French Pejorative Suffixes: Meaning and Morphology

In French, there are a variety of evaluative suffixes such as the diminutive, feminine, and augmentative. In addition, linguists and laypersons alike sometimes include the category “pejorative.” Suffixes such as -asse, -aud, and -ard have been labeled as pejorative by many authors, and words containing these suffixes are often considered pejorative by native speakers at first glance whether they are or not. The devil is in the detail, however, as many if not most of these “pejorative” suffixes are far more complicated than dictionaries and native speakers typically give them credit. Many have multiple uses or multiple forms, and most are often mislabeled as pejorative when “slang” is a more appropriate definition. In order to more fully understand and better classify these suffixes, I use dictionaries, books on slang, and the works of other researchers to examine each suffix in detail to determine the actual value of the suffix.