About

French Google Translate refers to memes in which names of various people and fictional characters are pronounced in French using Google Translate's text-to-speech function, with a "french" photoshop of that character then shown, accompanied by accordion music. The format originated on TikTok in October 2019 and gained significant popularity on Twitter, iFunny and Instagram in early January 2020. The meme later mutated to include Italian, German and other translations.

Origin

On October 23rd, 2019, TikTok^[1] user @austin.burnman posted a meme in which he used the text-to-speech function of Google Translate to generate the French pronunciation of the word "titties" (shown below). In the second part of the TikTok, @austin.burnham edited himself next to the Eiffel Tower holding a wine glass, with the video set to accordion music. The TikTok received over 1.5 million likes in three months, with an iFunny^[2] repost gaining over 30,400 smiles in the same period.

This post was a derivative of larger Reassuring Google Translate TikTok trend.

Spread

In the following months, the subformat saw moderate spread on TikTok along with Reassuring Google Translate. For example, on November 1st, 2019, TikTok^[3] user @memetix posted a French Google Translate meme which received over 5,100 likes (shown below, left). On November 28th TikTok^[4] user @kidalvn recreated @austin.burnham's meme, gaining over 1.4 million likes (shown below, center). A December 18th Baby Yoda meme by TikTok^[5] user @wesapple26 received over 186,400 likes (shown below, right).

The format did not see significant use outside of TikTok until on December 27th, 2019, Twitter^[6] user @riseofanida posted an Anakin Skywalker version of the meme using a photoshop of Anakin wearing a beret and holding a baguette instead of the lightsaber (shown below). The video received over 1.8 million views, with the tweet gaining over 40,600 retweets and 104,700 likes. In the following days, @riseofanida^[7][8] posted more photoshops of Anakin presented as a citizen of various countries.

Anakin Skywalker our boulanger du 16eme arrondissement pic.twitter.com/scV6xw82PI

— 𝑎𝑚𝑖𝑑𝑎𝑙𝑎 (@riseofanidala) December 27, 2019

On December 30th, Facebook^[9] page Implying Movies are Good reuploaded the meme, with the post receiving over 460 reactions and 480 shares in two weeks. On the same day, iFunny^[10] user Gadzirra reposted the meme from Facebook, gaining over 4,900 smiles in two weeks. Also on December 30th, Instagram^[11] user bearboob posted a Danny Devito version of the meme which received over 114,500 views and 30,100 likes (shown below, left). A January 2nd, 2020, Darth Vader edit reposted by iFunny^[12] user scoobysnackkkk received over 66,700 smiles in one week (shown below, right).

In the following days, the format gained significant spread on Instagram, iFunny and Twitter.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References