In this video, I talk to you about language tics that we often hear in France. Uh, huh, here we go, and other expressions that can sometimes disturb the understanding. If you liked the video, don't hesitate to like it and subscribe to the channel, it encourages me a lot ! Thanks

• 0:00 - Introduction
• 1:15 - Small
• 2:30 - As a result
• 3:47 - You see
• 5:05 - Err...
• 5:47 - Ben
• 6:51 - Here you go
• 8:03 - Hein
• 9:16 - Conclusion

Video Transcript - French Language Tics 100%

Hello, I hope you are well and that you are having a nice day. Today, we are going to see together some words, expressions or sounds that the French use a lot when they speak. These words, these sounds or these expressions are actually language tics, that is to say, things that the French will slip in when they speak, so they will slip them in their sentences, but which in fact does not bring much.

They are a bit like parasite words, useless, they don't bring any meaning to the sentence, to what we say. So, for someone who doesn't speak French or who is learning French, these words will add incomprehension to the sentence, they will make it more difficult to understand. Before you start, remember to add the subtitles to the video, it will make it easier to understand. Don't forget to subscribe to the HelloFrench channel to follow all my videos.

The first word we'll look at together is the word small.

- Let's do a little restaurant? - Adding "petit" in front of anything and everything to make it sound nicer is very French.

So you may know this word which is the opposite of big, so small, big. The French love this word and slip it into many sentences throughout the day, without actually meaning that something is really small. So, for example, I might say to someone, "Shall we have a little dinner tonight?" or I might say to someone:

"Great little article you sent me" or "I'm sending you a little email". So, in reality, we don't want to say that we go to a smaller restaurant than another one or that the article I read was necessarily small. We put the word small like that, in a lot of sentences, as if to soften them, to make the sentence a little more sympathetic. But you get it, it doesn't mean that things aren't big.

The second word we're going to see, the second expression, is the expression "du coup".

You are my friend, my confidant. So I love it when we hug and say goodbye.

If you come to France and you talk to French people, it's an expression that comes up very, very often and again, it's a language tic, it doesn't bring much meaning to the sentence. It's just a bit of a clutter, so if you're already trying to understand a French person when it's not your mother tongue, it's a word that makes the sentence more complicated.

So, you can put it at the beginning of a sentence, in the middle of a sentence, at the end of a sentence. For example, I'm going to tell someone who I know is interviewing for a job, I'm going to tell them:

"So, how did your interview go?". The "as a result" is like I want to say. "So what?" "So." But it's true that it doesn't add value. I could just say, "Did your interview go well?". You can also put it at the end of a sentence. For example, I can say to someone, "It's 1:00 p.m., are we going to eat then?" Again, I could just say "It's 1pm, shall we go eat?" It's true that the French love to slip this word du coup in just about everywhere.

The next expression is "you see".

See the last time when the chick left me there?

Again the French put this expression "tu vois" everywhere and it's a real language tic, even in the same conversation, someone might say it five times. Often we put it at the end of a sentence, it's a way to punctuate. For example, I might say to someone, "I don't speak English, so when I go abroad, it's hard to speak, you know?" Of course, you don't expect the person in front of you to say, "No, I don't see." It's really just a little bit of a sentence that you add like that, kind of like adding volume to the sentence, adding rhythm to it. I'll give you another example so that you can understand better and especially how this expression is a little parasitic, useless.

For example, if I'm with a friend and I want to tell her about last night, I'll start by saying, "See, yesterday I was at the bar and I ran into Jonathan. And then we went out for a drink, you know, because I hadn't seen him in a while.

The next expression, it's more of a sound, it's the uh sound.

Hey guys, I quit school uhhh, I quit school at 16.

So, we also use this sound a lot when we speak in French, so again, it's a bit of a parasitic sound, often, we use it to avoid an embarrassing silence or to show that we are thinking.

For example, if someone asks me "do you want a pizza?" I might answer "uh more like pasta" or if someone says "do you know where Caroline is?" "Uh, no idea." So, you see, it's really more to show that we're thinking, it's to avoid putting a big silence.

So the next expression again, it's more of a sound, it's the "ben" sound.

Why don't you buy a house here then? Well no, we'd have to come here all the time.

Actually, well, it's "well" or "and well" mispronounced. So, it's the way you pronounce it. For example, if you see someone who is a little sad, you might say "well what's wrong, did you cry?" Or another example might be if someone asks me "are you sure you don't have any sugar?" I might answer "well yes". Another example might be if someone asks you "do you have your driver's license?", I might answer "well yes, I passed it when I was 18", as if to say "well yes, remember, you know it very well". Finally, a last example.

If someone says to you "well your car won't start?" "Well yes, I don't know what's going on! " So here, it's more to show that you don't understand the situation. So, you see it can be used in many contexts, so it can be complicated for you to understand what it means, how it is used and how it is used.

So the next expression is the word "voilà".

Because what interests me is really, it's really the adventure, the human adventure and meeting people, that's it.

Sometimes, we even say "that's it, that's it". So, it's an expression that we often use because we don't know how to conclude or because we're a bit uncomfortable. So, it can also be used at the beginning of a sentence. I will first give you an example when it is used at the beginning of a sentence. For example, if someone asks me to introduce myself, I will say "my name is Elisabeth, I am 28 years old and I live in Paris". It's because I used it, because I didn't know very well how to start my sentence, I wasn't very comfortable. So often we use it at the end of the sentence, for example, using the same example, so I can say "My name is Elisabeth, I am 28 years old, I live in Paris, that's it, that's it". So, it's because I didn't know how to conclude, I wanted to show my interlocutor, the person I'm talking to, that I had finished.

So finally, the last sound, so the last expression we're going to see today, is the "huh" sound.

- Ah that to be solid it is solid, eh Serge? - What does he always have to say, eh Serge, eh Serge ?

 So like "ben", "huh" has many meanings that you have to try to decipher a bit, to understand it according to the context.

So "huh" can both show that you're surprised, that you're annoyed or just sometimes it comes into sentences a little bit to... to punctuate, so to add a little punctuation to a sentence in speech. I'll give you some examples like that, so you'll probably understand it better.

For example, if someone says to me, "I'm very hot." I can say "have a glass of water eh" as if to say do this "eh", the "eh" here is to emphasize, you are hot, have a glass of water eh. In the example I'm going to give now, you'll see, it's more to show the surprise. For example, if someone tells me "There was no more soda at the supermarket, I could only take water" I can answer "Huh? But it's not true?" to say that I am super surprised that there are no more sodas at all in the supermarket.

That's it for today, I hope you enjoyed this video. If you've already heard other language tics that you don't understand, don't hesitate to put them in comments so I can explain them to you. To see more videos, consider subscribing to the HelloFrench channel.

See you soon.