# French translation question: "ou" & "comme"
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [November 29, 2013, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086 "2013-11-29T17:55:07Z")
**Posts on this page:** 17
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2013, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/1 "2013-11-29T17:55:07Z")
Ran across this inoccuous sentence in [a _Washington Post_ article](http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/govbeat/wp/2013/11/14/16-american-cities-foreign-governments-warn-their-citizens-about/):
> [@](#):
>
> “_Le quartier Anacostia n’est pas recommandable de jour **comme** de nuit._” Translation: Don’t go to Anacostia, day or night.
In the sentence above, the French “_comme_” – often translatable as “like” or “as (well as)” in English – is translated with “or”. IIRC, in a strong majority of cases, English “or” corresponds to French “_ou_”.
Obviously, when going between languages, lexical/connotative correspondences are not one to one. What I’m wondering is if the French sentence above can be rendered equally well with “_ou_” in place of “_comme_”?
If not, and “_comme_” is essentially obligatory in such constructions, how does using “_ou_” there sound to native French speakers? A small mistake that doesn’t get in the way of understanding the gist? A typical learner’s mistake? A strange, stilted (non-native) manner of speaking? Just flat out incorrect and quite possibly making the utterance mean something else entirely different from what was intended?
---
### Author:  [@runningdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/runningdude)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2013, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/2 "2013-11-29T18:11:21Z")
I’m not a native French speaker by any stretch, but a more literal translation may be illuminating:
[ul]
[li]“Le quartier Anacostia n’est pas recommandable _de jour_ **comme** _de nuit._”[/li][li]“The Anacatia neighborhood is not recommended _in the day_ **as well as** _at night_”[/li][/ul]
The literal translation is a little clunky, while the rough translation you’ve provided is more relatable and direct in conveying the sentence’s meaning in English. I’m sure you could construct the thought in French using “ou”, but it might be similarly clunky. You might out yourself as a non-native speaker by using this construction, but you would generally be understood.
---
### Author:  [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2013, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/3 "2013-11-29T18:26:57Z")
“comme” might also be loosely translated as “like” as in:
“The Anacatia neighborhood is not recommended in the day _as like_ at night”
---
### Author:  [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2013, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/4 "2013-11-29T18:48:11Z")
Google translate offers this “quartier anacostia n’est pas recommandé jour et nuit.” which actually looks better to me.
---
### Author:  [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2013, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/5 "2013-11-29T18:55:32Z")
> [@bob\_2](#):
>
> Google translate offers this “quartier anacostia n’est pas recommandé jour et nuit.” which actually looks better to me.
Are you a native speaker? If so, what’s the difference between the feeling of that sentence vs the OP’s? I’m just a bit surprised that Google translate would work well on something like this. It’s typically terrible at well-nuanced translations and only gets you in the ballpark of the right words.
---
### Author:  [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2013, 7:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/6 "2013-11-29T19:00:34Z")
Also not a native speaker, but my sense:
_de jour comme de nuit_ = “by day as by night,” that is, both.
_de jour ou de nuit_ = “by day or by night,” that is, either.
If you’d been talking about dodgy neighbourhoods that were unsafe at night but okay by day, and then mentioned Anacostia, you’d probably use _ou_ for the contrast. Otherwise, if what you’re stressing is that there’s never a good time to be there, use _comme_.
---
### Author:  [@sailor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sailor)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2013, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/7 "2013-11-29T19:12:31Z")
Spanish uses “como” (like) the same way. Sometimes it is difficult to analize the construction of a phrase in too much detail. It is just the way they say it.
Look at it this way:
The Anacostia neighborhood is not safe in daylight [just] like [it is not safe] after dark.
---
### Author:  [@Heracles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Heracles)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2013, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/8 "2013-11-29T19:12:59Z")
> [@](#):
>
> Thinking about Latin cum for a second, I could also see comme as meaning “day, inclusive of night,” and thus clarifying that this is jour = 24-hour period and not jour = daytime.
(Native speaker)
Nope, definitely not. The formulation _A comme B_ signifies applicability to both context A and context B. So, in this case, _jour_ means “daytime”.
The expression is a wordy, more literary, version of _et_ (“and”) for this particular context. It’s as if you were saying “both during the daytime and at night”: the “both” doesn’t add much.
---
### Author:  [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2013, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/9 "2013-11-29T19:15:45Z")
> [@bordelond](#):
>
> Obviously, when going between languages, lexical/connotative correspondences are not one to one. What I’m wondering is if the French sentence above can be rendered equally well with “_ou_” in place of “_comme_”?
>
> If not, and “_comme_” is essentially obligatory in such constructions, how does using “_ou_” there sound to native French speakers? A small mistake that doesn’t get in the way of understanding the gist? A typical learner’s mistake? A strange, stilted (non-native) manner of speaking? Just flat out incorrect and quite possibly making the utterance mean something else entirely different from what was intended?
Frenchie here. “Ou” in this particular case would sound most weird, but would strictly speaking nevertheless be grammatically correct as the French “ou”, like the English “or”, can be both exclusive or inclusive. As for “comme”, it has a [laundry list of possible uses](http://fr.wiktionary.org/wiki/comme), but in this case means “both”.
What we’ve got here is [del]failure to communicate[/del] a textbook collocation : you just don’t say “de jour ou de nuit”, you say “de jour comme de nuit” for no other reason that it’s the canned phrase/construction people use :). You could also say “Le quartier d’Anacostia n’est recommandable ni de jour, ni de nuit” and that would be fine too despite the double negative.
But using “ou” would definitely sound non-native. Unless one were to tack some more Frenchy collocation gloss goodness and reach “Le quartier d’Anacostia n’est pas recommandable, que ce soit de jour ou de nuit” (which would then be translatable as “Anacostia is not recommended, be it day or night”).
I’m honestly not even sure the full meaning would get through, since “ou” can be so ambiguous and as I said would not be the go-to conjunction for a French speaker.
Fact is, were you to make that “mistake” in speech I would half expect a French listener to believe you were asking the question “Is Anacostia not recommended by day, or by night ?”, even if the correct intonation for that question would not match the declarative you were aiming for at all. But since the syntax of the declarative would in itself be indicative of foreign-ness, well, as far as your putative native listener is concerned maybe you ain’t know ? :D.
---
### Author:  [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2013, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/10 "2013-11-29T19:24:50Z")
[QUOTE=bob++]
Google translate offers this “quartier anacostia n’est pas recommandé jour et nuit.” which actually looks better to me.
[/QUOTE]
Ugh, no. That’s bad grammar on top of being a bad collocative use of “jour et nuit” which does means 24/7 but with implicit notions of tirelessness, effort or dearth of relief. Ceaselessly, tirelessly, incessantly would all be correct English translations of “jour et nuit”.
And that’s why translators such as yours truly still get some work from time to time ;).
---
### Author:  [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2013, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/11 "2013-11-29T19:43:02Z")
> [@Heracles](#):
>
> (Native speaker)
>
> Nope, definitely not. The formulation _A comme B_ signifies applicability to both context A and context B. So, in this case, _jour_ means “daytime”.
>
> The expression is a wordy, more literary, version of _et_ (“and”) for this particular context. It’s as if you were saying “both during the daytime and at night”: the “both” doesn’t add much.
That’s why I edited this comment in, then right back out as soon as I saw it in black and white. Dumb idea—never mind!
(and all the editing in _this_ one is to fix the quote tags.)
---
### Author:  [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2013, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/12 "2013-11-29T20:02:46Z")
Thanks for the replies, all. Purely for my own edification, allow me to submit a piggyback question.
To translate W.C. Fields’ expression “It’s not a fit night out for man **or** beast!” into French, “_comme_” wlll generally be preferred? Something ending in something like “_… homme comme bête!_” (unsure of the use of prepositions and articles here)?
---
### Author:  [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2013, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/13 "2013-11-29T20:12:33Z")
Translating literally I’d use a “ni pour …, ni pour…” construction I think.
Or, depending on the context of the phrase, which I’m not entirely familiar with, possibly use the ready-made French expression “Un temps/une nuit à ne pas mettre un chien dehors !”, which is used when the weather is foul enough that letting a proverbial dog sleep outside would be cruel (much less, of course, a man).
---
### Author:  [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2013, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/14 "2013-11-29T20:15:18Z")
> [@bordelond](#):
>
> Thanks for the replies, all. Purely for my own edification, allow me to submit a piggyback question.
>
> To translate W.C. Fields’ expression “It’s not a fit night out for man **or** beast!” into French, “_comme_” wlll generally be preferred? Something ending in something like “_… homme comme bête!_” (unsure of the use of prepositions and articles here)?
Which of course probably should be “… nor beast.”
Does French make a habit like English of dropping words, espcially in spoken language?
Should be “T’aint a fit night out for [a] man nor [for a] beast.”
But for the spoken language especially, and for flow and poetic effect, we drop implied words.
("_Ah, yes. I remember the time… I had 3 aces, he had four. Normally, that doesn’t bother me, but I know what I dealt him…"_ -W.C. Fields)
---
### Author:  [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2013, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/15 "2013-11-29T20:27:43Z")
Tangent:
> [@md2000](#):
>
> Which of course probably should be “… nor beast.”
I had thought so, as well. But [in the movie’s script](http://www.aellea.com/scripts/fatal_glass_of_beer_the.html), it’s given as “ **… or beast** ”. Also, [here’s one of the several scenes from the film where Fields delivers this line](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VcGfuEZ9dSo).
I think Yukon Cornelius says “ **… man nor beast** ” in the iconic Rankin-Bass _Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer_ Christmas special, though 😃 Towards the end, right before the Abominable Snowman places the star on the elves Christmas tree.
---
### Author:  [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2013, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/16 "2013-11-29T23:44:58Z")
> [@md2000](#):
>
> Should be “T’aint a fit night out for [a] man nor [for a] beast.”
> But for the spoken language especially, and for flow and poetic effect, we drop implied words.
But “a man” and “a beast” have slightly different connotations than without the indefinite article. It doesn’t make too much a difference in most cases but, “a man” implies an individual while “man” without the article means more like “humanity” in the collective sense–the Neil Armstrong “one small step for [a] man…” (with the “a” being swallowed in the transmission) quote being the being the big one where the inclusion or exclusion of the indefinite article makes a difference to the meaning of the sentence.
---
### Author:  [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2013, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/french-translation-question-ou-comme/675086/17 "2013-11-30T00:46:24Z")
For some reason I often find it difficult to translate German into English, even when I understand the German passage perfectly and although English is my native language. What usually happens is that my translation comes out rather awkward and stilted, much more so than if I were to write the same passage in English. I’m sure it’s something about the cognitive processes involved, which professional interpreters and translators have managed to overcome.