assister

Assister is a French verb with two primary senses depending on its construction. The first meaning is to be present at an event or occurrence, expressed with the preposition à: assister à un concert, à une conférence, ou à un match. In this use, the verb conveys attendance or witnessing, not action. The second meaning is to help or support someone in a task or undertaking; this sense is transitive and can be rendered in English as “to assist” or “to aid.” For example, assister quelqu’un dans ses démarches or assister une personne dans son travail.

Etymology and form: assister comes from Latin assistere, meaning to stand by or to help, and it has cognates in other Romance languages as well as the English verb assist. In modern French, the verb is conjugated regularly: j’assiste, tu assistes, il assiste, nous assistons, vous assistez, ils assistent. The passé composé uses avoir: j’ai assisté à la réunion. The past participle is assisté, with no agreement when used with avoir, though agreement would occur in passive-like constructions.

Usage notes: In everyday speech, aider is more common than assister for the sense “to help.” Assist is still correct in formal writing or certain contexts, especially when describing providing support or aiding someone in a task. The phrase assister à is a fixed form meaning “to attend,” as in assister à une cérémonie. The noun forms related to the verb are l’assistance (help, support) and l’assistant/l’assistante (assistant).

In sports, the French equivalent of an “assist” in scoring statistics is typically described by terms like passe décisive rather than assister, though the verb form can appear in broader descriptions of action.