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First lesson of French :
Hello, welcome into my blog, my name is Théo and this is the first lesson of the blog. We will learn the very basics of French like its origin, the basic greetings but first, where do we speak French ?
French is a language which has a very important in the history of the world, it was the main language of exchanges after Latin and before English. During the XVIIth century, it was the language of science and literature thanks to the king Louis XIV. This language is spoken in France but also outside :
It is spoken in France, Belgium, Canada, Luxembourg, Monaco, Haïti, Côte d'Ivoire, Switzerland, Democratic Republic of Congo, Algeria, Morocco, Liban and so on. This language is spoken on the 6 continents ! French was spoken by the bourgeoisie in England during Middle Age because of the Norman Conquest, in such countries as Romania, Italy, Spain, etc. It was also spoken in Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam (Tokin, Annam and Cochinne) during the time of Indochina colony broken in 1954.
From where French does come and since when do we speak it ?
French has its roots in Late Latin and in Gallo-Romance languages, so it belongs to the Romance language family. French was a language used in the region of Paris and it expanded thanks to the Ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts, signed in 1539, putting French as the language of the state. We still have regionnal languages in France like Occitan, Catalanese, Franco-provençal, only two regionnal languages have no relation with a Romance language family : Breton and Basque.
Now you know a little about the history and the origin of the languages, let's learn !
Please note the fact that (fm) means formal and (infm) informal.
First of all, the most known of all, the famous one, Bonjour (fm) which means Hello, Bonjour is used during the morning and the afternoon, during evening and the night, we use Bonsoir.
Bonjour and bonsoir are quite formal greetings, when you are with friends, you can use Salut (infm) or Yo (infm), but there are informal use so don't use it with strangers or with your boss !
After bonjour, you generally ask " Comment allez-vous ? (fm) " which means "How are you ?" or "Comment ça va", "Comment vas-tu" or "ça va ?" with friends.
To answer the question, if you are fine, you say "Je vais bien, et vous ?" (f) which means "I'm fine, what about you ?", you can also answer ça va et toi ?, Bien et toi ? (infm) with your mates. If you are going bad, not in the sense you are feeling sick but in the sense you feel sad or whatever, you can say "Je ne vais pas bien, et vous ?" (fm) or ça ne va pas bien, je vais mal (infm) , etc.
To thanks someone, you use "Merci" , you can add Beaucoup or bien after Merci to show you are very glad or polite.
To the merci, you reply with joy "De rien" or "Il n'y a pas de quoi."
You had a great time with your friends but it's already the time to say goodbye or good night, you will say Au revoir (fm) or Salut (infm) to say goodbye and Bonne nuit for good night. I hope you shall not never use it, to tell "Farewell" to someone, you say Adieu (or litteraly translated as "To god").
So today, we learnt this :
Bonjour (day) = Good morning, good afternoon, hello,
Bonsoir (night) = Good evening, hello,
Salut = Hi,
Comment allez-vous ?, Comment ça va ?, ça va ? = How are you (going) ?,
Je vais bien, et vous ?, ça va, bien et toi ? = Fine, what about you ?, Good and you ?,
Je ne vais pas bien, et vous ?, ça ne va pas bien, je vais mal = I'm going bad,
Merci (merci beaucoup, merci bien) = Thanks (a lot),
De rien, il n'y a pas de quoi = You are welcome,
Au revoir = Good bye,
Salut = Bye,
Bonne nuit = Good night,
Farewell = Adieu. |
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