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Which is the Best Engish/French Dictionary?


Mme poivre
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[quote user="sweet 17"]BTW, Gengulphus told me months ago (after I told him that I read books on line) that books on line just aren't the same as real books because you can't take them to bed or read them in the bath,etc.[/quote]

I wondered why my ears were burning yesterday.  I had no idea that you were discussing my bedroom activities on the Forum. 

No I don't really like cyber-books.  They are quite useful for rapidly sourcing quotations etc.  -  but I certainly wouldn't consider reading them in the bath.  'Scrolling down' is so laborious when your fingers are soapy.

But online dictionaries are a different matter, and I really cannot speak highly enough of the wordreference.com site which I use incessantly, and think you ought to give it a go.  And if it weren't for urbandictionary.com I would scarcely understand a single word of what the gilded British youth were saying to one another.

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I'm glad I'm not the only person who doesn't understand the "gilded British youth"!  I'd go further than that, I find most British speech, as used by persons say, below the age of 40 or so, almost completely incomprehensible. 

Even when I get the sense or gist of what they are on about, their speech is so riddled with clichés, errors, signs of sloppy thinking, etc and is generally so very unattractive that I do not bother to listen.  Mind you, I'm only talking about UK TV; don't really know about real-life people because I am no longer in the relevant age-group to interact for any length of time with the gilded youth.

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I recently asked someone in a shop (UK) could they please check to see if there was any stock of something not on the shelves, he asked a colleague in a way that always annoys me,  being the negative "we havnt any **** have we," or "we cant do such and such can we?" but this time the phrase was really memorable.......................

"We like ain't not got none like, no? innit? - know what I mean?"

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Mme poivre. In addition to a good dictionary, if you are studying for GCSE French may I recommend the CGP books which will give you all the vocabulary you need to get a top grade. If you work through The Revision Guide and the Workbook, you cannot go wrong. I can give you the ISBNs if you like.

Sorry, these books wont be for everyone because they are written in a very chatty, dare I say slang, manner for the average 16 year old student.
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  • 1 month later...
I can thoroughly recommend the Franklin French-English electronic dictionary (the one I've got is the BFQ-450). It's excellent, and beats the socks off the previous 6 language electronic dictionary I had previously. I use it all the time, and it's small and light enough to carry round in a pocket.
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I use the Collins/Robert Senior, which is a big thing but covers most eventualities, and the Hachette French dictionary - if I come across a word or term I don't understand in French, looking it up in a French dictionary often helps, and gives synonyms in French which are always useful. I do use an on-line dictionary when working on the pooter, but if I get a letter, or come across something in a book or newspaper which I don't understand, it is far simpler to just look it up in a book, rather than faffing around on-line.

I take a dictionary with me for meetings and appointments, (the Hachette college one)  not necessarily because I will have a problem with French, but that can nearly always be explained in different terms which I will understand, but for when I need to translate something from English and my mind goes a complete blank!

Incidentally, I did a couple of courses at the Alliance Francaise in The Hague, and the Hachette dictionary was recommended by our teacher, because it gives a good range of synonyms, together with an explanation of the different shades of meaning of said synonyms.

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  • 1 month later...
just to update we ordered a collins robert dictionary from amazon when it was recommended earlier but we are still waiting for delivery .......

On the other hand i am half way through my GCSE French course and have for the first three modules (which = 1/2 course)

B for oral A* for reading and listening and an A for Writing, so Half way there, after easter, another two speaking tasks and three more papers, in 8 weeks will all be over.

Hope my dictionary gets here soon though :-)

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sorry Mark, but I do not understand:  there might be similar- and there are. What do you mean?

Beyond GCSE learners' dictionaries are a disaster- as they give only one meaning per word and no context. For intermediates and above, a dictionary of synonyms/thesaurus is also really useful.

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[quote user="Mme poivre"]just to update we ordered a collins robert dictionary from amazon when it was recommended earlier but we are still waiting for delivery .......

On the other hand i am half way through my GCSE French course and have for the first three modules (which = 1/2 course)

B for oral A* for reading and listening and an A for Writing, so Half way there, after easter, another two speaking tasks and three more papers, in 8 weeks will all be over.

Hope my dictionary gets here soon though :-)[/quote]

Félicitations et bon courage!

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