tu

[Jill<br><br>Jill (99)]

I've just spent an evening with French friends and occurred to me that they were saying tu even though they were talking to two of us.  Any explanation?

One thought is that it is just bad French because they don't know how to conjugate vous.

Another is that they do it to make one feel one is being addressed individually.

Or they are using it where it could be possible to say one.  For example

Tu as la grande cheminee a gauche, puis tu tourne a droite.

Or

Tu melange la farine avec le beurre et puis tu ajoutes...........

Any thoughts on this.  I have noticed it before.  Is it a Normandy thing perhaps?  Thanks.

[YCCMB]

Well, you can put entirely out of your head the idea that they "don't know how to conjugate vous", which, in any case, isn't a verb.[8-)]. It's entirely possible that (despite the average French person spending 60% of their education being taught their own language, or so always appears) they might not write French very well, but it's impossible that a French adult, unless they have severe learning difficulties, doesn't know how to use "tu" or "vous" with the appropriate form of the verb.

It's really nothing more than a "way" of speaking. The examples you describe are "addressing" you, and refer to something general.."you've got the big chimney on the left and then you turn right" i.e. they are not suggesting that you, personally, are the owner of the big chimney, nor that you should drop everything right this minute and turn right. Likewise for the recipe...they're explaining in general terms how it's done, not suggesting that you, personally, do it now. Because they're on familiar terms with BOTH of you, in this instance they use "tu" rather than "vous"..... as "vous" might be misinterpreted (by you) as being too formal, and also probably because unless you're conjoined twins, you're unlikely to be doing tandem cake baking or having to execute simultaneous driving manoeuvres.

It's along similar lines to something  occasionally heard in English, when people are asked a question, and, although they're referring to themselves, they use "you".

[giantpanda]

Hi!

Normally it is used for friends - but the proposition is usually done formally.

It can also be an indication of the political background, but must not be.

Yours,

giantpanda

[5-element]

"Tu" can be used in general terms, as you (one) would use you (one)...

Maybe that is what happened?

[Frenchie]

Absolutely..

Tu vois, le genre de truc où tu dis " tu "  sans vouloir vraiment t'adresser à quelqu'un en particulier , c'est donc un " tu" générique...  Un espèce de " on" , finalement...

[oscar]

In my experience it's certainly not a Normandy thing.  In fact, I can't say that I've ever heard tu used in this way.  It always makes me giggle that you can speak to the most down to earth, ordinary bloke around here - someone that you know if you were talking to in English they would be saying cor blimey guv'nor, you're 'avin' a larf incha? and yet they still use "on", as in "one should never use you in this sense, one should always use one". 

[leurne]

yes yes... For  simplify:

You use "tu" for friends, or with people that you knew (family...), but with a unknown, or in a company, with your superior, you use "vous".

If you have questions... ^^

[Frenchie]

I also say ' tu ' to any teacher I meet in my school, whether I know him/her or not..   Just a teachers' thing...

 

[Maricopa]

[quote user="Frenchie"]I also say ' tu ' to any teacher I meet in my school, whether I know him/her or not..   Just a teachers' thing...[/quote]

Not just teachers, same thing applies for pompiers and I would imagine for other such professions.[:D]

[leurne]

no, 'cz you dont know personnaly your teacher, and you will use "vous" for show that, you respect him

[Cat]

Leurne, Frenchie is French, and a teacher, so I suspect she knows what she's talking about [:)]

I can confirm what Maricopa says too.

[Clair]

All true, but I still am uncomfortable saying tu to people I barely know...

[Dick Smith]

A friend of our son's came over from Paris for the weekend, and she was tutoying within minutes. But our farmer neighbour, after years it's still 'vous'. A generational thing?

[Frenchie]

[quote user="Cat"]

Leurne, Frenchie is French, and a teacher, so I suspect she knows what she's talking about [:)]

I can confirm what Maricopa says too.

[/quote]

I say TU to any fellow teacher I meet, just as pompiers say tu to other pompiers, etc, even if they ve never met before..

 

Edited .. ( I had misunderstood your post Cat .. sorry)

[Clair]

It's a minefield!

Our fifty-year old (male) neighbour insists I tutoie him, uses vous when speaking to me and tu when speaking to Mr Clair.

Another (female) neighbour says tu to me, but vous to Mr Clair.

[Benjamin]

You're all missing talking to children and animals as well. Or am I wrong with that one?

[Clair]

I never speak to children. I simply ignore them.

I speak to animals in Franglais.

[anniefromwales]

I'm glad this thread has come up because I find it difficult, I'm always worried about offending and causing embarrassment all round. I have one friend (male) who has recently started calling me 'tu', but hasn't told me to do the same, so we have these conversations that feel weirdly lopsided to me, with him saying 'tu' and me saying 'vous' back. I don't want to start with 'tu' in case it looks like a come-on! but I don't want him to think I'm being unfriendly either. I keep thinking the only thing to do really is come straight out and say 'what am I supposed to be calling you please?' - but that might cause embarrassment too!

[LisaJ]

I had trouble explaining to one of my neighbours that the use of "you" in English doesn't mean that we are being terribly formal all the time. I guess thee and thou is still around in some places in the UK though - I remember when we lived in Yorkshire someone going for an interview and being asked "Art th'often badly?"

regards

L

[leurne]

Cat, you broke me... ^^ 'cz hm.... I'm... French too! :o

But i meaned, if Cat say "tu" at teachers, it's because they are her colleagues

but i'm not teacher... Just I'm here for improve my english... (I'm just searcher in cheese making 8-)

and Annie, if it's someone who is close to you, you can say "tu"... If it's friend, or colleagues :D

[Frenchie]

Edited...

 

Et là tu te dis " c'est pas possible un tel bazar à cause de ce tutoiement !!" [blink][Www]

[leurne]

Oui mais j'pense que c'est une des choses qui donne son charme à la langue française. Et si tu prends le japonais, tu retrouve le même style de concept de respect du vouvoyement avec -san, -sama, -chan, -kun ^^

Et pour un français, enfin pour mon cas, je trouve ça bizarre qu'il n'y ait pas de "vous"... Ca donne l'impression de tutoyer tout le monde ^^

[Frenchie]

En un sens tu as raison !!

Ma grand mère avait un ami qui disait tu à tout le monde et à son chien il disait " Vous, taisez vous !!"   [:D][:D][:D]

Il aurait dû lire ce thread !

[Rose]

[quote user="anniefromwales"]I'm glad this thread has come up because I find it difficult, I'm always worried about offending and causing embarrassment all round. I have one friend (male) who has recently started calling me 'tu', but hasn't told me to do the same, so we have these conversations that feel weirdly lopsided to me, with him saying 'tu' and me saying 'vous' back. I don't want to start with 'tu' in case it looks like a come-on! but I don't want him to think I'm being unfriendly either. I keep thinking the only thing to do really is come straight out and say 'what am I supposed to be calling you please?' - but that might cause embarrassment too![/quote]

I've been in the same spot Annie although with one of the other mums's at school...I tried this, which seemed to work... We were talking one day and I dropped in a tu and then apologised and said vous... she said tu was good for us and it's been tu since... maybe worth a try? [:$]

[Jill<br><br>Jill (99)]

Sorry if I bring this back to the original question, and perhaps Frenchie, Leurne or Clair would be most suitable to answer it (sorry everyone else), but why do you think my French friends address two of us at the same time as tu?  I know all about the formal and non formal, but we are talking singular and plural here.  I don't think they used vous once during the whole evening and it made me quite uncomfortable asking them "vous-aimez habiter ici? and "quand est-ce que vous venez en Angleterre".  It made me feel I was being quite unfriendly with them.

On the familiarity thing, I had a French Swiss friend living at Annemasse, married to a Frenchman and she found it strange that I called her tu when I first wrote to her (but all my other French penfriends tutoied from the start) and she said there are women she knows from waiting for children outside school and she would not tutoie them.  On the other hand, I remember watching "Chateauvallon" French soap in the 80's, dreadful stuff but it was actually something French on English television.  Anyway, I remember a scene where two lovers were just getting out of bed and they were vous voying, so I asked a French friend and she said it was because they were bourgeois.

So, presumably my Swiss French friend is bourgeoise and perhaps vous is going the same way as thou in English with the less bourgeois classes?