Enthusiasm, politeness and culture

Culture
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I wanted to share this article that I enjoyed.

The Beeb link was referred to by a Youtube French language teacher I am watch regularly to help my French language skills and understanding of the country. He talks about polls in which people believed the French to be very rude to visitors and also criticised French tourists abroad.
I actually delayed visiting France until later in life because I was concerned about some of the stereotypes. I soon realised I had made a big mistake in staying away.

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“Life in France places you happily in the present tense”

I like that quote in the article. :slight_smile:

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Surely one can say “je suis ravi” or nous sommes ravis" ?

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Doesn’t that mean “thrilled” or “delighted” rather than “excited”? Almost but not quite the same thing?

I think “excited” has an element of anticipation to it (e.g. “I am excited to be going on holiday”) where thrilled is more about something that has already happened?

We need a native speaker to advise!

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I’m not a native speaker, but it’s clear from what I have seen and heard in person and on tv that, while “Je suis excitĂ©(e)” can have a sexual connotation, it is also used in the way Anglophones would use it without any misunderstanding, perhaps in imitation.

And prohibiting its use is a little old-fashioned.

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Here’s a link

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The article is really comparing the French with Americans. I think any European finds Americans over-effusive. I must say though that since I left the UK 47 years ago the British have become a lot more overtly emotional. Long gone are the days of the stiff upper lip and British reticence.

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But surely it depends on context? Who you are speaking to and what your relationship is to them, as well as how formal or otherwise the situation is, your respective ages and so on. Depending on that I would use “Je suis trĂšs enthousiaste” or Je suis ravie”. Or in some contexts “J’ai hĂąte d’ĂȘtre”. I don’t think I have ever used “Je suis excitĂ©e” in my life!

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I found this more interesting - from the BBC article

When I was 19 years old, after five years of back-and-forth trips that grew longer each time, I finally relocated officially from the United States to France. Already armed with a fairly good grasp of the language, I was convinced that I would soon assimilate into French culture.

Of course, I was wrong. There’s nothing like cultural nuance to remind you who you are at your core: my Americanness became all the more perceptible the longer I remained in France, and perhaps no more so than the day a French teacher told me his theory on the key distinction between those from my native and adopted lands.

“You Americans,” he said, “live in the faire [to do]. The avoir [to have]. In France, we live in the ĂȘtre [to be].”

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avoir été seems more appropriate to many of the manifestants