S'arrêter and 'arrêter'

What is the difference between the words 's'arrêter' and 'arrêter' ?

The dictionary says that the both words mean to stop.


Police stop the protesters marching towards the prime minister's office.

( In the above, I don't know whether to use 's'arrêter' or  'arrëter' )

1. Elle arrête de fumer.


2. Je arrête de fumer.

 Are my sentences correct?


One of the online dictionary says you should use 'arrêter' when turning off electrical appliances.

I am a bit confused because when I shut down my mobile phone, it uses the word 's'arrěter'.



On my mobile phone, I have French as the default language. When I shut it down, I read the words 'va s'arrêter'.



I appreciate if you shed some light on my question.

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Permalink Reply by Charles D on April 10, 2015 at 4:52am

I wasn't aware of that. See, here we all something new.

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Permalink Reply by Robert on April 10, 2015 at 8:06am

If avoir is part of the plu parfait, then être taking the place of avoir will also represent no other than plu parfait , will it?

I believe my perception about the double objects above was false, and the reason was I've misinterpreted être as representing the voix passive, where in fact it's plu parfait. (In the former case, the subject is direct object of the verb, whereas in the latter the subject is active, so there is no such cause for any silly conundrum.)

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EducatorPermalink Reply by George Hunt on April 10, 2015 at 1:03pm

I think you can delete your own posts by clicking on the little blue cross at the top right hand corner of the post.