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- "Elle aime un homme allemand."
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Oh it's my first French tongue twister - All I could figure was 'el emonom el nom'.
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Bahahahaha!! I know, right? When I read along, I feel like I understand it just fine.....then I hear the translation WITHOUT the accompanying subtitles, and I think "What the what....?"
This sounds like it could be the opening line of a bad WW2 romance novel.
Is there any way to distinguish between love and like in French? In this sentence it could me she has a little crush on a German man or she's been madly in love with him her whole life. You would think this could get confusing.
Aimer means "to like" or "to love" when followed by a noun or infinitive .
J'aime Paris - I love Paris
Il aime les chats - He likes cats
Aimes-tu voyager ? - Do you like to travel?
When aimer is followed by a person, it means "to love" or "to be in love with.
To say that you "like" or "are fond of" someone, qualify aimer with an adverb, such as assez , bien , or beaucoup . These adverbs make aimer less strong, so that it can be used with friends rather than family and lovers.
J'aime assez Paul. I kind of like Paul.
J'aime bien Ana. I like Ana.
J'aime beaucoup Étienne. I really like Étienne.
Je t'aime bien. I like you.
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Strange that adding beaucoup to aimer makes it less strong I would have thought it would intensify it
While there is je t'adore, a much stronger way to say je t'aime, it isn't really used. The French prefer to use aimer for love and keep it more ambiguous. I may think my fiancé and I are soulmates but I rarely say je t'adore, and I would never say je t'adore in front of people or je adore mon fiancé to anyone but my best-est of friend. And if I did say je t'adore frequently, people would probably call me crazy Haha
It took my fiancé, an American who speaks some French, a while to understand that I was just reluctant to use strong language, and not that I wasn't in love with him. Silly thing. But to me Americans toss around the word love like it is nothing, they love everything ! That was hard for me to understand when I moved from Croatia to USA.
We use "hate" too much as well unfortunately. Maybe we are more passionate than I thought!
To fix the mistakes of the previous answers, adorer is not necessarily a stronger form of aimer. Aimer is used for both like and love in a serious sense (e.g. Je t'aime) but adorer is used less seriously to describe what you really, really like (J'ADORE les noix de cocos etc).
It's a common mistake to think adorer is just a more intense version of aimer.
Aimer + Person = Love. Aimer Bien + Person + Like very much.
Adorer is the verb to love/adore but it's not a serious kind of love, it doesn't hold as much brevity. It's like in English, when we say things like "I love chocolate, it's so tasty!".
Yes, that's pretty much how it goes. As with English you have to use context here, a girl might say to me "I really like you" and depending on who she is and where she is when it is spoken I could take it either as friendly or romantic.
Adore is a stronger version of aime just like adore/love is a stronger version of like in English so you can use that to help with the distinction when you are speaking.
i put "guy" instead of "man" and it was incorrect. wouldn't it be usually normal to call "un homme" "a guy"?
USA taught, but a French teacher I once had told us "mec" is basically the equivalent of "dude"
Not related to your comment, but damn that's a lot of languages you're learning there.
Haha, thanks (I guess xD) (I mostly just try them out though, because I like languages)
Sometimes it says "aimer" as to like, sometimes as "to love" ; why not just accept both??? does she really have to love a German guy? Maybe she just likes him or fancy him :D
@ladiocu90
Yes she could just like him. In that case it would be "Elle aime bien un homme allemand"
@PatrickJaye Yes I get that, but in others lessons when, for example, you are asked to translate something like "I like chocolate", Both "J'aime bien le chocolat" and "J'aime le chocolat" are accepted. So why don't use the same judgement here?
"Aimer" works differently depending on whether we are referring to people or something else.
When referring to people and pets:-
"aimer" = "love"
"aimer bien" = like"
When referring to anything else:-
"aimer" and "aimer bien = "like"
"adorer" = "love"
"I love Marie" = "J'aime Marie"
"I like Claudette" = "J'aime bien Claudette"
"I like chocolate" = "J'aime le chocolat" or "J'aime bien le chocolat"
"I love chocolate" = "J'adore le chocolat"
Is it proper to capitalize allemand? It seems odd to capitalize German in English, but not allemand in french.
@tomwolf11235
English and French capitalisation rules are different. Capitals are used much less in French.
In the case of nationalities the name of the country is capitalised in French - but the name of the language is not. When the nationality is used as an adjective as it is in this particular case it is capitalised in English but not in French. Although where a nationality is used as a noun it is Capitalised in both English and French.
Checkout link for more detailed information on the differences between English and French capitalisation rules.
http://french.about.com/library/writing/bl-capitalization.htm
Is this a specific German man or is it a preference for German men or either?
A specific one. For preference one would say elle aime les hommes allemands. Saying elle aime les Allemands would mean she loves the Germans in general, no specific gender.
I would agree with that up to a point, but if someone said to me "j'aime les hommes allemands" I would more likely assume they are referring to specific German men. Elsewise I would use "j'aime des hommes allemands".
It's much more natural to say "She loves a German" than to say "She loves a German man" but I was marked wrong.
It's more ambiguous in English. A German could be a female or a male. This problem, of course, does not exist in French.
how my computer speakers pronounced allemand sounded like Elmo. No fair. She could love her German man or she could love her man Elmo.
I love the idea that all the other nations only differ a little bit from the English words but the word for German is not even close to the English version of it :D
It's because Germany is so old and varied. The French term refers to a Germanic tribe called the Alamanni. There are actually several languages which make this connection, like Catalan and Spanish (Alemania, Alemany, etc). But the term 'German' is also made up, by the Romans and Greeks. Neither of which are what Germans call themselves, which is Deutsch/Deutschland. There are many names for Germans and Germany.
Could I ask, out of curiosity, why is it that there is no vowel clash/shortening in "elle aime" - is it just how it is, or am I missing a rule about when and when not to shorten clashing words?
I didn't hear the "m" in "aime" which made the sentence come out very differently: "Elle est un homme allemand"!
I can understand espagnol is for Spanish, anglaise is for English, africaine is for African, japonais is for Japanese, chinois is for Chinese but how is allemand for German?
Funny that you're not asking why it's "German" in English and "Deutsch" in German! We're no better than the French!
@Soumyadeep740242
The name is based on the "Alemanni" which was a confederation of Germanic tribes in Roman and early medieval period.
When "aimer" is used with persons, it means "to love". If it were "she likes a German man", it would be "elle aime bien un homme allemand".
I've put plural "Elles aiment..." and it's been marked incorrect. Is there a difference in pronunciation?
Elle aime is pronounced "el em" whereas elles aiment is pronounced "elz em" due to the liaison.
"aimer" means "to love" when referring to someone. "A German man" is a person, therefore "elle aime" here means "she loves".
Here, you would have to add "bien" after "aime" to mean "like".
You can like a person without loving them. You really do make some bad decisions
Yes you can like a person without loving them. In that case the am French sentence would be "Elle aime bien un homme allemand".
How are you supposed to know if it is like or love with so little context
The context is: "Is it a person or a pet?" If it is, then « aimer » means "love", otherwise if it's an object it means "like".
You need to say what your full sentence was, and why you think it's right. Otherwise, we can't help you.
I said she likes a german man....when it said like was wrong....aime means Like/love so i used like and got it wrong. Stupid duolingo
The difference between using « aimer » for "to love" and "to like" is well explained elsewhere on this very page.
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aime = to like Why not accept that as an answer. She likes a German man is just as acceptable as She loves a German man.
The words "love" and "like" already appear on this page about 50 times each. If you search for them, you'll quickly discover that they're not interchangeable.
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She loves a German is correct, it is assumed that she loves a man. If it was a woman then one needs to add woman after German.
tired of doulingo being picky when it comes to aime somtimes its translates to like, sometimes love, and you get it wrong if you dont put the right word, why not allow both ?
The verb "aimer" can mean both things, so I understand the confusion. However, when it is directed from one person to another, it usually means "to love" and when directed at an object, means "to like."
How was I supposed to know that "aime" means "love" and not "like" in this sentence?
When referring to a person, "aimer" means "to love." It would say "aime bien" if it meant she likes him. It's just one of those things you have to pick up on or look through comments for.
Went back to childhood. When I used to say LMNO fast something like this came out.
