On the OffQc Facebook page, I asked recently what Québécois French word you had trouble understanding. Andrew said the word guidoune.
In Québécois French, une guidoune refers to a promiscuous woman. Because guidoune is an informal and offensive word, its equivalent in English would be words like slut, slag, whore, etc.
You may hear guidoune used to refer to a prostitute, or a woman judged to be “slutty” in appearance or behaviour.
In 2011, a Toronto police officer claimed that if women stopped dressing like “sluts” (s’habiller en guidoune), they’d avoid being assaulted.
A group of women angered by the police officer’s comments then organised a march in Toronto called SlutWalk.
On 29 May 2011 in the Montréal edition of the Métro newspaper, the police officer’s comments were discussed in an article:
Plus tôt cette année, un policier torontois a prétendu que si les femmes arrêtaient de s’habiller en «guidoune», elles éviteraient peut-être d’être maltraitées (…).
Earlier this year, a Toronto police officer claimed that if women stopped dressing like “sluts,” they would perhaps avoid being assaulted.
SlutWalk has spread to other cities. In the image above from the Montréal SlutWalk, we see the event name rendered in French as Marche des salopes rather than Marche des guidounes.
Image source: TVA Nouvelles
