French pronouns are stupid.. WTF @ en

[Syne]

Seriously, what's wrong with just having the words "it" and "them" as pronouns for things? How the hell do you just know when to use 'en' in a sentence without thinking about a million different rules? What other language makes pronoun use so counter-intuitive?

I've been struggling with this damn pronoun for 4 years, and to this day I still screw it up every other time I try. It's not like I know that the person or thing I'm referencing needs it unless I think about it. I'm going to use "le, la, les, lui, leur, y or ou" and screw it up.

Sorry, test in 12hrs and I'm stressing out.

Can someone please give me a straight-forward, simple rule of when to use 'en' as a pronoun, so that I can just use the damn thing properly in a sentence without thinking about what I'm referencing? Thank you.

[opento]

le mrde

[Piro21]

Sorry you're so bad at languages.

[Syne]

While you're at it, give me an easy one for 'dont' (vs. qui et que)

[uber_shnitz]

En replaces the partitive article + noun or de + indefinite article + noun. It is equivalent to "some," "any," or "one" in English.

ex: Do you have any bread? Yes, I have some.
As-tu du pain ? Oui, j'en ai.


In a sentence with a modifier, such as an adverb of quantity or a number, plus noun, en replaces the noun and the modifier or number is placed at the end of the sentence. Note that "of it" and "of them" are usually optional in English, but en is required in French.

ex: There are a lot of rooms. There are a lot (of them).
Il y a beaucoup de chambres. Il y en a beaucoup.


En also replaces de + noun with verbs and expressions that need de. Again, in French, you must include either de + something or its replacement en, even though "about/of it" is usually optional in English.

ex: What do you think about my idea? What do you think (about it)?
Que penses-tu de mon idée ? Qu'en penses-tu ?
Wrong: Que penses-tu ?

For the record, the entire French language is a pain :lol:

[Syne]

^ I do appreciate it, but let's say I'm thinking in english and I want to say, "there are a lot of them" referring to rooms, but the fact that "beaucoup" is followed by "de" doesn't necessarily pop into my head. Obviously that's a bad example because it's an oft used phrase, but let's say it's a more obscure one. How do I know, without knowing that the verb uses "de" as its preposition, that I must use "en" as my pronoun?

[Ghiness]

There is never a straightforward answer/rule in french... There will be a general rule, then some special cases, then some special exceptions where you must memorize. It's like English in terms of pronunciation, you just have to memorize how it's pronounced if you're not a native speaker :/

[Syne]

It amazes me that entire degrees are formed around french grammar and even french culture, but not a single degree exists where you actually learn how to speak french fluently.

Are other language courses structured in this way? Is becoming a German linguist important if you can't carry on a conversation with an actual German?

[BluePhirePB]

I never understood why the French language is structured the way it is. It sucks ... plus the language itself sound snobby. That and the French word for seal sounds like f**k.

[uber_shnitz]

^ I do appreciate it, but let's say I'm thinking in english and I want to say, "there are a lot of them" referring to rooms, but the fact that "beaucoup" is followed by "de" doesn't necessarily pop into my head. Obviously that's a bad example because it's an oft used phrase, but let's say it's a more obscure one. How do I know, without knowing that the verb uses "de" as its preposition, that I must use "en" as my pronoun?

Beaucoup de = a lot of

In a nutshell of course :razz:

[Syne]

Did you read my question when you quoted it?

[Feneant]

For the record, the entire French language is a pain :lol:

This couldn't be truer... it's very unfortunate that in some areas now (like in New-Brunswick, Quebec, Ottawa, etc.) you need to speak French to be able to land a job so you are doing the right thing by learning.

Don't feel bad about it being hard, I used to get much higher grades in English than French even if the latter is my maternal tongue.

[Muney]

For the record, the entire French language is a pain :lol:

While this is true, and I hate french, the English language has way more WTF points in it compared to french. If we didn't know English and were trying to learn it you would say the same about it.

[Syne]

Maybe it would help if I gave a concrete example

Elle a fait trente kilomètres à pied. Elle en était très fière.

Please explain the use of "en" in this sentence. Where is the 'de' statement it is describing?

Now I know what the sentence means. She was very proud [of it] which means that fiere likely takes "de" as its preposition.. but my point is, if you didn't already know that, you would have no clue what pronoun to use here. Do you understand why this is so frustrating?

[uber_shnitz]

I'm not entirely sure what you're asking :razz:

That being said I do understand the frustration in regards to having to ask yourself 50 questions about a sentence's parts to know how to write it in French. It's even worse once you get to the past participle tense in French :lol: French for some reason decided to replace what took 1 word in English with 50 words with no actual reasoning half the time. The easiest example is how objects have "genders" in French. In English, it's "a" table, "a" spoon, "a" computer, but in French a table is feminine, a spoon is feminine and computer is masculine lol

[Syne]

Thanks for letting me rant :)

Also, why is the subjunctive so nitpicky? Je pense que isn't subjective, but je crois que is? Why!?

Neither is "un fait comme certain" IMFO

[wilsonlam97]

Sorry you're so bad at languages.

Not true. French just sucks as a language. Sorry.

[laihama]

One thing about the French language is that when you write down a French word, there is no ambiguity in how you pronounce it. Not true with English. For example, the word bass.

[Syne]

^ What about -ent verbs a la parlent?

[ShadowVlican]

hate french... wasted so much time learning it in school and now what..... forgot it all... never needed to use it once.... i support their desire for separation

[Poulet]

Good luck with your test.

[Peckman]

Seriously, what's wrong with just having the words "it" and "them" as pronouns for things? How the hell do you just know when to use 'en' in a sentence without thinking about a million different rules? What other language makes pronoun use so counter-intuitive?

I've been struggling with this damn pronoun for 4 years, and to this day I still screw it up every other time I try. It's not like I know that the person or thing I'm referencing needs it unless I think about it. I'm going to use "le, la, les, lui, leur, y or ou" and screw it up.

Sorry, test in 12hrs and I'm stressing out.

Can someone please give me a straight-forward, simple rule of when to use 'en' as a pronoun, so that I can just use the damn thing properly in a sentence without thinking about what I'm referencing? Thank you.

When you want to say it or them you use "le/la" or "les"

think of "en" as what to use when you are replacing more than one word.

"do you have the book?" "oui, je l'ai" -> yes, I have it
"do you have any of the books? "oui, j'en ai" -> yes, I have some of them

Be also weary of "Y" and "En" with the verb penser
-> J'y pense = I'm thinking about it...for example "hey are you going to go to the concert again this year? "hmm, j'y pense"
but j'en pense is also possible..for example someone says "there's an election coming up, what do you think about it? someone might respond "je vais te dire ce que j'en pense" -> I'm going to tell you what I think about it"

y penser = "to think about it" in the sense of "to ponder, to consider"
en penser = "to think about it" in the sense of "to actively form an opinion on the subject"

Tricky, I know...



While you're at it, give me an easy one for 'dont' (vs. qui et que)


"dont" just think about it as an equivalent of "of which"
"ahh, ce sont les souliers dont vous m'avez parlé hier soir" "ahh, those are the shoes of which you had spoken to be about last night"

que could be used in the above phrase as well. Just depends on how casual the conversation is. "dont" is sort of fancy, but still often used.




^ I do appreciate it, but let's say I'm thinking in english and I want to say, "there are a lot of them" referring to rooms, but the fact that "beaucoup" is followed by "de" doesn't necessarily pop into my head. Obviously that's a bad example because it's an oft used phrase, but let's say it's a more obscure one. How do I know, without knowing that the verb uses "de" as its preposition, that I must use "en" as my pronoun?


the "de" is just to mean "of" hence "beaucoup de" = "a lot of" that's why "there are a lot of them" becomes "il y en a beaucoup"
so whenever there is a word followed by "of" there's a good chance "en" can be used...i.e.
there's a couple of them -> il y en a un couple
there's a few of them -> il y en a plusieurs
there's some still left -> il y en reste toujours




Maybe it would help if I gave a concrete example

Elle a fait trente kilomètres à pied. Elle en était très fière.

Please explain the use of "en" in this sentence. Where is the 'de' statement it is describing?

Now I know what the sentence means. She was very proud [of it] which means that fiere likely takes "de" as its preposition.. but my point is, if you didn't already know that, you would have no clue what pronoun to use here. Do you understand why this is so frustrating?


"elle en était très fière" replaces "elle était très fière de ça"

this is because, in french, saying "elle était très fière" is an incomplete sentence is left like that. Although it wouldn't be surprising to hear people say that. It's not technically correct.

Unfortunately, you have to "already know" that, because you need to understand that "elle était très fière" is an incomplete sentence. It would need either a "de ça" or "en" in it somewhere because the sentence would have to be referring to something already mentioned for it to make sense in the first place.





Thanks for letting me rant :)

Also, why is the subjunctive so nitpicky? Je pense que isn't subjective, but je crois que is? Why!?

Neither is "un fait comme certain" IMFO



Je pense que and je crois que both don't take the subjunctive in the affirmative. They both do, however, take the subjunctive if in the form of a question or in a negative context. i.e.

je pense que tu as raison
je crois que tu as raison

penses-tu que ce soit une bonne idée?
crois-tu que ce soit une bonne idée?

je ne pense pas que tu me comprennes
je ne crois pas que tu me comprennes

this is because in the affirmative you're stating something you think/believe is true, but if asked as a question, or used in the negative form, you're raising doubt, which is one of the criteria for using the subjunctive.

[laihama]

^ What about -ent verbs a la parlent?
What about it? I only know of one proper way to pronounce parlent.

Just to clarify, in French, a certain pronunciation can have one or more spellings (homophones). However, the converse is not true. A certain spelling has only one pronunciation.

[Syne]

You rock, Peckman that was super helpful. If I could thank in OT, I would.