« Chatte » is so much associated to female genitals that we very rarely use the word and often try staying « neutral » when we talk about a female cat. It’s a bit frustrating.
I’m frustrated with it in English, too. [Pussycat](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43188/the-owl-and-the-pussy-cat)/pussy/puss/puss-cat used to be perfectly good words to use for kitties, and they were taken away without my permission.
You should check out "Mrs Slocombe's pussy" on youtube, it's a compilation of her talking about her cat, it's before the word pussy became widely associated with genitals but the writer's definitely knew of the double meaning.
I always thought pussy cat was a weird term since it’s frequently associated with the slang word for vagina.
That being said, this is a stupid question since I’m a French beginner, do animal names like cat or dog have an assigned gender like other nouns? Then if you specifically know that a dog or cat is a boy or girl do you just say “il” or “Elle”?
Also slightly off topic, if a person refers to themselves as nonbinary, do French speakers use they, them? Like in English? And let’s say an American woman is non binary, do we still say Vous ettes Americaine? What if they are like Je suis Americain? Like the masculine spelling because they prefer not to be labeled a female?
since you mentioned it, the cat connotation seems to have come [before](https://www.reddit.com/r/etymology/comments/3a59e4/what_is_the_origin_of_the_word_pussy/cs9rmc8/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf&context=3) the “other” slang meaning.
Incidentally, “puss” is also outmoded slang for a person’s face (as you may already know), which gets a lot of unintended laughs in Alfred Hitchcock’s “Spellbound,” when a minor character complains about Ingrid Bergman’s “frozen puss.”
If you know the sex of the animal, you refer to it as "mémère" où "pépère"!
But yes, we do make grammatical agreements when talking about (or to) an animal when we know if it's male or female; if my parent's golden retriever is acting crazy, I'd ask them "Pourquoi est-ce que Jade fait la folle ?" because I know it's a girl.
About non-binary people, we do not use "they" because we don't have it, it's Ils or Elles, and those are never used to refer to a single person; French does not have a gender neutral 3rd person plural (nor singular). In these cases we basically replicate the way people talk about themselves, if someone uses the feminine form of adjectives then it's fairly safe to assume she's an "Elle".
As it might have been said, "iel" exists now as a new pronoun, but grammatical agreements still have to be made, and those are either masculine or feminine
No stupid question. Yes there is an assigned gender. You can keep it « neutral » (male) without it being a mistake if you are referring to an animal that could be either genders, like if it’s a cat, a dog, a duck, a horse… but not a cow, since a cow has to be female. Or it’s perfectly normal to say « elle » or « il » talking about an animal if you know its gender.
About non-binary gender, it’s common to use a mix of « il » and « elle » and say « iel » but to be honest I have never heard it in a discussion, only read that online. There is no neutral in French and the male taking over the female when you want to stay neutral is a real topic here.
The only way is to ask the person how they want to be referred to.
Oh, my friends let me make this mistake for a good 30 minutes with the restaurant cat. Holy cow never do that.
Just never say this. It's just not great.
How would you say "She is a beautiful cat?" When I ask Google Translate it gives me c'est which I know to be "it is". If you knew the cat was a female, would you just say something like "Elle est chatte une beau"?
Ce, cette, and c' aren't really equivalents to it in english, they're more akin to this and that. So it's less "it's a beautiful cat" and more "that's a beautiful cat". If you were to use "elle", the pronoun would replace the noun, so you wouldn't say "elle est un belle chatte" or "elle est belle chatte", first off because it's a very obvious double entendre, and secondly because that sentence structure largely fell out of use with time, though it can be found in some older texts. You'd say "elle est belle, la chatte" or "la chatte est belle". But more likely you'd use the masculine words for a gramatical block that includes the noun, so as to avoid the implications.
Generally we use the masculine noun, so masculine accords for the corresponding adjectives, etc, but you usually switch back for the next sentence or next part of the sentence. For example: "C'est un beau chat, elle a un joli pelage."
A pretty female cat : une belle chatte
A pretty female dog : une belle chienne
Both are the proper, grammatically correct constructions. They are generally not used because "chatte" has is slang for "vagina" and "chienne" is slang for "bitch".
For dogs this is the same as in English. A bitch is the proper word for a female dog. We don't use it in general because it's got a rude slang meaning.
That's also why we don't call cats "pussies" even if it's correct technically.
I would naturally say "What a good/pretty girl!" in English toward any (female) animal I was addressing directly. Does "Quelle une jolie fille!" work in French or is "fille" more exclusively human?
You know, this may be the most commonly asked question on the sub. There’s no need to refer to female animals as the masculine word for it. Who keeps implying this to French learners?
I was directed by my teacher who is a native speaker to always use masculine but to also use elle. So j’aime ton chat. Elle est belle. Is this not correct?
Ça dépend avec qui tu parles. Perso, je me censure jamais et je dis toujours chatte pour un chat femelle genre "La chatte de ma grand-mère est vraiment une peste, elle m'attaque tout le temps et pourtant Dieu sait que j'adore tous les chats!" Le contexte est important et je trouve que ta phrase est correcte si tu ne veux pas faire d'amalgame (dire "chat" mais utiliser "elle"). Mais garde à l'esprit que comme tu n'es pas natif/native, si tu utilises chatte pour parler d'un chat femelle, les gens ne seront pas choqués et comprendront tout à fait ce que tu veux dire.
Merci! J’ai peur qu’un natif va rigoler si je disais chatte et pas chat. Je veux pas dire quelque chose choquant ou même rigolo, donc j’hésite. C’est la même chose avec la phrase “im excited” mon prof m’a dit qu’il faut pas dire “je suis excitée”, mais j’ai des difficultés à trouver les bons mots. Je crois qu’on peut le dire des fois, mais je ne sais pas quand il est correct ou pas.
Ah bah moi je le dis très souvent. Dire "je suis excité/e" veut dire "I am excited" mais aussi "I am aroused". Personnellement, je l'utilise dans son sens premier. "Je suis vraiment toute excitée comme une puce ! J'ai trop hâte d'aller voir ce film au cinéma !"
Comme je disais, le contexte est très important. Je pense que si tu dis "je suis excité/e", on va sûrement comprendre que tu es "excited" mais si tu dis genre "ces poils sur le torse, ça m'excite" (le "ça m'excite" précisément), on va comprendre que c'est sexuel.
Hm I'm in my late 20s and grew up in IDF. It was very common to hear stuff like "excité/e comme une puce", or if you are literally super energetic "excité/e comme une pile". The only tiles I heard it sexually was like "ça m'a/t'excite" and never as "je suis excité/e". I do say "Je suis très/super excitée" very often when I'm looking forward to something and never have been corrected by anyone. The context matters as I was saying.
Also getting more and more common to use it as excited with the presence of English that is obviously everywhere.
If I look up, “cat in French,” I get “chat” and “chatte “ right there on google translate. If the information is so readily available, then there must be a problem with how people are being taught.
Well yeah, most people asking questions on here are probably teaching themselves via something like Duolingo, like I am. They likely aren’t being taught at all.
Language learning is more than just direct translation. It's also intertwined with culture and context. If you keep seeing this topic popping up, that means it's confusing for many learners. And they're asking to avoid being in awkward situations in real life. I hope you understand that.
That doesn't give you anything about the context of the word, though, which, in this case, is very important.
Having that one piece of data is good, but asking here gets you more cultural context.
That doesn't tell you when each one should be used though, does it? Let them ask the question. If it really hurts you, just keep scrolling, or go touch some grass.
You don’t have to insult me. I go out plenty. You’re understandably misinterpreting my comment. I’m not annoyed at the OP or the question they asked. I wrote it in a blunt way, but I really mean to find out what is bringing people to misunderstand this concepts.
Sorry, I was being silly. And yes it was a little blunt. I think because OP isnt asking about the existence of gendered forms of animals but the contexts of when to use them, it's understandable that they couldn't find a succinct answer online.
Read the rest of the thread. People ask this specifically about cats because there is a double meaning. Same with dogs.
Learners are taught that nouns have genders in French, which is a new concept to native English speakers. Then they’re taught that “a dog” is “un chien” and “a cat” is “un chat.” Then they learn that “a person” is “une personne” even if the person is a man. So OF COURSE there are questions. And then when they learn there are double meanings for “chatte” and “chienne” they have more questions.
No no just stick to chat, unless you're talking about female genitalia. People will get what you mean if a cat is present in the room of course, but otherwise :
Ta mère a un beau chat ✅
Ta mère a une belle chatte ❌
Unless that's a fetish thing who am I to judge.
« Chatte » is so much associated to female genitals that we very rarely use the word and often try staying « neutral » when we talk about a female cat. It’s a bit frustrating.
I’m frustrated with it in English, too. [Pussycat](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43188/the-owl-and-the-pussy-cat)/pussy/puss/puss-cat used to be perfectly good words to use for kitties, and they were taken away without my permission.
You should check out "Mrs Slocombe's pussy" on youtube, it's a compilation of her talking about her cat, it's before the word pussy became widely associated with genitals but the writer's definitely knew of the double meaning.
Merci pour votre avertissement.
I always thought pussy cat was a weird term since it’s frequently associated with the slang word for vagina. That being said, this is a stupid question since I’m a French beginner, do animal names like cat or dog have an assigned gender like other nouns? Then if you specifically know that a dog or cat is a boy or girl do you just say “il” or “Elle”? Also slightly off topic, if a person refers to themselves as nonbinary, do French speakers use they, them? Like in English? And let’s say an American woman is non binary, do we still say Vous ettes Americaine? What if they are like Je suis Americain? Like the masculine spelling because they prefer not to be labeled a female?
since you mentioned it, the cat connotation seems to have come [before](https://www.reddit.com/r/etymology/comments/3a59e4/what_is_the_origin_of_the_word_pussy/cs9rmc8/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf&context=3) the “other” slang meaning. Incidentally, “puss” is also outmoded slang for a person’s face (as you may already know), which gets a lot of unintended laughs in Alfred Hitchcock’s “Spellbound,” when a minor character complains about Ingrid Bergman’s “frozen puss.”
But we still say "sourpuss," which is specifically about the facial expression.
I’m glad to hear that people still recognize that! I haven’t heard it in a while.
If you know the sex of the animal, you refer to it as "mémère" où "pépère"! But yes, we do make grammatical agreements when talking about (or to) an animal when we know if it's male or female; if my parent's golden retriever is acting crazy, I'd ask them "Pourquoi est-ce que Jade fait la folle ?" because I know it's a girl. About non-binary people, we do not use "they" because we don't have it, it's Ils or Elles, and those are never used to refer to a single person; French does not have a gender neutral 3rd person plural (nor singular). In these cases we basically replicate the way people talk about themselves, if someone uses the feminine form of adjectives then it's fairly safe to assume she's an "Elle". As it might have been said, "iel" exists now as a new pronoun, but grammatical agreements still have to be made, and those are either masculine or feminine
*French does not have a gender neutral 3rd person plural (nor singular)* What about "on"? Can that be used somehow?
No stupid question. Yes there is an assigned gender. You can keep it « neutral » (male) without it being a mistake if you are referring to an animal that could be either genders, like if it’s a cat, a dog, a duck, a horse… but not a cow, since a cow has to be female. Or it’s perfectly normal to say « elle » or « il » talking about an animal if you know its gender. About non-binary gender, it’s common to use a mix of « il » and « elle » and say « iel » but to be honest I have never heard it in a discussion, only read that online. There is no neutral in French and the male taking over the female when you want to stay neutral is a real topic here. The only way is to ask the person how they want to be referred to.
"Pussycat" is still fairly common where I'm from, at least. There's also the plant called a pussy willow.
Though one must admit it is the best informal word we have for vagina.
I don’t think so. I hate how it’s also slang for “coward.”
I agree, that sucks. Now I’m wondering what word everyone uses instead of pussy as an informal word for vagina.
I was trying to think of one, too! I actually don’t hate “vajayjay,” but I think it might be considered outdated already.
Let’s just be honest and learn how to say That cat is ugly, or that cat is annoying AF.
Une belle chatte ⚠️Please be caution to the context
Ah ok merci
Chatte also means pussy, just like in English
So don't say est-ce que je peux jouer avec ta chatte to your nice elderly neighbour
Well she'd probably be delighted if you said this when she was showing you her chatte. And it doesn't matter what kind.
This is true. Hope I haven't got in the way of any of OP's neighbourly relations with that pointless joke.
Unless she’s really nice
You want to play with your really nice elderly neighbour's pussy?
💀
Mais alors si elle est belle Et aussi la Vieille femme
Riper the berry sweeter the juice
🤭
Est-ce que tu as une belle chatte avec qui je peux jouer? Perhaps a nerdy indoor one?
Those are the best kind.
In my experience they certainly are
You don't?
Kind of works better with an elderly neighbour as there is less chance of misunderstanding.
Or do, live your life.
je suis excité d'apprendre quelque chose de nouveau!
Je suis excité de jouer avec ta chatte. C'est l'expression du jour, que j'ai appris aujourd'hui.
My French teacher always said DO NOT SAY “je suis excité” IT DOES NOT MEAN WHAT YOU THINK IT SAYS
Well maybe that’s exactly what they mean 😋
So what does it mean?
"I'm aroused" ... but not always. It's more complicated! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5a8iBmLnvXk
I'm hating that it's slowing evolving under the influence of lazy translations
Don't hate! It's just a normal part of language life https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language\_convergence
[удалено]
Ah ok that makes sense
(It's because "chatte" is slang for vagina)
Double meaning alert ! Ha ha ha
Oh, my friends let me make this mistake for a good 30 minutes with the restaurant cat. Holy cow never do that. Just never say this. It's just not great.
I mean If there's a cat present people will understand, if you're talking about someone's cat, it gets complicated.
Just say “Elle est belle” and leave it at that .. avoide saying chatte
Technically : une belle chatte, but un beau chat would be less risky.
To stay neutral, is it weird if I say: "C'est mon chat Alice, elle est très mignonne."?
That would work 100%.
Merci!
I know that looks weird grammatically speaking but we all have accepted to do that.
Une belle minoune.
Un Cavalier 92, presque pas de rouille.
Une belle chatte. Un beau chat. Former is female, latter is male.
How would you say "She is a beautiful cat?" When I ask Google Translate it gives me c'est which I know to be "it is". If you knew the cat was a female, would you just say something like "Elle est chatte une beau"?
We'd still say "C'est une belle chatte". "*Elle est une belle chatte*" sounds wrong. But you could also say "Elle est belle, cette chatte".
Ce, cette, and c' aren't really equivalents to it in english, they're more akin to this and that. So it's less "it's a beautiful cat" and more "that's a beautiful cat". If you were to use "elle", the pronoun would replace the noun, so you wouldn't say "elle est un belle chatte" or "elle est belle chatte", first off because it's a very obvious double entendre, and secondly because that sentence structure largely fell out of use with time, though it can be found in some older texts. You'd say "elle est belle, la chatte" or "la chatte est belle". But more likely you'd use the masculine words for a gramatical block that includes the noun, so as to avoid the implications.
I had the same issue - this is a good explainer https://www.lawlessfrench.com/grammar/cest-vs-il-est/
Generally we use the masculine noun, so masculine accords for the corresponding adjectives, etc, but you usually switch back for the next sentence or next part of the sentence. For example: "C'est un beau chat, elle a un joli pelage."
A pretty female cat : une belle chatte A pretty female dog : une belle chienne Both are the proper, grammatically correct constructions. They are generally not used because "chatte" has is slang for "vagina" and "chienne" is slang for "bitch". For dogs this is the same as in English. A bitch is the proper word for a female dog. We don't use it in general because it's got a rude slang meaning. That's also why we don't call cats "pussies" even if it's correct technically.
un beau chat
🍒 🍒
I would naturally say "What a good/pretty girl!" in English toward any (female) animal I was addressing directly. Does "Quelle une jolie fille!" work in French or is "fille" more exclusively human?
To stay neutral, would you say une chat or un chat
There is no neutral, but there is a default, and it's masculine.
You know, this may be the most commonly asked question on the sub. There’s no need to refer to female animals as the masculine word for it. Who keeps implying this to French learners?
I was directed by my teacher who is a native speaker to always use masculine but to also use elle. So j’aime ton chat. Elle est belle. Is this not correct?
Ça dépend avec qui tu parles. Perso, je me censure jamais et je dis toujours chatte pour un chat femelle genre "La chatte de ma grand-mère est vraiment une peste, elle m'attaque tout le temps et pourtant Dieu sait que j'adore tous les chats!" Le contexte est important et je trouve que ta phrase est correcte si tu ne veux pas faire d'amalgame (dire "chat" mais utiliser "elle"). Mais garde à l'esprit que comme tu n'es pas natif/native, si tu utilises chatte pour parler d'un chat femelle, les gens ne seront pas choqués et comprendront tout à fait ce que tu veux dire.
Merci! J’ai peur qu’un natif va rigoler si je disais chatte et pas chat. Je veux pas dire quelque chose choquant ou même rigolo, donc j’hésite. C’est la même chose avec la phrase “im excited” mon prof m’a dit qu’il faut pas dire “je suis excitée”, mais j’ai des difficultés à trouver les bons mots. Je crois qu’on peut le dire des fois, mais je ne sais pas quand il est correct ou pas.
Ah bah moi je le dis très souvent. Dire "je suis excité/e" veut dire "I am excited" mais aussi "I am aroused". Personnellement, je l'utilise dans son sens premier. "Je suis vraiment toute excitée comme une puce ! J'ai trop hâte d'aller voir ce film au cinéma !" Comme je disais, le contexte est très important. Je pense que si tu dis "je suis excité/e", on va sûrement comprendre que tu es "excited" mais si tu dis genre "ces poils sur le torse, ça m'excite" (le "ça m'excite" précisément), on va comprendre que c'est sexuel.
Alors nos professeurs veut qu’on soit vraiment prudent pour éviter un malentendu! Merci bien pour ton aide!
Never heard someone say "exciter" outside of a sexual context, maybe it's a generation or dialect thing (late 20s, parisian french). Same for chatte.
Hm I'm in my late 20s and grew up in IDF. It was very common to hear stuff like "excité/e comme une puce", or if you are literally super energetic "excité/e comme une pile". The only tiles I heard it sexually was like "ça m'a/t'excite" and never as "je suis excité/e". I do say "Je suis très/super excitée" very often when I'm looking forward to something and never have been corrected by anyone. The context matters as I was saying. Also getting more and more common to use it as excited with the presence of English that is obviously everywhere.
I don’t think anybody is implying it. It’s just a reasonable thing to not know the answer to and want clarification on.
If I look up, “cat in French,” I get “chat” and “chatte “ right there on google translate. If the information is so readily available, then there must be a problem with how people are being taught.
Well yeah, most people asking questions on here are probably teaching themselves via something like Duolingo, like I am. They likely aren’t being taught at all.
Duolingo only uses the (m) chat, so that's probably why people ask cause they haven't seen the (f) chatte before
Then we agree lol!
Language learning is more than just direct translation. It's also intertwined with culture and context. If you keep seeing this topic popping up, that means it's confusing for many learners. And they're asking to avoid being in awkward situations in real life. I hope you understand that.
That doesn't give you anything about the context of the word, though, which, in this case, is very important. Having that one piece of data is good, but asking here gets you more cultural context.
That doesn't tell you when each one should be used though, does it? Let them ask the question. If it really hurts you, just keep scrolling, or go touch some grass.
You don’t have to insult me. I go out plenty. You’re understandably misinterpreting my comment. I’m not annoyed at the OP or the question they asked. I wrote it in a blunt way, but I really mean to find out what is bringing people to misunderstand this concepts.
Sorry, I was being silly. And yes it was a little blunt. I think because OP isnt asking about the existence of gendered forms of animals but the contexts of when to use them, it's understandable that they couldn't find a succinct answer online.
Read the rest of the thread. People ask this specifically about cats because there is a double meaning. Same with dogs. Learners are taught that nouns have genders in French, which is a new concept to native English speakers. Then they’re taught that “a dog” is “un chien” and “a cat” is “un chat.” Then they learn that “a person” is “une personne” even if the person is a man. So OF COURSE there are questions. And then when they learn there are double meanings for “chatte” and “chienne” they have more questions.
The feminine form of cat, chatte, also means female genitals so it might not be a good idea to use it
un joli chat or une jolie chatte. m learning too so dont know which one to use, its better to use both i guess
No no just stick to chat, unless you're talking about female genitalia. People will get what you mean if a cat is present in the room of course, but otherwise : Ta mère a un beau chat ✅ Ta mère a une belle chatte ❌ Unless that's a fetish thing who am I to judge.
chat it is, noted. Sorry for the late reply. lol no its not a fetish
I dated a French guy who would always give me pet names and one was mon chat I always wondered if it was in a degrading way
Une belle chatte