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Become a French Pronouns Pro! Posted by on Jun 13, 2011 in Grammar, Vocabulary

Whether it’s in French or in English, les pronoms (pronouns) belong to one of those classes grammaticales that many people seem to often have a hard time remembering what they are, or what they are supposed to stand for.

Here in The French Blog, the goal is always to try -and, hopefully, succeed too- to give you the best astuces (tricks) to learn something well—and remember it for good!

* Qu’est-ce que les pronoms (What are pronouns), au juste (precisely)? Acording to etymonline.com, the definition of a pronoun is as follows:pronoun 1520s, from pro- and noun; modeled on M.Fr. pronom, from L. pronomen, from pro- “in place of” + nomen “name, noun.” A loan-translation of Gk. antonymia. Adj. pronomial is recorded from 1640s. Like Jean-Paul Belmondo, quickly become “un vrai pro” des pronoms (Become a “real pro” of pronouns)!

From this definition, we can see clearly that un pronom is in fact breakable like this:

 

PRONOM = PRO + NOM

(PRONOUN = PRO + NOUN)


Meaning that its purpose is to REPLACE A NOUN!


* Prenons un exemple
(let us take an example):

– “J’aime beaucoup le French Blog. Le French Blog est le seul Blog en français dont le contenu offre autant de variété!” (Meaning: “I like the French Blog. The French Blog is the only Blog in French whose content offers as much variety!”) 🙂

As you noticed, un pronom (a pronoun) would serve the purpose of avoiding la répétition.

So instead of the previous phrase (sentence), it is possible to replace “le French Blog” by a pronoun that would assume the same genre (gender) and nombre (number), which in this case are masculin for the former, and singulier for the latter:

– “J’aime beaucoup le French Blog. Il est le seul Blog en français dont le contenu offre autant de variété!” (Meaning: “I like the French Blog. The French Blog is the only Blog in French whose content offers as much variety!”) 🙂


* Here’s a non-exhaustive list of pronoms, classified by categories (Notice that one pronoun can belong to more than just one category!):

  • Les pronoms personnels sujets: Je , tu, il, elle, nous, vous, ils, elles, on
  • Les pronoms personnels compléments: me, moi, te, toi, le, la, lui, nous, vous, leur, eux, en, y
  • Les pronoms interrogatifs: To introduce a question! Qui, que, quoi, où, quel, lequel, quels, quelle, quelles
  • Les pronoms possessifs: Le mien, la mienne, les miens, les miennes; le tien, la tienne, les tiens, les tiennes; le sien, la sienne, les siens, les siennes; le nôtre, les nôtres; le vôtre, les vôtres; le leur, les leurs
  • Les pronoms démonstratifs: Notice that they all start with the letter “C”! Celui, celui-ci, celui-là; ceux, ceux-ci, ceux-là; celle, celle-ci, celle-là; celles-ci, celles-là; ce, ceci, cela, ça
  • Les pronoms relatifs: Quoi, que, qui, dont, où, lequel, laquelle, lesquels, lesquelles; duquel, de laquelle, desquels, desquelles; auquel, à laquelle, auxquels, auxquelles
  • Les pronoms indéfinis: Aucun, d’aucun, certain, chacun, l’un, l’autre, le même, maint, plus d’un, quelqu’un, tel, tout, un autre, autrui, personne, plusieurs, quiconque
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Comments:

  1. Jennifer:

    Thanks, but how can we remember if something is la or le? Are there any tricks for that?
    Merci beaucoup! 🙂