Swiss French

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The French-speaking part of Switzerland is shown in green on this map.

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Map of the Franco-Provençal area, historical language spoken in Romandy, with place names in arpitan and historic political divisions.

Swiss French (Template:Langx or ) is the variety of French spoken in the French-speaking area of Switzerland known as Romandy. French is one of the four official languages of Switzerland, the others being German, Italian, and Romansch. In 2020 around 2 million people, or 22.8% of the population, in Switzerland spoke French as their primary language, and 28% of the population used French most often at work.

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Clara, a speaker of Swiss French

The French spoken in Switzerland is very similar to that of France or Belgium. The differences between the French of Switzerland and of France are most noticeably lexical, influenced by local substrate languages. While substantial phonological differences exist, as the French of Switzerland preserves many distinctions lost elsewhere, the phonetic qualities are often quite close, such as with the existence of long vowels or the distinction between /ɛ̃/ and /œ̃/. This contrasts with the differences between Standard German and Swiss German, which are largely mutually unintelligible.

Swiss French is characterized by some terms adopted from Arpitan, which was formerly spoken widely across the alpine communities of Romandy, but has far fewer speakers today. In addition, some expressions have been borrowed from both Swiss and Standard German. Although a standard form of French is taught in schools and used in the government, the media and business, there is no uniform vernacular form of French among the different cantons of Switzerland. For example, some German terms in regions bordering German-speaking communities are completely unused in the area around Geneva, a city by France's border with Switzerland.

Phonology

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• The nasal vowels are pronounced like in France. → , → , → . Conversely, the nasal vowels and are kept separate in much Swiss French speech, where much speech in France has merged them. For example, (stalk) and (brown) are still pronounced differently, like in Quebec and Belgium, unlike in Paris.
• As in Belgium, the distinction between the vowels and is maintained in Switzerland, but they have merged in France. For example, (put) and (master) are still pronounced differently, unlike in France.
• The distinction between mid vowels and has also been maintained in final open syllables, as well as that between and . For example, (skin) and (jar) are still pronounced differently, unlike in France and Quebec. For that reason, (entered; past participle of the verb ) and (third-person singular of in the imperfect indicative) are differentiated, just like in Standard French.
• There is a stronger distinction between long and short vowels in Switzerland:
  • Long vowels are allowed in open syllables, even at the end of a word: Template:Angbr, Template:Angbr , Template:Angbr , Template:Angbr , Template:Angbr and Template:Angbr . As a result, almost all feminine adjectives are still phonetically distinct from their masculine counterparts, unlike in France and Quebec.
  • Speakers also differentiate masculine from feminine adjectives phonetically, including in final closed syllables, although the spelling only partially bears out this occurrence, e.g. is pronounced , whilst the feminine is pronounced . Other minimal pairs are similarly differentiated, like and (third-person singular in the present indicative of , to lead).
  • The marginal phoneme is usually pronounced , meaning (paws) and (pasta) are differentiated. Similar to the process described above, the circumflex also affects vowel length when used above a vowel, meaning Template:Angbr is pronounced , Template:Angbr as , Template:Angbr as , Template:Angbr as and Template:Angbr .

Examples of words that differ between Switzerland and France

Swiss French	Metropolitan French	English	Notes
action	promotion	special offer	Germanism, from "Aktion" ("promotional campaign").
adieu	salut	hello/goodbye	In French, "adieu" means "farewell" and is generally never used except in cases where the people concerned will not meet again. In Switzerland it is used as an informal general form of greeting when people meet or leave each other.
attique	dernier étage	top floor (attic)
bancomat	Distributeur automatique de billets	ATM	Germanism(?), from Bankomat (Bankautomat)
bobet	crétin (noun) or bête/stupide (adjective)	idiot (noun) or stupid (adjective)
boguet	mobylette	moped
bonnard	sympa or bien	nice	Informal term.
bonne-main	pourboire	tip (gratuity)	Literally "good-hand".
borne hydrante	bouche d'incendie	fire hydrant
bourbine	suisse-allemand	Swiss-German	This word is considered pejorative.
carnotzet	cave à vin/cellier/fumoir	Wine cellar	This expression can sometimes be found in France, in places close to Switzerland.
chenis	désordre	mess
chiquelette	chewing-gum	chewing-gum
collège (Genève, Valais, Fribourg) or gymnase (Vaud)	lycée	high school
crousille	tirelire	piggy bank
cornet	sac en plastique	plastic bag	In France, "cornet" would typically designate an ice cream cone.
cutips	coton-tige	cotton bud/swab	Antonomasia from the brand Q-tips which phonetically becomes "cutips" when pronounced in French.
cycle (Genève, Fribourg, Valais)	collège	middle school
déjeuner	petit-déjeuner	breakfast	Meal names have shifted in the French of France, where déjeuner is now the name for lunch, and dîner now refers to dinner. Swiss French (like those of Belgium and Québec) has retained the older meanings.
dîner	déjeuner	lunch	Meal names have shifted in the French of France, where déjeuner is now the name for lunch, and dîner now refers to dinner. Swiss French (like those of Belgium and Québec) has retained the older meanings.
duvet	couette	comforter / duvet	"Duvet" comes from the fact that comforters used to be filled with down feather (duvet). "Duvet" in France means sleeping bag, for similar reasons.
s'encoubler	se prendre les pieds dans quelque chose/trébucher	to trip over
s'énuquer	se briser la nuque	to break one's own neck
étude d'avocats	cabinet d'avocats	law firm
fœhn	sèche-cheveux	hairdryer	Germanism, from der Föhn (the hairdryer); both names ultimately derive from the Foehn wind.
fonds	terrain or champs	field
fourre	dossier/housse	folder	In French, "fourrer" means "to stuff".
Frouze / frouze	Français / français	people from France / French	This word is considered pejorative. Used also in Belgium.
galetas	grenier	attic	Also used in Alpine regions of France, down to Dauphiné.
giratoire	rond-point, giratoire	roundabout	Comes from "carrefour à sens giratoire" which would translate to "circular crossroads".
gouille	flaque	puddle
huitante	quatre-vingts	eighty	In Swiss French, as opposed to the French of France, the words for seventy, eighty and ninety are similar in construction to the ones used for thirty up to sixty. Huitante is only heard in Vaud, Valais and Fribourg.
linge	serviette	towel	Swiss French still uses the generic uncountable word “le linge” to define “laundry”, but the countable word “un/le/les linge-s” (which has no meaning in the French of France) means “une/la/les serviette-s”. Furthermore, the use of “serviette” is exclusively for “napkin” in Swiss French, whereas in regular French it could mean both “towel” or “napkin”.
lolette	tétine	pacifier/teat
maman de jour	assistante maternelle	day care assistant
mascogner	tricher aux examens	cheat during exams
maturité	baccalauréat	high-school final examination	From German "Maturitätsexamen", "Matura".
mutr	mère	mother	Comes from the German word for "Mother", "Mutter".
natel	(téléphone) portable	mobile phone
nom de bleu !	nom de dieu !	in the name of god!/god dammit!
nonante	quatre-vingt-dix	ninety	In Swiss French, as opposed to the French of France, the words for seventy, eighty and ninety are similar in construction to the ones used for thirty up to sixty.
panosse	serpillière	floorcloth or mop
papier ménage	papier essuie-tout	paper towel
pive	pomme de pin	conifer cone
poutzer	nettoyer	to clean	Comes from the German verb "putzen" which means "to clean".
Procès verbal d'examen (PV)	bulletin de note	report card
réclame	publicité	advertisement	"Réclame" is an older disused word for advertising in French.
régie	agence immobilière	real estate agency
roye	pluie	rain
royer	pleuvoir	to rain
sans autre	sans plus attendre	without delay
santé	à tes/vos souhaits	bless you (when someone sneezes)	In France, santé, in particular by itself, as an exclamation (Santé !), is always interpreted as a drinking toast (À votre/ta santé !, meaning "[here's] to your health").
septante	soixante-dix	seventy	In Swiss French, as opposed to the French of France, words for seventy, eighty and ninety are similar in construction to the ones used for thirty up to sixty.
service	je t'en/vous en prie	you're welcome	From "à votre service" meaning "at your service".
services	couverts	cutlery
signofile/indicateur	clignotant	indicator/turn signal (motor vehicle)
souper	dîner	dinner	Meal names have shifted in the French of France, where souper has been replaced by dîner (which historically referred to lunch). Swiss French (like those of Belgium and Québec) has retained the older meanings.
tablard	étagère	shelf
uni (short for université)	fac (short word for faculté)	university
votation	scrutin	voting
vatr	père	father	Comes from the German word for "Father", "Vater".

See also

• Demographics of Switzerland
• Linguistic geography of Switzerland
• Swiss Standard German
• Swiss German
• Swiss Italian

External links

• French (Swiss) DoReCo corpus compiled by Mathieu Avanzi, Marie-José Béguelin, Gilles Corminboeuf, Federica Diémoz and Laure Anne Johnsen. Audio recordings of narrative texts with transcriptions time-aligned at the phone level, translations, and time-aligned morphological annotations.