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Lesson 7 - D'où viens-tu (Where do you come from)

Some sound files of this lesson are not available yet but I thought that it was worth releasing this lesson because I know how eager to learn French you are. The missing sound files will be added very soon.

Lesson plan :

1. Vocabulary
2. Conversation
3. Notes on Vocabulary
4. Liaisons Guidelines

1.Vocabulary

Noms (Nouns)

• ici (here)
• là (there)
• un pays (country)
• une ville (city, town)
• la citoyenneté (citizenship)
• une destination (destination)
• une origine (origin)

Verbes (Verbs)

• venir (to come)
• aller (to go)
• aller à (to go to)
• venir de (to come from)
• voyager (to travel)
• être né (to be born)

Adjectifs (Adjectives)

• loin (far)
• près (close)

Prépositions (Prepositions)

• de (from)
• à (to)

Conjonctions (Conjunctions)

• quel/quelle/quels (what)

2. Conversation

La famille Dupont a de nouveaux voisins. Pierre rencontre le fils de ses voisins.
The Dupont Family has new neighbours. Pierre meets the son of his neighbours.

Pierre : Bonjour. Je m'appelle Pierre. Comment t'appelles-tu ?
Pierre : Hello, my name is Pierre. What is your name ?

Peter : Je m'appelle Peter
Peter : My name is Peter.

Pierre : D'où est-ce que tu viens ?
Pierre : Where do you come from ?

Peter : Je viens d'Angleterre. Mes parents sont anglais.
Peter : I come from England. My parents are english.

Pierre : Super ! Est-ce que tu viens de Londres ?
Pierre : Wonderful ! Do you come from London ?

Peter : Oui. Je suis né à Londres.
Peter : Yes. I was born in London.

Pierre : Tu parles bien français. Moi, je ne parle pas anglais.
Pierre : You speak French very well. As far as I am concerned, I don't speak English.

3. Notes on Vocabulary

Countries and Citizenship

In French, as in English, the first character of country names must be uppercase, while the uppercase is not required for the citizenship. Example (refer to the " additional vocabulary " section for more country names) :

Country                       Citizenship
-------------------------------------------------
France                        français (French)
Belgique (Belgium)            belge (Belgian)
Suisse (Switzerland)          suisse (Swiss)
Angleterre (England)          anglais (English)
Allemagne (Germany)           allemand (German)
Italie (Italy)                italien (Italian)
Espagne (Spain)               espagnol (Spanish)
Irlande (Ireland)             irlandais (Irish)
Russie (Russia)               russe (russian)
États Unis d'Amérique (USA)   américain (American)
Canada (Canada)               canadien (Canadian)
Québec (Quebec)               québécois (Quebecer)
Chine (China)                 chinois (Chinese)
Japon (Japan)                 japonnais (Japanese)

Note that, as opposed to English, the citizenship cannot be easily derived from the country name. Citizenship is similar to an adjectif [je suis français (I am French)]. Consequently, citizenship must be in accordance with the gender and the number of the people considered. Example :

• Elle est anglaise (She is English)
• Mes amis sont américains (My friends are American)
• Les chinois et les chinoises ne sont pas grands (Chinese men and women are not tall)

As same as citizenship, the way French people call the inhabitants of a city is not straight forward. The list below provides some examples :

City                      Inhabitant
-------------------------------------------
Paris                     parisien
Marseilles                marseillais
Lyon                      lyonnais
Lille                     lillois
Toulouse                  toulousain
Bruxelles                 bruxellois
Genève (Geneva)           genèvois
Rome                      romain
Londres (London)          londonien
Berlin                    berlinois
New York                  new-yorkais
Pékin (Beijing)           pékinois

There are some striking irregular examples :

City                      Inhabitant
-------------------------------------------
Saint Étienne             stéphanois
Saint Malo                malouin
Bordeaux                  bordelais
Madrid                    madrilène
Moscou                    moscovite

Prepositions de and à

When used with verbs expressing a movement, the preposition de means from, while à means to. Therefore, they are both key prepositions in French language. Examples :

• venir de (to come from)
• aller à (to go to)

More precisely, de and à refer to locations and not to movements. de refers to the origine of the movement and à refers to the destination. To illustrate that, consider the following expression : d'ici à là [d'ici is the contraction of de ici] which means from here to there (ici = here, là = there).

Note that de and à have both different meanings depending on the verb they are associated with or their role in the sentence. For instance, we have already mentioned (see lesson 6) that de is used to express the genitive relationship between two words.

4. Liaisons Guidelines

Pierre : Bonjour. Je m'appelle Pierre. Comment t'appelles-tu ?

Peter : Je m'appelle Peter

Pierre : D'où est-ce que tu viens ?

Peter : Je viens d'Angleterre. Mes parents sont anglais.

Pierre : Super ! Est-ce que tu viens de Londres ?

Peter : Oui. Je suis né à Londres.

Pierre : Tu parles bien français. Moi, je ne parle pas_anglais.

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