- Forum >
- Topic: French >
- "Il est français."
132 Comments
Not really. 'Pizza' is a feminine word in french. Everything in french is either feminine or masculine.
48
"Pizza" isn't a language. I think what EricaWelte is saying is that the words for languages, e.g. "Francais", "Anglais", are masculine. I don't know if that's accurate, but "Pizza" is unrelated.
But the other choice was elle.... why can't it be she is french. It didn't say translate "He is French." It said "what word is missing?"
Francais is the masculine term. It asked you to choose between Il and Elle because in order to speak the language properly, we need to be able to tell whether words are masculine or feminine. The proper use of elle would be "Elle est francaise" The e at the end makes it feminine
I got caught up on thinking that est was the word that needed to be masculine or feminine. I figured it would be este if it was feminine, so I went with "Il" and got it right.
After answering it, I wanted to make sure I really understood it and went to google translate to see what I'd get for "she is french". Still gave me "est". I kept changing it back and forth from "he is french" to "she is french" totally mind boggled as to how est could be correct in both, when the duolingo question only had "Il" and "Elle" as options. It wasn't till I came here to the forums that I realized it was "français" vs "française" that I should have been thinking about.
I'm really glad they included a link directly to these questions. Being able to discus them with other people makes the learning process so much more robust.
What word is missing was the exercise? Either are acceptable, right? il or elle the only two options
- 136
Different languages have different capitalization and punctuation conventions. It's like asking why it's capitalized in English; it just is.
Ah yes, but they don't capitalize the adjectives, even with regards to nationality. English is unique in the fact that they captialize nationality indicators (language, heritage, etc.), be they nouns or adjectives. German will only do so with the nouns. E.g.
"He can speak French well" -> "Er kann auf Französisch gut sprechen."
"He is a French musician." -> "Er ist ein französischer Musiker."
Gotta love languages!
I agree with your last sentence :) I still can't fully understand why people dislike (sometimes hate) learning foreign languages. It's just so interesting and exciting... )) I think probably the problem is in the bad teachers who break the interest of learning. And it's unfortunately make me sad.
I want to learn, but I believe that duolingo is truly worse than learning in a classroom setting. And before you ask, I have to do 5 a week, it's a grade at my language school.
I said "He is French" and got it right, then I see that an acceptable answer is "It is French"; this is why I can't seem to fully memorize the rules for using "il est" vs "c'est". :|
The difference between est and es is that est means is and es means are!!
How do i know when to use est and es? I got this one wrong because i typed " Il es français."
Im having trouble hearing the diffrence between "Est" "et" and "es". Is it more a matter if focusing on the noun? Like the female/male 'e' ending of a word?
the word French here needs to be capitalized. In fact, in french, if French refers to a person (if it is a noun in the sentence), then it is capitalized. But if the word french is an adjective in the sentence, then it is not capitalized. Ex: Les Francais sont forts. Les hommes francais sont forts.
Yes, but here it is obviously not a noun; "français" is here an adjective. If it was a noun, then it would have been "C'est un Français" here, and not in any way "Il est Français". Therefore, "français" should not be capitalized here.
The french dont usually use capital letters so when the use français it doesnt have to be a capital letter?!
Answer without capital letter shall be accepted I think: "he is french" or "He is french. Too much focus to english grammar and makes programm harder for non native english speaker. Boil up point comes because of english mistakes.
It's strange, I think Duolingo shouldn't be so strict with the rules of capitalizing on English in this case
Il est français as well as Elle est français both seems correct. What is wrong in selecting Elle
Stooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooop
- 166
Difference between il and elle elle=she and il-=he but its not like that in two lessons
Why cannot I respond in English from "Il est français" with "he is gay". Direct translation. Odd
Having problems with ILS and ELLES at the beginning of sentences. Elle and Il is singular but get confused with ELLES- ILS plural. Merci
The question was _____ est francais. I put Elle instead of Il. Shouldn't they both be right?
Based on fill in the blank How is one supposed to know if you're referring to male or female? ---- est francais
- 1069
Why is "it is French" an incorrect? Example: "What kind of bread is that? It is French." Since bread (le pain) is masculine, I would say "il est français."
On one of the tests, it was Il vs Elle. I picked Elle and it was wrong so I want to know if there is a rule for that or if it was just guesswork?
There is a difference between the language and the people. So the french female person is francaise, but if a female person speaks French (language) it stays masculine - francais.
Elle parle francais. Elle est francaise.
Took me a few minutes till i figured it out as i had the same issue ;)
I know right il and elle would both make sense it can be elle est francais
So when languages are used as adjectives in French you don’t capitalize them?
I wrote Elle but how was I meant to know it was wrong it didn't say it or anything
The new french female voice is fine, but please don't change the guy's voice! I love his accent!
Il or Elle? Francais represents to Il p.s> capitalisation isnt big deal. but naming male Elle or fem Il - is. there're many things but u have to catch most major ;d that means if u dont miss with that ull be much better than u miss with capitalisation but pst Elle here :3
ok so, it gives you the option for 'she' or 'he' and i chose 'she' because it was a 'fill in the blank' question. and it said i was wrong. why?
The question asked which one was missing IL or ELLE and I thought you could do both so I clicked ELLE but it said I was wrong... how was I supposed to know?
People are getting confused about why the french dont use that many capital letters and it is because they just dont want to
what if i select elle instead of il.....because both gender use same est as is
