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I'm pretty new to the French language and just saw the following line in the song "alors on danse" by Stromae;

"alors tu t'bouches plus les oreilles"

I know that "se boucher les oreilles" means to plug up/cover one's ears, but the sentence mean "So you stop covering your ears". How exactly does "plus" made it negative?

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The grammatically correct sentence is :

alors tu ne te bouches plus les oreilles

ne is often omitted in the spoken language when using the negation form.

ne plus literally means not anymore / stop.

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  • Oh right, he does that in the beggining also. So I just need to get used to "ne" being omitted.
    – noam b
    Commented Dec 1, 2015 at 11:32
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    and note that in some occasion, you need the context to understand the meaning of it, especially when written but sometimes also even when speaking, if the "s" is silent. Example: "J'en veux plus" could mean "I don't want anymore of it" (silent "s") or "I want more of this" (pronounced "s")
    – Laurent S.
    Commented Dec 1, 2015 at 12:09
  • That's so much easier now thanks! I just thought it was one thing to omit "ne" if you still have its other end like "pas" or "rien", but with "plus" it could literally mean the opposite. Thanks for the note.
    – noam b
    Commented Dec 1, 2015 at 20:46
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My 2 cents :

J'en veux = I want (some of) it

J'en veux plus = I want more of it (s pronounced)

Je n'en veux pas = I don't want (any of) it

Je n'en veux plus = I don't want anymore of it (s not pronounced)

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It is worth adding that plus is pronounced differently when it is a part of negation (pronounced as plu) and when it means more (pronounced as plusse). Thus, even when the negation particle ne is omitted, the following two sentences do not sound the same:
Je (ne) t'aime plus (I don't love you anymore.)
vs.
Je t'aime plus (qu'avant.) (I love you more (than before.))

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    j'aurais écrit plus (qu'avant) plutôt que plus (que avant).
    – XouDo
    Commented Sep 26, 2022 at 17:01

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