Re: French <chez>

'Chez' requests normally that what follows is animated
(and human). The usual example is: je vais au salon de
coiffure, mais chez le coiffeur. Some people say 'je
vais au coiffeur' but that is considered as very bad
French.

'Je vais à la maison' is 'I'm going home', not 'at the
home of' or 'into the house of'.

There is another meaning for 'chez', something like
'as to'. For ex, one can say 'chez les chiens,
l'odorat est plus développé que chez l'être humain'.
That doesn't refer of course to any 'dog's home'.

'Amener la chèvre au bouc' means 'to bring the goat to
the he-goat' (in order to get fecundated), but 'amener
sa femme au Mammouth' just means that you bring your
wife to the supermarket called Mammouth. There is a
slight difference.

--- Trebor Jung <treborjung@...> wrote:
> Merhaba!
>
> At school we learned that <chez> in French means
> 'at', but I've always thought it meant 'at the home
> of'. And what about <à la maison>, is there a
> difference between <chez> and that?
>
> --Trebor

=====
Philippe Caquant

"Le langage est source de malentendus."
(Antoine de Saint-Exupery)

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