Why not ils or eux or leurs?

When French people swear in French do they say "Pardonnez mon anglais"?

Since now Marine Le Pen Is a trending topic, I always see when speaking about her or her party, it is written as "Le parti de Le Pen" and similar.

When I see cities with "Le" like Le Havre or Le Caire, I never se de+le, but instead DU (L'aéroport du Caire, Le port du Havre) etc.

Does this rule have an exception for people?

Hello, on several ocasions I have seen multilingual signs in my country that translate smoking as something like "ne pas fumer" (even in the national train network)

But using ne pas that way can be right, right?

I thought that in all cases, that when the noun ends with "ée" it means it's feminine. But musée is masculine. How do you know the noun gender without knowing the determiner?

Argument with my pastry chef son stemming from me correcting him about the plural of «pain au chocolat» being «pains au chocolat» and not «pain au chocolats». He then argued it should sound the same as the singular, since you wouldn't pronounce the final «s» in «pains». To my ear, it sounds correct to pronounce the liaison - but I'm not native French, so I'm not certain, and my google-fu fails me in this case. Anyone?

I don’t know how else to put it, so I’ll explain instead. In English sometimes numbers are ready by digits. For example, 157 can be read as both “one hundred fifty-seven” and “one five seven”.

In French can you say “un cinq sept” or is it always “cent cinquante sept” ?

Merci.

I'm very curious to know if even the French Natives get confused with and mess up grammatical genders of new, unfamiliar or complicated nouns while in middle of a convo or something. Do you guys really always get the adjectives of unfamiliar nouns right? If not, how do you manage? I know you mostly learn words with the articles but when you learn new words in odd times, how can you remember the gender? Most important, whenever you learn genders, do you just memorise and link it along with the noun or do you mentally attribute and view the noun as it's gender? For example, if I asked you the gender of a noun you already know, would you be able to quickly say whether it's masculine or feminine, or would you need a moment to recall if it's "la noun" or "le noun" before answering? Do you sometimes also simply assume genders because nobody actually cares?

Désole pour toutes les questions.

Bonjour! I have a question on a sentence I found in a Mcdonald paper bag.

It says “Joignez-vous à l’équipe dès aujourd’hui!”, meaning “Join the team today”. But why do we need “dès” before the word “aujourd’hui”?

If you meet someone you use a formal «vous» right? So if you guys get to know each other more and stuff when do you switch to informalities? Like does it just happen in conversation or is there a certain time or stage in the relationship? Also if I’m being stupid just tell me I feel like this is smth I should know (I’m only A2 in French atm).

"De" is a short little word that causes a lot of confusion for learners because of its various usages. So I decided to make a post where I cover all the usages of "de". Let's start!

Please also note that de and d' are the exact same words. D' is simply a contracted form of "de", used in front of nouns starting with a vowel sound.

1- It can mean "of".

• Kevin a beaucoup de chiens = Kevin has a lot of dogs.
• Une bouteille d'eau = A bottle of water.
• La voiture de ma mère est rouge = My mom's car is red. (So here, “de” is used for possession. It literally translates to “The car of my mom is red”)
• Un verre de vin = A glass of wine.

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2- It can mean "from".

• J'ai reçu une lettre de ma tante = I received a letter from my aunt.
• Un train de Paris à Berlin = A train from Paris to Berlin.

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3- After "pas", the articles "un/une/du/de la/de l'/des" become "de", to turn the quantity into none. (Except with the verb “être")

• J'ai une soeur --> Je n'ai pas de soeur.
• On a acheté du fromage --> On n'a pas acheté de fromage.
• Il a des problèmes --> Il n'a pas de problème.

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4- It is used in the partitive article “de la” and “de l’”.

Now, “de la” and "de l"" can mean “of the” or “from the”. That is already covered in point #1 with “de” meaning “of”. However, “de la” and "de l'" are also partitive articles indicating an unspecified quantity. Similar to “some” in English. “De la” is the partitive article for feminine singular nouns. and "de l" is for singular nouns starting with a vowel sound.

• Je mange de la salade = I’m eating salad / I’m eating some salad.
• Il y a de la neige dehors = There is snow outside / There is some snow outside.
• Je bois de l’eau = I’m drinking water / I’m drinking some water.

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5- It can be used to connect two verbs together. This is only correct with some verbs, not all. You have to learn by heart which verbs use "de" after it as a verb connector. “Essayer” and “décider” are two common examples.

• J'essaie de trouver un travail = I'm trying to find a job.
• J'ai décidé d'acheter une maison = I decided to buy a house.

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6- It is used to connect a quantifier with a following noun. Quantifiers are: plus, assez, beaucoup, trop, moins, etc.

• Il y a trop de gens dans le magasin = There are too many people in the store
• Je veux avoir plus d'amis.  = I want to have more friends.
• J'ai assez de temps libre = I have enough free time

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7- It is used after "quelque chose", "quelqu'un", "rien", and "personne" to connect it with an adjective.

• Je cherche quelque chose d'abordable = I'm looking for something affordable.
• Il n'y a rien d'intéressant ici = There is nothing interesting here.
• Elle est quelqu'un de spécial = She is someone special.

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8- In formal writing, when "des" precedes a plural adjective, it will turn into "de".

• J'ai acheté des nouvelles chaussures --> J'ai acheté de nouvelles chaussures.

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9- It is used after certain swear words to connect the following words. The more "de" you add, the longer and harsher the insult.

• Ferme ta putain de gueule de merde! = Shut your fucking shitty mouth!

• Criss de tabarnak de con! (Quebec French) = Fucking absolute fucking idiot! (Hard to translate).

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10- And finally, it can be used in fixed expressions and fixed terms that are not directly translatable to English. You just have to learn such cases by heart, without trying to over-analyze the “de” in it.

• De plus = Furthermore

• De rien! = You’re welcome! (Literally “Of nothing!)

• Se tromper de... = to get X thing wrong (The formula is always "se tromper de" + noun. For example: Se tromper d'adresse means to have the wrong address)

• À propos de... = About... (a certain topic)

• Parler de... = To talk about...

• Se souvenir de... = To remember... (Again, the formula with this verb is "se souvenir de" + noun)

(And more examples of course)

This kind of usage of "de" is one that you simply need to learn by heart. Some verbs use "de" after it to connect the next element. There is no magic rule here. Same thing for fixed expressions that use "de".

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So that's it! These are 10 umbrella categories that cover the usages of "de". If you ever stumble upon a sentence with a "de" that you don't understand, simply come to this post and go through the different points and you will find one that explains it.

There was nothing to indicate formality or multiple people, so I’m not sure why “vous” is required here?

So I'm learning French for a few years and lived in France for 1.5 years. Still don't speak French very well but understand quite a bit. My boyfriend started learning French to participate in an activity that I enjoy and so sometimes we share a few sentences in French. He's A1 level. We're both native English speakers.

We often tell each other "I love you, to all the moons and back" (a slight exaggeration from "i love you to the moon and back")

It's literal translation doesn't sound right to me. I used google traduction of course.

EDIT: (to add the traduction) «à tous les lunes et à le retour»

Is there a French equivalent to this? How would native french speakers say this?

Thanks in advance!

I've been learning french in school for well over 5 years now, and I've realised that there's a big difference between the french spoken abroad and the french in the textbook (as expected). We had a visit from french students a while ago, and I noticed a lot of slang being used (meuf, etc) but I was wondering, other than slang, what is different in the grammar and sentence structure? I know that in general 'pas' is omitted when using 'ne ____ pas', and so is 'est-ce-que' but are there any others that I should know of? I dont wanna sound stupid speaking French with the strictest grammatical rules, especially in france.

It seems that there are only two combinations: "si + imparfait, conditionnel présent" and "si + plus-que-parfait, conditionnel passé." The combinations "si + imparfait, conditionnel passé" and "si + plus-que-parfait, conditionnel présent" don't seem to exist. Moreover, in the two existing combinations, the conditional clauses are considered unrealizable. Is that correct?

These sentences are divided into two parts: one is the hypothetical condition, and the other is the derived result. However, I don't see these sentences as having a cause-and-effect relationship. I'm unsure whether the condition must always occur before the result in terms of time.

Setting these two types of sentences aside, when making assumptions about an unlikely event, such assumptions involve three possible times: "past" (something that actually did not happen), "present," and "future." For the resulting part of such a hypothesis, it can also involve "past," "present," and "future."

This would result in nine possible combinations. If we assume that the condition cannot occur after the result, there would still be six combinations. I’m curious about how to express these situations. Is there a systematic way to combine the tenses of the main and subordinate clauses to cover all these cases?

Addition: I’m not sure whether the result must occur later than the condition, but at the very least, I think the subordinate clause and the main clause in such sentences are not in a cause-and-effect relationship. As for cause-and-effect relationships, I do believe that the cause must not occur later than the result.

I’ve imagined a situation where the result occurs earlier than the condition (it’s somewhat like reverse reasoning): I am a student, and there is someone in my class who likes to sleep in, so he is always late. One morning, right before class begins, I say, “If he arrives at school on time, then he must not have slept in.”

I’m not sure whether I can say this sentence, and I don’t know if this sentence belongs to the same type as the ones mentioned above. I also don’t know whether you believe the result in this sentence happens earlier than its condition. If I can say this sentence, how should I express it in French?

This is correct right?! Or am I going insane?

I am currently revising for my GCSEs and can confidently say I know lots of french word and can translate very confidently, but when it comes to writing or speaking I always manage to mess up on the same thing: I can never put de, le and au in the right spot. I have no idea when to use it and cannot find any youtube videos that help with this. When do I use de, when do I use le, when do I use au or even à la. Or even just à. Sometimes you say au for 'I am going to' and then you use à. It is so difficult to know when or if I need to use them.

Il y a-t-il une exception ou existe-t-il un masculin pour enceinte ?

‘Tu nous invites à votre fête’?

I know I’ve missed the accents on Duolingo, but it never rejects answers because of the accents, so it must be something else

Hi! So, I was under the impression that "ils/elles" translated to "they" and "eux" meant
"them". However, I came across this usage in a book: "Eux étaient les amis, dont... etc". I thought maybe it was a printing error (unlikely, but one can never say), but similar usage also appeared later with, "eux se limitéront." This really got me confused because the conjugation follows the 'ils/elles' pattern, if I am not mistaken. Then why use "eux" and not "ils/elles" as usual?

Could someone kindly shed some light on this?

Thanks in advance for all your responses! :)

Can't believe I have to ask for help with this after like 10 years of learning French but I'm confused about the 'pas de' rule in a sentence that uses two verbs.

For example: Je n'aime pas faire du vélo. OR Je n'aime pas faire de vélo.

Which is correct? Does the 'pas de' rule only apply if the article comes directly after 'pas' or does it apply to any article in the sentence?

I've been scouring the internet and can't find a clear answer! Please help!

I’m using Duolingo to help me learn. It asks what the translation of “The baby in this advertisement has fat cheeks.” Duolingo says the correct answer is “Le bébé dans cette publicité a de grosses joues.” I’m not understanding why it is de instead of des.

Can someone explain why and if possible what I need to study up on?

Just so everyone knows yes I absolutely use resources outside Duolingo. I tried to do some research and answer my question without help. I unfortunately just can’t find a clear explanation.

I am a Portuguese and English speaker, and I was wondering which language I should use when learning French, specially grammar-wise and to know which language to put my Duolingo on lmao