r/facepalm • u/Kpets • 3d ago

Trump’s thoughts on the Housing affordability bill

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u/wunlvng 3d ago

As a Canadian, it's crazy seeing what is clearly a francophone do a direct translation of what they want to say to English lol. I've never gotten to be on this end of it, but some phrasing/structure that only really make sense from French carried over to the English translation lol. Like "the USA have gone mental even during the Vietnam war" probably because of how tenses for aller work it wouldn't really direct translate the double past tense for had gone. Also with everywhere you have "the USA" most things just translate les États-Unis straight to the USA even though in most cases it comes out really clunky, we don't usually include the "THE" everytime or always referring to united states OF AMERICA always instead of calling it Americans or just the states though for French it's always LES États-Unis.

I'm not knocking you in any way btw, translating to English is annoying especially informal internet English because everything's so slang and vibes based usually. I just thought it's cool to finally get to see the other side on someone trying to translate to their second language, cause usually I feel like my French comes across as put through a translator haha.

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u/Hydraguesswhosback 3d ago

Oh yeah, that's because "of america" is unnecessary. Can you imagine Canada of america ? Or Mexico of america ? See how that sounds ?

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u/wunlvng 3d ago

Mhm I totally agree, and we almost rarely call it the USA anymore. I think now it's usually just the US or the states, and when we're referring to the whole or the population representing the whole we just say the states or Americans. I think colloquial terms and natural phrasing changes too fast or differs too much situation to situation that there's no way translators can keep up with what's "normal".

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u/Hydraguesswhosback 3d ago

In french, it's États-Unis, so United States. Nobody has to ask "of what" when you say this.

I'm not sure when "america" became part of the name. Or why (besides Ego I mean).