Le français est une langue très belle et très facile parlée en France et dans beaucoup d'autres pays dans le monde.
French is a very nice and very easy language spoken in France and
in a lot of other countries around the world.
- Determiners are short grammatical words found in front of a noun to modify it. Determiners agree with the noun they describe (gender/number). There are three kinds of determiners:
- Articles (indefinite, definite, partitive)
- Possessive adjectives
- Demonstrative adjectives
- Indefinite articles: un, une, des
They precede a countable noun that is not specified, about which nothing is known.
E.g. un chat, une maison, des idées...
- Definite articles: le, la, les
SPECIFIC use > They precede a noun that is specified, or known from the context.
E.g. le chat des voisins, la maison que tu as achetée, les idées de Platon...
GENERIC use > They precede a noun that is a general class of things/phenomena.
E.g. le chat est mon animal préféré, je déteste la lecture, les philosophes pensent le monde...
Note that le and la become l' when the following word start with a vowel or "silent h".
- Partitive articles: du, de la (des)
They precede a non-count noun to express a part/portion of something, an unknown quantity of something, like "some" in English.
E.g. il bois du vin, elle mange de la salade...
They also precede an abstract noun, when attributed to someone/something.
E.g. il a du courage, elle a de la patience...
Des as a partitive article is not really different from des as an indefinite article:
it introduces a count noun (plural).
E.g. il mange des pâtes, elle achète des salades...
The difference between de la salade/du vin, and des salades /des vins is that in the first case we consider wine/salade as the "stuff" or as an "abstract concept" (non-count noun), whereas in the other we consider wines/salads as "individual items/types" or "concrete things" (count noun).
E.g. des vins = différents types de vins (Bordeaux, Chianti etc.)
E.g. des salades = différents plats de salade (César, Niçoise) / différents types de salades (laitue, feuille de chêne...) / etc.
- Possessive adjectives: mon, ma, mes...
They precede a noun to express what/who is its owner. They agree with the noun they precede (and not with the owner).
E.g. mon vin, ta maison, ses enfants...
E.g. son père (à lui / à elle), sa mère (à lui / à elle)...
Note that possessive adjectives are usually not used in front of body parts, and that mon, ton, son are always used instead of ma, ta, sa when the following word starts with a vowel or "silent h".
E.g. j'ai mal à la tête, je me coupe les cheveux...
E.g. mon ami (un homme), mon amie (une femme), mon école...
- Demonstrative adjectives: ce/cet, cette, ces...
They precede a noun to point it out or single it out, implying a contrast between an entity and others of the same type. Ce becomes cet when the following word starts with a vowel or "silent h".
E.g. ce vin, cette salade, ces pâtes...
E.g. cet enfant, cet hôpital...
The noun can be followed by -ci/-là to stress proximity or non-proximity in space and time.
E.g. cette maison-ci (=this house), ce matin-ci (=this week)
E.g. cette maison-là (=that house), ce matin-là (=that week)
