The French race is foreign, obviously (4)
I believe the answer is:
lett
'foreign obviously' is the definition.
I can't tell whether this defines the answer.
'the french race' is the wordplay.
'the french' becomes 'le' ('the' in French).
'race' becomes 'tt'.
'le'+'tt'='LETT'
'is' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for lett that I've seen before include "East European" , "northerner" , "Native of Latvia" , "Baltic citizen" , "Balt" .)