As a bilingual, something that really irks me is when an English word is used by the French (or vice versa) and either the pronunciation or the original meaning is botched.
A short list of my biggest pet peeves in this area:
- un sweat (for sweatshirt and I’ve heard it pronounced a little like sweet. To hear people put on a sweat because it got cold is just so weird.)
- un mug (it just sounds so weird from the French)
- un mail (for email, apparently the French word courriel isn’t that popular anymore)
- shit (for hash. Nothing like hearing my mother-in-law talking about someone getting busted for shit)
*****
- Maître d’ (said like Mater Dee which always makes me think of the cartoon Cars)
- foyer (although when people do say it correctly, it comes across as pretentious. Damn those double standards!)
- voilà (I want to hit people who say wah-lah)
- Amélie (it’s my daughter’s name and seriously, no one who isn’t French or didn’t see the movie- which she was NOT named after- says it right. Ah-muh-lee, Amelia, Emily, Uh-MAY-lee. Jeez. Listen and repeat people, it’s not that hard. Even my family gets it wrong.)
