déjà vu
36
6.9
- noun
- /ˌdeɪʒɑː ˈvuː/
:
déjà vu
- When I walked into the room, I felt a strong sense of déjà vu, as if I had been there before.
- a sense of deja vu
- a feeling of deja vu
- a strong sense of deja vu
Examples
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I'm having the strangest feeling of déjà vu.
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Thinking these thoughts, I am swept by a sense of déjà vu.
Fiction book (1993) -
I just got a weird sense of déjà vu.
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Have you ever experienced déjà vu?
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I know, I feel like I have déjà vu.
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Just had a little déjà vu.
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Well, I'm having a déjà vu again.
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I'm having a déjà vu.
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The Iranian public, meanwhile, could be forgiven for feeling a strong sense of déjà vu.
Academic text (2004) -
My first impression of the huge, nearly empty room was a dizzying sense of déjà vu.
Fiction book (1999)
Synonyms
4
6.6
A feeling that you have already lived through the present moment
Antonyms
How Familiar
Surface Forms
Morphology
déjà + vu
Although déjá vu is a French loanword in English and the input lacks English definitions for the constituents, its meaning is directly compositional: déjá = 'already' and vu = 'seen', so the overall sense 'already seen' (the feeling that a situation has happened before) is transparently derived from the parts. Therefore a B1 learner who knows the constituent meanings would be able to infer the MWE meaning; the only difficulty is that the constituents are in another language, not semantic opacity.
Etymology
The phrase déjà vu comes from French words déjà meaning 'already' and vu meaning 'seen', and it paints the clear picture of a new moment that feels like you 'already saw' it. That's why déjà vu means the strange 'feeling that a situation has happened before'.