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French Expression
| Meaning | D-Day, the big day | ||
| Literally | J day | ||
| Register | normal | ||
| Pronunciation |  |
[leu zhoor zhee] | |
| IPA | [lə ʒuʀ ʒi] | ||
Usage notes: The original meaning of the French expression le jour J is D-Day: 6 June 1944, the day the World War II Allied forces invaded Normandy, France. This is also known as the Normandy landings – le débarquement de Normandie.
The military terms le jour J and D-Day, along with l’heure H / H-hour*, indicate when an operation will occur. As you’ve guessed by now, the capital letter is just a repetition of the word: J stands for jour, D stands for "day," and H stands for heure or "hour."
Le jour J and, to a lesser extent, D-Day can also be used by civilians, as a figurative reference to an important event, similar to saying "the big day" in English. While jour J can be used for happy occasions like parties, D-Day is limited to events that one doesn’t look forward to, like a deadline, perhaps because it’s easy to imagine D standing for "doom" or "disaster."
Par exemple…
| Le 4 août, c’est le jour J. | August 4th is the big day. | |
| Le jour J est enfin arrivé ! | The big day is finally here! |
Synonym: le grand jour
In business, jour J can mean simply "current"; for example, le stock jour J means "current stock."
* There’s also l’instant T – at a given moment. The T stands for temps. As far as I know, this is not used in the military, but rather physics.
Related features
- French alphabet
- Dates
- L’Appel du 18 Juin 1940 (video)
- 6 juin 1944 : voyage à travers le temps (video)
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