Fijian to French: distinguish whether from a condition before choosing si
Se and ke do different work
The Fijian course by Schütz and Komaitai explains se between alternatives as or and introduces it as whether before a subordinate question. Its exercises ask whether somebody will return today or tomorrow, and whether an event has happened or not. These constructions leave a question unresolved. A French translation should not turn that uncertainty into a condition governing somebody else’s action merely because French si can introduce both kinds of clause.
The same Fijian course uses ke for conditional relationships. Its fishing dialogue makes the trip depend on good weather, completed work and available room in the boat. Those are conditions for going, not questions about what the speaker knows. Translating the passage requires identifying whether the source is asking for information, reporting uncertainty or making an action depend on a circumstance. The repeated appearance of short linking words does not make those relationships interchangeable.
French grammar makes this distinction consequential for verb choice. OQLF explains that a conditional clause introduced by si does not put its verb in the conditional mood. By contrast, a subordinate question introduced by si can contain a conditional. Its independently attested Je lui ai demandé si elle voudrait me remplacer reports a question about the willingness of that particular person, rather than stating a condition that must be met.
Do not apply the conditional-clause rule to every uncertainty
For Fijian se, begin by identifying what remains unknown. If the source says the writer does not know whether somebody will return, the French version must preserve uncertainty about the return. Changing it into if somebody returns, followed by a newly supplied consequence, would create a plan absent from the source. Removing the uncertainty and asserting that the person will return would make the opposite error: a question would become a confirmed event.
For ke, retain which circumstance makes which action possible. In the fishing dialogue, having room in the boat is relevant to whether an additional participant may go. A French sentence that merely asks whether the boat has room does not necessarily reproduce the conditional permission to join. The recipient needs the dependency between space and participation, not just the same two facts mentioned somewhere in the translation.
This is why an English intermediate gloss using if can obscure the Fijian distinction. English if can also represent whether, whereas French si requires attention to the construction it introduces. Use the source relationship to guide French mood and sentence structure. A condition, a reported question and an assertion of knowledge may discuss the same future trip while making different commitments about it; preserving those commitments matters more than giving each short Fijian linker one permanent French equivalent.
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