Meaning
In familiar French, keuf means a police officer or cop. It is a verlan form associated with flic and is especially recognizable in youth and urban colloquial speech.
How it is used
Le Robert defines keuf as a familiar noun for a police officer and cross-references it with flic. Academic discussion of French urban youth language documents keuf among well-established verlan forms that became recognizable outside the groups where they first circulated.
Examples
- “Les keufs sont arrivés rapidement.”
- “Il a vu deux keufs au coin de la rue.”
- “Le mot keuf est très familier.”
Pronunciation
/kœf/ · KUHF
Tone and register
Informal and potentially distancing. It can be neutral shorthand among peers, but in tense police-related contexts it may carry hostility or contempt, so tone and situation matter more than a simple 'cop' gloss suggests.
Visitor guidance
Visitors should recognize keuf rather than treating it as the default word for police. Policier, policière, agent, or police are safer in neutral and formal contexts; keuf is best understood as marked familiar language whose social force changes with speaker stance.
Cultural context
Keuf belongs to the highly visible verlan layer of contemporary French and appears in media, music, fiction, and everyday conversation. Its association with urban youth culture does not justify inferring a speaker's ethnicity, neighborhood, politics, or relationship with police from a single use.
Places represented
Open the reviewed place guide for each regional sense carried by this canonical entry.