Regional French: Quebec, Belgium and Switzerland

Regional French: the grammar and sounds of Quebec, Belgium and Switzerland

Red marks the regional numbers. They are simply counted in tens, like English seventy and ninety; France builds the same numbers from sixty and four-twenties. Geneva, Neuchâtel and Jura say septante and nonante but keep quatre-vingts.

Short answer: written French is the same in Paris, Brussels, Geneva, Montreal and Dakar. Spoken French varies in a small set of features you can learn: the numbers 70 to 99, the Quebec question word -tu, Belgian savoir meaning “can”, a doubled past tense in the south and in Switzerland, and a handful of sounds. At C2 you understand them all; you speak one variety, usually the one you hear most.

Seventy to ninety-nine

France counts 70 as soixante-dix (sixty-ten), 80 as quatre-vingts (four twenties) and 90 as quatre-vingt-dix (four twenties and ten). Belgium and Switzerland use plain tens: septante and nonante, plus huitante for 80 in three Swiss cantons. The units join exactly as they do from 20 to 69: et un for 1, a hyphen for the rest. The basics are in French numbers.

	France	Belgium	Vaud, Valais, Fribourg
70
71
75
80
81
90
99

At a till in Lausanne

Çathatfaitmakesseptante-cinqseventy-fivefrancs.francs

sah feh sep-TAHNT-sank frahn“That comes to seventy-five francs.”

Why: Septante-cinq is built like soixante-cinq: tens, hyphen, unit. In France the same price is soixante-quinze francs, sixty-fifteen.

Quebec questions with -tu

In everyday Quebec French you can turn any statement into a yes/no question by adding -tu after the verb. Here tu does not mean “you”. It is a particle: a small word with a grammar job but no meaning of its own, like a spoken question mark. It comes from the old question form vient-il ?, said “vient-i”, whose ending spread to every person. Careful speech and writing in Quebec use est-ce que or intonation, as in France; see three ways to ask a question.

The word order of the statement never changes: the particle is simply added after the verb, which is why it is so common in fast speech.

Tu viens. →

Tuyouviens-tu ?come (question)

too vyen-TSU · “Are you coming?”The second tu is the particle, not a second “you”. Note the Quebec “ts” before u.

C’est loin. →

C’est-tuis-it (question)loin ?far

say-TSU lwen · “Is it far?”The particle works with any subject, even c’est, where France would say est-ce que c’est loin ?

On y va. →

Onweythereva-tu ?go (question)

on ee vah-TSU · “Shall we go?”With on (we, people in general), the particle makes a friendly suggestion.

Three more marks of spoken Quebec French

Quebec French also keeps some older forms that France has lost, and drops ne from negatives, as relaxed speech does everywhere. For vocabulary such as char and magasiner, see Quebec French in conversation.

Quebec, word by word	France	Meaning and why
JeIm’enmyself-awayvas.go zhuh mahn VAH	Je m’en vais.	“I’m off.” Je vas is the older form of je vais, kept in relaxed Quebec speech. Writing uses vais.
J’aime(I) likepasnotçathatpantoute.at-all zhem pah sah pahn-TOOT	Je n’aime pas ça du tout.	“I don’t like that at all.” Pantoute is a fused form of pas en tout, “not in anything”. Ne disappears, as in relaxed speech everywhere.
Onweseeach-othervoitseeàatsoirevening on suh vwah ah SWAHR	On se voit ce soir ?	“Shall we meet tonight?” À soir replaces ce soir in Quebec speech; à matin (this morning) works the same way.

Belgium and Switzerland: same words, different jobs

Belgian and Swiss French are close to the French of northern France. The differences that catch learners out are familiar words used in a different way.

Belgium · savoir = can

JeInenotsaiscanpasnotvenirto-comedemain.tomorrow

zhuh nuh say pah vuh-NEER duh-MAN “I can’t come tomorrow.” France: Je ne peux pas venir demain. In Belgium savoir also means “be able to” in a given situation. In France it means only “know how to”: je sais nager, “I can swim”.

Belgium · handing something over

S’ilif-itvousyouplaît.pleases

seel voo PLEH “Here you are.” France: Voilà. In Belgium the phrase for “please” is also what you say when you hand something to someone.

Belgium · une fois

Vienscomeuneonefoistimeici.here

vyen oon FWAH ee-SEE “Come here a moment.” France: Viens ici. Une fois softens a request, like English “just”. It is a loan translation of Dutch eens, from Belgium’s Dutch-speaking neighbours.

Switzerland · ça joue

Çathatjoueplayspourfortoiyou

sah zhoo poor TWAH “Does that work for you?” France: Ça te va ? In French-speaking Switzerland jouer, “to play”, also means “to work out, to be fine”. The answer is ça joue, “that’s fine”.

The doubled past: j’ai eu fini

The passé composé is the everyday past: an auxiliary (helper verb, avoir or être) plus a past participle, as in j’ai fini, “I finished”. The passé surcomposé doubles the auxiliary: j’ai eu fini. Everywhere, it can mark one past event completed before another. In the south of France and in French-speaking Switzerland it has a second, regional use in a main clause: something that happened in the past and is now over. The standard past tenses are in past tenses together.

In speech the surcomposé does the job that the literary il eut fini does in writing (see the passé simple): it puts one past event before the other.

Everywhere · one event before another

Quandwhenilheahaseuhadfini,finishedilheestisparti.left

kahn eel ah oo fee-NEE, eel ay par-TEE “When he had finished, he left.” Why: The double auxiliary a eu shows the first action was complete before the second, which is in the ordinary passé composé.

South of France, Switzerland · over and done

J’aiI-haveeuhadfumé,smokedmaisbutj’aiI-havearrêté.stopped

zhay oo fü-MAY, meh zhay ah-reh-TAY “I used to smoke, but I’ve stopped.” Why: In a main clause, the regional surcomposé marks a past habit or experience that no longer holds. In Paris you would say j’ai fumé or je fumais.

Six sounds that place a speaker

Most regional accents change a few vowels (sounds made with the mouth open, like a, é, u) and a few consonants (sounds made by blocking the breath, like t, d, r). Paris French is shown first; tap either form to hear it. A nasal vowel is one where air also passes through the nose, as in pain or brun; see French pronunciation.

This “ts” and “dz” is the quickest way to recognise a Quebec speaker. It happens only before the vowels i and u (and the glides in tiens, dieu).

Feature	Paris	Regional	Where
t and d before i and u	puh-TEE	puh-TSEE	Quebec
è and ê in a final syllable	FET	FAYT, the vowel glides	Quebec
final e	puh-TEET	puh-TEE-tuh, the e is said	South of France
nasal vowels	PAN, through the nose	PENG, with a final ng	South of France
un and in	BRAN, same as brin	BRUHN, kept apart from brin	Belgium, Switzerland, south of France
huit	WHEET, with a rounded ü-glide	WEET	Belgium

Audio uses your device’s regional French voice where one is installed; the respelling under each word shows the regional sound.