secrétaire général
\sə.kʁe.tɛʁ ʒe.ne.ʁal\
The verdict
“secrétaire général” is outside the top-ranked French vocabulary, used as a noun - the kind of word writers most often double-check.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency French
- 18
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Fonctionnaire chargé de la correspondance, de l’expédition des ordres et de la partie purement administrative dans un ministère, dans une préfecture, etc.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | secrétaire général |
| Language | French |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | \sə.kʁe.tɛʁ ʒe.ne.ʁal\ |
| Letters | 18 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “secrétaire général” sits in French frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The French entry for secrétaire général is 18 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as \sə.kʁe.tɛʁ ʒe.ne.ʁal\. It sits outside the most-frequent rank tiers, which is often why uncommon words generate more spelling variants per reader. Wiktionary records 3 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for secrétaire général, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. No confusable counterpart is on file for this word, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
No explicit etymology string is stored for this entry, so its spelling is easiest explained by how it's pronounced rather than where it came from. The correct French form is secrétaire général, spelled S-E-C-R-É-T-A-I-R-E- -G-É-N-É-R-A-L.
Definition
- 1Fonctionnaire chargé de la correspondance, de l’expédition des ordres et de la partie purement administrative dans un ministère, dans une préfecture, etc.
- 2Personne en charge de la gestion administrative de l'ambassade.
- 3Nom donné au dirigeant de divers syndicats, partis, églises ou associations.
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Using “secrétaire général”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct French spelling is S-E-C-R-É-T-A-I-R-E- -G-É-N-É-R-A-L - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as \sə.kʁe.tɛʁ ʒe.ne.ʁal\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Browse more French words and confusable pairs in the same reference. French words
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.