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FRENCH WORD OF THE DAY

French word of the day: Couvade

The French language is rich with really specific words that describe basically anything or any state of mind and don't quite translate. This is one of them.

Published: 28 January 2020 16:30 CET

French word of the day: Couvade

Photo: Annie Spratt/Unsplash/Nicolas Raymond

Why do I need to know couvade?

It might be a French word, but it is describing an international phenomenon.

What does it mean?

You might be familiar with the phenomenon that in English is known as ‘sympathy pregnancy’, which describes the not-so-rare case of a man putting on weight alongside his pregnant partner.

Well, there is a word describing that process in French: couvade.

La couvade comes from syndrome de la couvade, which is something that apparently 20 percent of French men experience.

A man suffering from this will experience similar pregnancy symptoms to his partner (belly-growing, morning sickness, etc).

But simply saying couvade can be used in a lighter, more teasing way for men who gain weight while their partner is expecting.

So if your Missus is expecting and your French friend asks, eyes lingering on your belly, tu couves pas un peu? – ‘are we getting a bit of a belly?’ – you will know what it means.

One French dad of our acquaintance tells us that 'it's because you have to drink for two'. Hmmm.

Alternatives

Seeing as syndrome de la couvade is actually classed as a mental illness it is probably better to use another term if you want to poke fun at a male friend who has softened a bit around the edges during his partner's pregnancy.

Bide is a very common (and harmless) option.

On a pris un petit bide, non? – 'Have we grown a little belly?'

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French word of the Day: Jours ouvrés

Why do I need to know jours ouvrés?

Because you need an accurate time estimate.

What does it mean?

As most French learners will know, jours means days, while in this context ouvrés means ‘working’. Therefore jours ouvrés – roughly pronounced jzoor-ouv-ray – means ‘working days’. You may also see jours ouvrables, which means the same thing.

You’re most likely to come across this in the context of estimates on how long things will take – for example a delivery or the processing of an official task or perhaps the results for a test or exam.

And this is where the calendar comes in – ‘working days’ doesn’t include the weekends, but also excluded are public holidays, of which France has quite a lot. So an estimate for livraison dans les cinq jours ouvrés – might actually take almost two weeks to reach you, if there are weekend days and public holidays in between.

Days on either side of public holidays (known as ‘pont‘ days) are technically working days, but don’t be too surprised if things don’t happen on these days either.

Although ouvrés looks similar to ouvrir (to open) the root of the work is actually ouvrer – an archaic verb meaning to work or to labour.

This word was gradually supplanted by travailler in around the 16th century, but some derivatives of it are still used – most commonly ouvrier (or ouvrière for women) which means a worker – it can be used for all types of salaried workers, but is more commonly used for people who do manual labour or work with their hands.

It’s often used in a political sense too – one of France’s leftist political parties is Lutte ouvrière, which translates as Worker’s struggle.

Use it like this

La livraison est estimée à trois jours ouvrés – Delivery is estimated within three working days

Les résultats seront communiqués sous 48 hours (jours ouvrés) – the results will be sent within 48 hours (on working days)

Not to be confused with

If you want to talk about ‘open days’ – days when institutions including schools, the military or artists workshops open up to the public – in France these are known as portes ouvertes (literally ‘open doors’).

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