What's your bête noire of French grammar?

Dear all,

I'm looking to expand the site's French grammar section so am looking for suggestions of new topics to include. So in a nutshell my question is:

What are the things that you find difficult/confusing about French?!

0 members like this

Replies are closed for this discussion.

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Laura Williams Rice on February 16, 2010 at 4:21am

I have been trying to figure out the difference in when to use
a cause de
parce que
car
all of which mean "because"

Permalink Reply by Nana Lee on February 26, 2010 at 3:47am

Hello. I would like to know how to say a command sentence in French.
For example, we say "open the door" in English. In French, it is "ouvres la porte" or "ouvrir la porte"?

And I want to know what is the difference between "chaque jour" and "toutes les jours".

Thank you.

Permalink Reply by Isabelle75Paris on February 26, 2010 at 2:09pm

To order someone to do something you use the imperative form, so you'll say "ouvre la porte".
"ouvrir la porte" is the infinitive form.

"chaque jour" and "tous les jours" mean both "every day" but with a slight difference. Their use will depend on the context of the sentence, but most of the time you can use them both.

Permalink Reply by Nana Lee on February 27, 2010 at 3:03am

Merci

Permalink Reply by Pete Laubscher on March 5, 2010 at 10:30pm

1. It's the order of the words. Immediately after the subject, the object and then the rest. Terribly confusing.

Si je vous laissais entrer seule. Perhaps I you leave to enter alone.
Puis-je vous parler ? Could I you to talk?

2. Then it is the unnecessary number - and order! - of words to say what in English is accomplished in a few.

Pour ce qui est du meurtrier, il vous faudra le découvrir. For that who is of the murderer, that you will have to it to discover = As the murderer, that will naturally require an investigation.

Hope that confuses.

Thanks for the great site. HUGELY necessary if you ask me.

Permalink Reply by Isabelle75Paris on March 6, 2010 at 3:16pm

Yeah well the construction of the sentences is different because the French language has Latin origins whereas the English language has german origins. English is probably the simplest and less elaborated language in the world. No offense by that, a language doesn't have to be complicated to be good.

To me the most complicated thing with the English language is the accent. When English people talk it's like they are singing lol it's a beautiful language.

Permalink Reply by Yvonne Carolyn Joyce (Carolyn) on March 28, 2010 at 7:41am

There are many areas that I think I understand till it comes time to use them - when we learn and understand we have plenty of examples to work with, in the isolated incident there are no guide posts. In particular I find this when trying to differentiate the meaning of an adjective before and after a noun: eg la reine ancienne, l'ancienne reine.

But most difficult for me are the idioms - for instance the so many different ways to use faire, where just the difference of a prepostion in a structure can change the whole meaning. Probably this means I too am confused by the use of prepositions - which one to use where to mean what :(

Permalink Reply by James H Smith on July 15, 2010 at 11:26am

Your point about the positioning of adjectives, is an area I'm researching at the moment - it confuses me also !!
My findings so far are;
Some adjectives can only go after the noun, whilst some can only go before.
Some adjectives can be used before or after the noun, changing the meaning completely (as you point out).
Putting one of these adjectives before the noun gives it a figurative meaning; putting it after gives it a literal meaning.
In your examples; la reine ancienne = the old queen, l'ancienne reine = the ex-/former queen.
This helped me somewhat, I hope it helps you.
If you find any good tips on this subject, I would be glad to hear.

Permalink Reply by asf on November 30, 2010 at 1:55am

one can use BAGS

Beauty
Age
Goodness
Size

for these, the adjective goes b4, for sure

Permalink Reply by Adam Kim on May 27, 2010 at 5:00am

Pronunciation and liaison are my hardest issues in learning French.

Permalink Reply by Veronica on June 1, 2010 at 11:25am

I don't only have one bete noire, but one of my difficulties is knowing the difference between 'mieux' and 'meilleur'. Any help on remembering when to use which one would be appreciated.

Permalink Reply by Isabelle75Paris on June 1, 2010 at 1:46pm

mieux = better
meilleur = best

‹ Previous
1
2
3
4
5
6
…
8
Next ›