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annowiki | 3 years ago

There's a piece of graffiti from the May 1968 Paris riots that goes "I have something to say but I don't know what." Reminds me of this. I can't find the original French but I think it's something like "J'ai quelque chose a dire mais je ne sais quoi."

Found it: https://www.dicocitations.com/citations/citation-67489.php

They use the pas

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BrandoElFollito|3 years ago

This is a great historical slogan, thanks for bringing it up.

There is a big difference between "... je ne sais quoi" and "... je ne sais pas quoi".

"... je ne sais pas quoi" means "I don't know what". The slogan is indeed "I have something to say but I don't know what".

"je ne sais quoi" is a weird French construction which is actually a name. It takes a masculin determinant and means "a little something".

Il manque à ce plat un petit je ne sais quoi = this meal is missing a little something

hemmert|3 years ago

Ah, nice! I'll compile a page of related projects on the website (with all the interesting links from this discussion), and that will go on it, too, of course! Thanks!