vouvoyer

English

Verb

vouvoyer (third-person singular simple present vouvoyers, present participle vouvoyering, simple past and past participle vouvoyered)

1. Alternative form of vousvoyer
   • 1996 May 17, Elizabeth Thompson, “Bertrand found fake ‘Bouchard’ a bit haughty”, in The Gazette, page A 2:

     [Guy] Bertrand said he should also have twigged when “Bouchard” – whom he has addressed using the familiar “tu” for years – started off the conversation using the formal “vous.” “I found myself saying, ‘Hello, Lucien, how is it going?’ and he ‘vouvoyered’ me and he had a bit of a haughty air. So I told myself that even though we know each other well, perhaps it’s better if we use vous.”

   • 2000 February 19, Mary Blume, “Mastering the Unmasterable: A French Puzzle”, in The New York Times:

     An outraged Parisian gave up skiing when his instructor addressed him as tu, while a fashionable personal trainer insists upon it because he would not feel right about vouvoyer-ing deltoids and abs. […] Questioned on his use of tu and vous, a Paris doctor said he doesn't know why he addresses his daughter-in-law as vous and his son-in-law as tu or why he tutoyers his golf pro but vouvoyers his golf partners.

   • 2012 January 7, Joanna Briscoe, “Alone in Paris”, in The Independent, number 7872, page 46:

     I had followed up the few leads I had and was invited to a couple of dinner parties, but after years of over-busy social life in London, I had become an awkward mute, knowing I was failing to understand the codes, the tutoyer-ing versus the vouvoyer-ing.

   • 2016, Jo Baker, A Country Road, A Tree, New York, N.Y.: Alfred A. Knopf, →ISBN, page 181:

     The lad is vouvoyering him, being well brought up: the state he’s in, he has hardly earned the formal mode.

   • 2020 January 29, Norman Hunt, “Madame XXX”, in The Connexion:

     In my view, vouvoyering is not enough. Far better to go on to monsieur et madame, which applies another diaphanous layer of style.

French

Alternative forms

• vousoyer
• voussoyer

Etymology

An alteration of voussoyer (vous +‎ -oyer), influenced by the v in vous and the form of tutoyer.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /vu.vwa.je/

• Audio

  (file)

Verb

vouvoyer

1. (transitive) to address someone using the formal pronoun vous rather than the informal tu, to use the V-form, to "you" (as opposed to "to "thou"")

   Antonym: tutoyer

Conjugation

This verb is part of a large group of -er verbs that conjugate like noyer or ennuyer. These verbs always replace the 'y' with an 'i' before a silent 'e'.

Conjugation of vouvoyer (see also Appendix:French verbs)

infinitive	simple	vouvoyer
	compound	avoir + past participle
present participle or gerund1	simple	vouvoyant /vu.vwa.jɑ̃/
	compound	ayant + past participle
past participle		vouvoyé /vu.vwa.je/
		singular			plural
		first	second	third	first	second	third
indicative		je (j’)	tu	il, elle, on	nous	vous	ils, elles
(simple tenses)	present	vouvoie /vu.vwa/	vouvoies /vu.vwa/	vouvoie /vu.vwa/	vouvoyons /vu.vwa.jɔ̃/	vouvoyez /vu.vwa.je/	vouvoient /vu.vwa/
	imperfect	vouvoyais /vu.vwa.jɛ/	vouvoyais /vu.vwa.jɛ/	vouvoyait /vu.vwa.jɛ/	vouvoyions /vu.vwaj.jɔ̃/	vouvoyiez /vu.vwaj.je/	vouvoyaient /vu.vwa.jɛ/
	past historic2	vouvoyai /vu.vwa.je/	vouvoyas /vu.vwa.ja/	vouvoya /vu.vwa.ja/	vouvoyâmes /vu.vwa.jam/	vouvoyâtes /vu.vwa.jat/	vouvoyèrent /vu.vwa.jɛʁ/
	future	vouvoierai /vu.vwa.ʁe/	vouvoieras /vu.vwa.ʁa/	vouvoiera /vu.vwa.ʁa/	vouvoierons /vu.vwa.ʁɔ̃/	vouvoierez /vu.vwa.ʁe/	vouvoieront /vu.vwa.ʁɔ̃/
	conditional	vouvoierais /vu.vwa.ʁɛ/	vouvoierais /vu.vwa.ʁɛ/	vouvoierait /vu.vwa.ʁɛ/	vouvoierions /vu.vwa.ʁjɔ̃/	vouvoieriez /vu.vwa.ʁje/	vouvoieraient /vu.vwa.ʁɛ/
(compound tenses)	present perfect	present indicative of avoir + past participle
	pluperfect	imperfect indicative of avoir + past participle
	past anterior2	past historic of avoir + past participle
	future perfect	future of avoir + past participle
	conditional perfect	conditional of avoir + past participle
subjunctive		que je (j’)	que tu	qu’il, qu’elle	que nous	que vous	qu’ils, qu’elles
(simple tenses)	present	vouvoie /vu.vwa/	vouvoies /vu.vwa/	vouvoie /vu.vwa/	vouvoyions /vu.vwaj.jɔ̃/	vouvoyiez /vu.vwaj.je/	vouvoient /vu.vwa/
	imperfect2	vouvoyasse /vu.vwa.jas/	vouvoyasses /vu.vwa.jas/	vouvoyât /vu.vwa.ja/	vouvoyassions /vu.vwa.ja.sjɔ̃/	vouvoyassiez /vu.vwa.ja.sje/	vouvoyassent /vu.vwa.jas/
(compound tenses)	past	present subjunctive of avoir + past participle
	pluperfect2	imperfect subjunctive of avoir + past participle
imperative		–	tu	–	nous	vous	–
simple		—	vouvoie /vu.vwa/	—	vouvoyons /vu.vwa.jɔ̃/	vouvoyez /vu.vwa.je/	—
compound		—	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	—	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	—
1 The French gerund is usable only with the preposition en.
2 In less formal writing or speech, these tenses may be found to have been replaced in the following way: past historic → present perfect past anterior → pluperfect imperfect subjunctive → present subjunctive pluperfect subjunctive → past subjunctive (Christopher Kendris [1995], Master the Basics: French, pp. 77, 78, 79, 81).

Derived terms

• vouvoiement

See also

• T-V distinction

Further reading

• “vouvoyer”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.