Biggest difficulty?

[chessfou]

For me, gender. 80% of all words ending in "e" are feminine but that still leaves 20%... How do YOU go about coping with this and trying to learn what's what (for those with French as langue maternelle I don't think it is a problem at all, or is it?).

Worse still, all those "bisexual" words:

le moule & la moule

le voile & la voile

without even thinking about

le totale & la totale.

[Judith]

I was told not to worry too much, knowing you are not a native French speaker is enough for most French to understand and work it out.  The fact that they may correct you so they understand it is immaterial, except that it gives you the correct version.  Whether you remember it or not is entirely a different matter.

My biggest difficulty is converting what I happily say in English to French - without thinking about it for ages first!

[Anton Redman]

I thought there were less than a dozen words with different meanings according to gender.

Livre, Orange, Cote, Does anybody have a complete list ?

 

[tegwini]

Hello All

I have a very useful little book which lists the gender rules & exceptions- a page of exceptions to the rules,  sadly!

JR Travis  A precis of French Grammar:  London, G Harrrop, 1969

It's paperback size, and so very useful.  It seems to be available second hand, but I have no knowledge of this company.

 :http://www.booksandcollectibles.com.au/book.php3?book_id=219814137&

Regards

Tegwini

 

[allanb]

AR: The links provided by Puzzled refer to (a) words that are spelled the same except for an accent, and (b) words that are spelled differently but sound the same.

I think you are asking about words that are spelled the same, including any accents, but have two possible genders with different meanings.  If so, I don't know of a list, but I would guess there are more than a dozen.  Here are a few more: mode, tour, poste, moule, manche, poêle.

The only trick I know to help with the French gender problem is to think of a phrase that contains the noun with an adjective that shows the difference.  For instance, I can remember that "liver" is le foie, not la foie, because what's on the label is foie gras and not foie grasse.  

You don't have to buy it, just memorize it.

[mint]

I do something similar allanb.  For example, I only need to think of le Tour de France but la Tour Eiffel to know which is a bike race and which a tower.

Edit:  Sorry, didn't express myself properly.  I meant le tour as in doing a round or circuit.

As for poêle, I think of la poêle as being used by the woman in the kitchen and le poêle as the thing in the sitting-room where the man lounges.  I know, not at all PC but I think the French are generally not quite as PC as Anglo-saxons, don't you think?

[allanb]

[quote user="sweet 17"]I think of la poêle as being used by the woman in the kitchen and le poêle as the thing in the sitting-room where the man lounges.  I know, not at all PC...[/quote]

No, but I like your attitude.

[YCCMB]

Here's more:

Une/un barde

Une/un carpe

Une/un cartouche

Une/un hymne

Un/une livre

Un/une mousse

Un/une page

......and I don't know if any real French people want to 'fess up, but I wager that lots of them have doubts as to the gender of certain words.[:D]

[DZ]

I find this list very useful.

http://french.about.com/library/vocab/bl-dualgender.htm

[mint]

Nice & useful, DZ.  I never knew there were so many of these!

[Richard T]

Michel Thomas' advice for spoken French is to just lightly touch the le or la so that either becomes l' as in l'moule (masculine) or l'moule (feminine). Same applies to indefinite article: use 'n for un or une.

It works if you use it with confidence.

Richard T

[chessfou]

Yes, it is fairly easy to "cheat" with spoken French but it doesn't help a lot with writing letters and e-mails, drafting statutes or writing articles.