It turns out articles in French and English (5)
I believe the answer is:
lathe
'it turns' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'out articles in french and english' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite understand how this works, but
'articles' could be 'athe' (two examples of the part-of-speech: a+the) and 'athe' is found within the answer.
A single letter 'l' remains which might be clued in a way I don't understand.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for lathe that I've seen before include "Turner's machine" , "Wood-turning machine" , "Turner's tool" , "Turning device" , "Machine for cutting, drilling or polishing" .)