Today’s blog is the second in our mini series about ‘false friends’ in the English and French languages to help our French speakers.
A ‘false friend’ is a word that looks the same in two languages but actually has a different meaning in the different languages. They often confuse and cause French learners of English to make errors.
If you are a Spanish learner of English, please check out our previous blog by Kate B on ‘false friends’ in English for Spanish speakers and also my interview with our wonderful Mexican student Jorge.
First I will cover the verbs that are often confused:
To attend / attendre –
In English ‘to attend’ means to be present (at a meeting or event) and in French you would need to use the verb ‘assister à / participer à.’
“She attended every lesson throughout the year.”
Attendre in French means to wait.
So when describing how long you stood at the us stop before the bus arrived, you need to say :
“I waited at the bus stop for 20 minutes before the bus arrived.“
To rest / rester –
To rest in English is to relax, to take a break, to stop being active. It does not mean ‘to stay’ somewhere.
“I needed to rest after a busy month at work so I went on holiday.”
Rester in French is translated as ‘to stay’ in English.
“We stayed in Paris for 3 days.”
To support / supporter –
To support in English means to give someone with assistance, to help someone. It is not used when talking about tolerating someone.
“They supported the troops that went to war.”
For tolerating and enduring someone we use the verb ‘to put up with’ where the French use ‘supporter’.
“I don’t have to put up with your nonsense any more. Goodbye.”
Next is an adjective that causes problems in both French and Spanish: sensible.
Sensible / sensible
Sensible in English means that you are making good choices and being smart and not taking risks.
“He decided to be sensible and save his money.”
Sensible in French is translated as sensitive.
“She was very sensitive when talking about the difficult family problem.”
In French, there are also English words that have been borrowed and are either not correct and don’t make sense in English or do not exist in the English language.
Parking:
This word in French only exists as a verb in English: He was parking his car when he hit the bins.
To talk about the specific area where we park cars, we use the word ‘car park.’
Footing:
This word does not exist in English. To talk about the type of running people do every day as a regular form of exercise, we say ‘jogging’ in English – he went jogging yesterday.
Relooking:
Another word that doesn’t exist and the correct word is a ‘makeover’: “she had a complete makeover and looked completely different.”
Baskets:
To talk about the comfortable, sports shoes people put on their feet, British people say trainers and Americans say sneakers.
‘Baskets’ in English are what we put our shopping in or our flowers in not the shoes.
So now you know, you can use these words correctly and avoid common mistakes! Don’t forget to also share with your French-speaking friends who are learning English.
Stay tuned for other false friends blog posts coming soon!