Comments on: Voulez-vous coucher…

By: théo-Montpell

théo-Montpell — Thu, 04 Nov 2004 14:01:24 +0000

Point de vue d’un français: i found it cute when native english speakers use “tu” instead of “vous”…I don’t feel offended, even in a professional context. I’ll feel at ease and use “tu” myself: native english, your mistakes are a strengh for you !!! A frenchman that would be offended bye a “tu” would really have a problem of ego i think…It is so seldom that anglosaxon learn to speak french, that we really excuse such details as a “tu”.
I continue in french: Bien au contraire, les anglosaxons, en particulier américains ont une spontanéité que j’apprécie particulièrement. Que le “vous” n’existe pas en anglais en est un signe. La société française est assez ouverte pour ne pas focaliser sur de tels détails, dumoins je l’espère.:wink:

By: Katia

Katia — Mon, 25 Oct 2004 19:22:14 +0000

I use “vous” for my FIL and “tu” for my MIL. That’s because at the very beginning, my FIL told me a big long story about how it was all about tradition and respect which means that one must always use “vous” for ones parents in law. My MIL, however, crept up to me five minutes later and insisted that tradition is ridiculous and I use “tu” when speaking to her. ;)

I’m still only just coming to grips with the language, and find that I accidentally slip between “vous” and “tu” at times. Most people just laugh it off. I do find it very hard to move from a “vous” relationship to a “tu” relationship in a work situation. I never know what to do.

By: Miss Tra-La-La

Miss Tra-La-La — Wed, 20 Oct 2004 18:30:46 +0000

This tutoyment business annoys me. Here in Brussels people tend to use “tu” a lot more than seems appropriate to me. Shopkeepers, policemen, delivery men, salesmen, colleagues in the office and generally complete strangers all insist on addressing me as “tu”, while I stubbornly soldier on with the “vous”. After 22 years of living in the UK, I am just no longer used to the “tu” and hearing it irritates my ear!

By: Natalie

Natalie — Sun, 17 Oct 2004 00:04:18 +0000

Be glad you are not dealing with Thai, which has, as I recall, 54 different honorifics, depending on the relative status of each person in the conversation.

Most foreigners (and of course in Thailand you have the advantage of your foreigness being immediately visible) simply learn the medium/high polite term “Khun” and use that for more or less everybody.

I had a real ethical problem, however, when I got a maid, who I should by rights have called Nu (literally mouse), also the term used for children, because of my relatively high status. I deliberately decided, however, that I wouldn’t do this, even though she was uncomfortable with “Khun”. You can take “going native” only so far.

By: Root

Root — Fri, 15 Oct 2004 21:43:09 +0000

Only the French could worry about the proper form prior to getting their kit off. N’est pas ? :)

By: Suziboo

Suziboo — Fri, 15 Oct 2004 10:56:34 +0000

I have always found it strange that in French I can call God On High ‘tu’, yet my boss and bank manager are without a shadow of a doubt ‘vous’. Why is that?

By: Jason Stone

Jason Stone — Fri, 15 Oct 2004 10:16:42 +0000

One weekend, I was taking the TGV from Marseille back to Paris. The couple sitting across from my partner and I piqued my interest. She was very attractive and in her 20′s and he was much more mature. I thought they might be father and daughter until she straddled him and they started playing with each other’s tonsils. I, then, found it even more interesting that she would talk to him using the “vous” form and he would respond to her using the “tu” form. The man was wearing a wedding ring, but I have this strange feeling that they were not married to each other.

By: vitriolica

vitriolica — Fri, 15 Oct 2004 09:59:59 +0000

I feel your pain, querida! in pt we’ve got the equiv of tu and vous PLUS “o senhor” OR the person’s name to avoid using either and I’ll be buggered if I’ll ever get used to calling my m-i-l DONA Mariana (as in “Yes’um, Miss Scarlett” in gone with the wind)… and the awful descision to stop calling someone tu after você… when to do it,… will they get offended…etc … It’s terrible for an english person.

By: nardac

nardac — Fri, 15 Oct 2004 08:39:51 +0000

There are these french filmmakers, Daniele Huillet and Jean-Marie Straub. Real old couple, real bunch of characters. The work together. He smokes his cigar, yells at everyone and ruins his fedora by endlessly squashing it. She stands apart, with arms crossed, and only speaks to correct him, which is rare, but when it comes, deadly. But when they speak to each other, they always vous voyais. That’s respect and love.

By: mraparis

mraparis — Fri, 15 Oct 2004 06:17:07 +0000

I always use the Tu form, but then again, 90 percent of the time I’m talking to my children’s French friends. When I talk to adults, I forget, and say things the way I’m used to saying them, in the Tu form. As you can imagine, this causes all sorts of problems and then I start speaking English so they know I’m just a forgetful American and that I didn’t mean any kind of disrespect.