"Are these your new pants?"

Translation: C'est ton nouveau pantalon ?

[northernguy]

In French le pantalon is singular. Therefore everything in the sentence must agree with it.

Hence, singular C'est not plural Ce sont .

Singular ton not plural votre.

Masculine nouveau not feminine nouvelle.

[BluJai]

Northernguy, you just armed me with knowledge I couldnt find anywhere...thank you.

[northernguy]

For an English speaker all the rules in French about about pronouns and articles are frustrating until you realize that often those same pronouns and articles are the only clue you have as to the gender and plurality of the adjectives and nouns that follow.

When you hear the easily distinguished C'est at the beginning of sentence you are getting a very large signal about what is to follow. If you hear Ce sont you are getting an entirely different signal.

When listening, the only way I can tell pain from pomme is that it is du pain and that sounds very different from la pomme. When listening to the Duo robot I truly need that article.

Can't remember if pantalon is plural or singular in French. No prob. Don't even waste time thinking about. C'est at the beginning of C'est ton nouveau pantalon ? tells you all you need to know.

I recognize that you were given the English not the French to translate. Here the solution is reversed. If you can remember that pantalon is singular and masculine then everything else in the sentence follows.

For help with determining noun characteristics go to

http://translate.reference.com./translate?query=eau&src=fr&dst=en

The repetition that Duo enforces will soon have you remembering the gender of nouns. The articles that French demands will tell you the number.

[DuFarge]

So even though it says 'pantalons' with an 's' .........it's singular? One of the correct solutions was 'ce sont vos nouveaux pantalons'. I'm confused.

[northernguy]

I would take ce sont vos nouveaux pantalons to refer to more than one pair of pants.

In English we consider pants to mean a pair of pants as if pants consisted of 2 items joined together. In French, they are regarded as a single unit.

[lai_mesunda]

Just a reminder, votre is also singular. You must mean vos. :)

[northernguy]

good point, my bad.

[frankwingle]

I need some instruction on positioning of adjectives

[learnallthetime]

Usually before the noun, but BAGS adjectives (beauty, age, size, goodness) go BEFORE the verb.

[eddiehi]

Awesome mnemonic device!

[sherryli1119]

Why it cannot be : Ce sont ton nouveau pantalon?

[djami_duo]

it can be : ce sont tes (vos) nouveaux pantalons ?
in english pants (un pantalon) is plural even we talk about one pants

[facw]

i had the same problem... duo is inconsistant in regards to pants.... sometime singular sometime plural.. it's frustrating

[BluJai]

C'est votre nouvelle pantalon? isn't correct, why?

[Kinerd]

pantalon is a masculine noun. so in order to get a grammatically correct sentence, you have to use the masculine version of all the adjectives in the sentence. Thus, it becomes ton/votre (masculine) nouveau (masculine) pantalon (masculine).

[hwakely]

Can't I say 'Est-il ton nouveau pantalon?'

[apasternak]

Duo should've given a quick lesson earlier in the series. You can't say il/elle est something in French. You have to use c'est, or ce sont when it's plural. Ils/elles sont ... is incorrect.

[Shar-Lee_Jessica]

why nouveaux with an x?

[ptngan]

would 'ce votre nouveau pantalon?' be correct. I don't really understand the difference between ce and c'est in this context.

[northernguy]

ce = this (that)

c'est = the elided form of ce est = this is

[ptngan]

thanks for the clarification

[lookitsjing]

Translate "Are these your new pants?" to French.

So in English you can't refer to two pairs of pants just as pants?

I mean, if it does not ONLY mean one pair of pants, then the plural version should be right.

I'm not a native English speaker, so I'm really not sure of this.

[northernguy]

In English, to refer to pants in plural you need to say x pairs of pants. Pants by itself is considered to refer to one pair. Originally the legs were separate from the upper portion. When they were joined together to form one unit, English speakers chose to focus on the number of leggings involved.

In French, since you have only one item you use the singular form.

[lookitsjing]

I see. So I'm not supposed to say something like 'I have many pants', instead I should say 'I have many pairs of pants'. I think I got it. Merci beaucoup!

[northernguy]

Correct (for English).

How many pairs of pants are you bringing? At least six.

Pairs are not needed in the answer because it has been mentioned previously.However if you did feel the need to include pants they you say six pairs of pants.

Of course, you may run into someone who feels it is a waste of time to follow that particular rule.