Montreal City Weblog

Kate 11:58 on 2020-11-10 Permalink Reply  

• Cadichon 12:00 on 2020-11-10 Permalink

  «Essai» as in «non-fiction».

• Kate 12:05 on 2020-11-10 Permalink

  Thank you. In English, the word tends to mean a shorter piece, like a long magazine article.

• azrhey 12:29 on 2020-11-10 Permalink

  Does english make a the difference betweeen “essai” and “dissertation” ? I’d say dissertation is 1 to 8-10 pages, where essai is a structured group of dissertations on the same theme. In highschool they make you write tons of dissertations, then in college you learn how to put them together in a coherent piece of work.

• Kate 12:34 on 2020-11-10 Permalink

  In English, the word “dissertation” is mostly used for major academic writing, often a PhD thesis or the like. I certainly never heard it used for any writing at the high school level. We wrote essays, and they weren’t particularly structured. In general literature, an essay is usually taken to be a fairly personal piece on a given topic, not book length, I would say. Montaigne wrote essays. So did E.M. Forster. Belles-lettres in French?

• azrhey 12:52 on 2020-11-10 Permalink

  oh maybe that’s a semantic change then.
  In French we right, not particularly structured dissertations ( intro-developement-conclusion and the teach would be happy ) and then essais are longer things that require research and citations and what not and are more or less academic. mémoires and thèses are a type of essai that is strictly academic where thèse exposes newly researched stuff and date and mémoire is more a comparison or an analysis of previous known stuff.
  But yeah , I think the meanings got switched between French and English. As I’ve been writing dissertations since grade 7, but I’ve only ever written one essai and it was for my bachelors. At least in French. 🙂
  Languages are weird/fun.

• Daisy 13:03 on 2020-11-10 Permalink

  Then what is a “composition”? That’s what we used to write in French immersion classes.

  Our high school essays were supposed to be structured like so: introduction, three body paragraphs (each with its own main point), conclusion. That’s the kind of writing we had to be able to do for the English 12 Provincial Exam (not in Quebec obviously).

• azrhey 13:19 on 2020-11-10 Permalink

  Composition is explanatory , dissertation is argumentative ( not sure it’s the right words though ).

  Composition : The dangers of fighting in peewee league

  Dissertation : Should fighting in peewee league be banned legally?

  I hope it’s clear 🙂

• Kate 14:17 on 2020-11-10 Permalink

  I wonder if there’s a piece anywhere on these faux amis in cultural contexts. I remember when it dawned on me that in French a comédien wasn’t someone who told jokes…

• azrhey 14:26 on 2020-11-10 Permalink

  https://fr.wiktionary.org/wiki/Annexe:Faux-amis_anglais-fran%C3%A7ais

  my favourite one is still congealed vs congelé 🙂

• Kate 14:35 on 2020-11-10 Permalink

  Great list, azrhey, but there are so many. Skimming down, I was struck by “activism (n) : militantisme” but not the reverse. In English, a militant is often someone who’s very politically active, verging on dangerously so. In French, you get statements like this one about the recent Projet Montréal party conference: “Les militants de Projet Montréal s’étaient réunis virtuellement dimanche…” meaning simply active members of the party. In English, Google gives this definition: “combative and aggressive in support of a political or social cause, and typically favoring extreme, violent, or confrontational methods.”

• PatrickC 14:43 on 2020-11-10 Permalink

  There are several dictionaries of faux amis, including this one (though it’s not that recent):
  https://www.bloomsburycollections.com/book/faux-amis-and-key-words-a-dictionary-guide-to-french-language-culture-and-society-through-lookalikes-and-confusables/introduction?from=search

• Mark Côté 01:45 on 2020-11-11 Permalink

  In my high school in rural eastern Ontario we learned very structured essay writing. Overly structured really, but it cemented the fundamentals of writing an effective argumentative piece. I’ve come to realize that my school’s focus on English was comparatively rare though.

• Mark Côté 01:50 on 2020-11-11 Permalink

  Memories flooding back: we specifically learned how to write expository essays, after first learning expository paragraphs.

• MarcG 11:03 on 2020-11-11 Permalink

  Manifestation sounds weird to me in both languages now