Did you know that the funny “little hat” (^) symbol that can appear above any vowel (â, ê, î, ô, û) actually serves a purpose? The accent circumflex (^) can indicate a spelling change from Latin, a change to the pronunciation of “a, e, o”, and / or distinguish between words otherwise spelled the same. […]
Did you know that the funny little symbol under the letter « ç » changes the pronunciation of the “c”? Just as the accent « aïgu » above the letter « é », and the accent « grave » above the letter « è » are signals for the prononciation of the letter “e,” the […]
Did you know that during this week, France commemorates Victory in Europe Day? Thursday, May 8th is la Fête de la Victoire de 1945 (Victory in Europe Day). This French public holiday is also known as Jour de la Liberation, which marks Germany’s surrender in Reims, France in 1945. With this surrender, World War II […]
Did you know that with the arrival of the month of May this week, France looks forward to three public holidays? May 1st is la Fête du Travail (Labor Day), May 8th is la Fête de la Victoire de 1945 (Victory in Europe Day), and May 29th is l’Ascension (Ascension Day). I’ll give more info […]
Did you know that French accents are important to the pronunciation of words in French? You may think that you can get away with not using the accents, but you would be wrong about that. It’s important to at least try to get the pronunciation correct. The French will appreciate that you are trying. The […]
Did you know that this week has three holidays in France? Friday, April 18th is Good Friday, which is observed as a public holiday in Alsace and Moselle. As a holy day for practicing Catholics, Good Friday is typically honored with a day off work in France. The bells of churches are tied so they […]
Did you know that, as expected (as usual with la langue française), there is an exception when it comes to typing French quotation marks ( « » )? As indicated a few weeks ago, French quotation marks need a space before and after when typing… except, when followed by a period or a comma… in […]
Did you know that today is Poisson d’avril (April Fool’s Day) in France? Poisson d’avril literally translates to “April Fish.” In North America, we know to be on the look out for pranks on April Fool’s Day. Although France has adopted more western prank traditions, a historic prank is to stick a paper fish on […]
Did you know that although one-part punctuation marks (like the period and the comma) are used identically in English and in French when writing a sentence, two-part punctuation marks (like the semi-colon, colon, question mark, and exclamation mark) need a space before and after? This convention is intended to enhance readability and visually separate the […]
Did you know that French punctuation is just similar enough to English to make you think “this is going to be easy,” but just different enough to throw you off? French considers punctuation marks in two categories: one-part punctuation marks (like the period and the comma); and two-part punctuation marks (like the question mark and […]
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