis de l'opinion.
Nicolas Sarkozy tries to double down on opinion.
Captions 17-18, Le Journal - Sarkozy en Afrique du Sud - Part 2
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There’s also a related verb, coter, which means to rate, quote, or list the price of something.
Cette voiture est cotée à 24.000$ dans le journal.
This car is listed at $24,000 in the newspaper.
Whether you’re talking economics, opinions, proximity, food, or geography, you’ll be better equipped knowing the nuances and differences of these similarly spelled words!
It's easy to get lost in the French language, let alone for things to get lost in translation. So many French words have multiple meanings, and often the meanings are surprisingly disparate. That makes context particularly important in the understanding of French. But what if the context itself seems to support multiple meanings? The solution is to redouble your efforts and discern the logic of the utterance as well as you can. The French appreciate the subtleties of language—and you have to pay close attention to properly parse them.
The verb relever is a good example. It's made up of the verb lever (to raise) and the prefix re- (again). As a reflexive verb, se relever means to get back up (e.g., after you've fallen); as a transitive verb, relever means to stand something back up after it's fallen over (e.g., a lamp). It can also mean simply "to raise" something, including prices. (Ils ont relevé leurs prix: "They have raised their prices.") So we might easily be tempted to believe that the following, spoken by a France 2 reporter, is about a strange mission to raise the prices of food at a local supermarket:
Objectif de la matinée: relever les prix dans un magasin Carrefour.
The morning's goal is to note the prices at a Carrefour store.
Captions 5-6, Le Journal - Contrôle des prix alimentaires
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The news crew, however, is not setting out to jack up the price of butter and baguettes. As you can see from the translation we have chosen, relever has other meanings, one of which is "to note" or "to survey." The morning's goal is to take note of the prices found at a Carrefour (one of the world's largest supermarket chains), not to raise them. How do we know the meaning here is "to note" rather than "to raise"? It's hard to say, but we have to apply logic and common sense—good old French rationality. It simply wouldn't make sense for the French Minister of Finance to march into a store and raise prices.
We find the verb used again in the line that follows:
Yaourt nature par seize,
Plain yogurt sixteen-pack,
deux cinquante-cinq, relevé à deux quatre-vingt-cinq.
two fifty-five, noted at two eighty-five.
Captions 6-7, Le Journal - Contrôle des prix alimentaires
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The speaker is using a bit of verbal shorthand. The price for a sixteen pack of plain yogurt is found to be 2.55 euros today, but it had been "noted" (relevé) in the past at a higher rate, 2.85 euros. This story is a little bit complicated: it turns out that prices on supermarket shelves were found to be considerably lower than those reported in a study of online (delivery service) supermarket prices by the French consumer magazine Soixante Millions de Consommateurs (Sixty Million Consumers).
Donc, ça signifie que les prix en grande surface
So, that means prices in big supermarkets
sont moins élevés que ce qui a été relevé par
are lower than what was recorded by
"Soixante Millions de Consommateurs".
"Sixty Million Consumers" [French "Consumer Reports"].
Captions 8-9, Le Journal - Contrôle des prix alimentaires
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Once again, relever is used to indicate that information was "noted" or "recorded." A generic term for things that are recorded, in the context of an investigation such as the one conducted by the consumer magazine, is "findings." The French word for "findings" is relevés (the noun form of relever), and we find it used a few lines later in the same news report:
Et ses relevés, au moment de passer en caisse,
And her findings, as she goes through checkout,
sont l'occasion de répéter le même message...
provide the opportunity to repeat the same message...
Captions 13-14, Le Journal - Contrôle des prix alimentaires
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If you've ever had a French bank account, you're familiar with a relevé de comptes. Here, relevé means "record." Literally, then, a relevé de comptes is a "record of accounts," better known to English speakers as a "statement."
So what have we noted today? Qu'est-ce qu'on a relevé? Certainly, you should now be familiar with some of the meanings of this intriguing word. (There's another interesting discussion of it here.) Perhaps you've also learned—or been reminded—to fully consider context before jumping to conclusions about the meaning of a word. Context, properly discerned with good common sense, is the trusty guide that can keep you from getting lost in French.
We provided you with a few things to take note of today, n'est-ce pas?