"Ça casse."
Translation:It breaks.
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According to the language teacher Michel Thomas when the phrase it is is followed by a word ending in…ing the phrase it is translated as ça
examples
ça commence - It is starting
ça ne reste pas - It is not staying
ça va être - It is going to be ..
ça prend trop de temps - It is taking too much time
Ca devient ennuyeux - it is becoming boring
Ça ne va pas être facile à organiser. - That is not going to be easy to organize.
ça prendre - It is taking
Exception When you have impersonal expressions with a dummy subject then you use il
examples
it is raining - il pleut
it is snowing - il neige
il commence à pleuvoir - it is starting to rain
In those examples, you are making a statement about the weather (le temps), so it is standard to use the impersonal pronoun il. If you're making a brief statement about something other than the weather, ça or cela is a kind of dummy pronoun when the gender is either unclear or unimportant, like when the noun is abstract or unnamed.
It is not reflexive here, although "se casser" could be used to express the idea that "it" is breaking (itself) rather than just breaking. That would be a degree of specificity that would not translate directly. It is breaking (because something else is breaking it) or "it is breaking" because of its own action.
There are a few French idioms using "ça casse" but in general it's "it breaks". http://dictionnaire.reverso.net/francais-anglais/%C3%A7a%20casse
It is an idiom. Another example of how a literal translation often doesn't work. http://dictionnaire.reverso.net/francais-anglais/casse%20toi
They have exactly the same sound. It should be obvious which one to use based on context, because ça is a pronoun, so it can be the subject or object of an action, but sa is only a possessive adjective and must come before the noun it describes. So if you hear ça and a verb, or ça by itself at the end of a phrase, it's the pronoun.
Just the opposite -- 'casse' is only a singular conjugation. All verbs ending in '-er' in the infinitive are conjugated the same way: « je casse ; tu casses ; il/elle casse » are singular; « nous cassons ; vous cassez ; ils/elles cassent » are plural. Also, since the subject is 'ça', which is strictly singular, then the verb must be singular as well.
For some reason the spoken word here pronounces the vowel 'e' in the word 'casse'. I've learned that letter 'e' in the end of the word is silent. This is contradicting, and I would like to know the truth.
The answer is: it varies. Different dialects pronounce words differently. The female voice does not pronounce the final "e" as a separate syllable, but the male voice does. This is not a bad thing. It is a good thing because you will learn that even French people may pronounce words slightly differently.
What's throwing me is that the "ca" in "Ca casse" seems to be used here as the COD, rather than the subject. This sentence means, I assume, that "it" has been broken by something, not that it has broken something else. In that vein, would the answer to the question "What is the baseball doing?" be "Ca casse la fenetre," or would that be "Il casse la fenetre"?
The game of baseball is masculine. So, it is “le baseball, but the ball is feminine “la balle de baseball”, so it would be “Elle casse le fenêtre.” or “Ça” which would mean “this” or “that” or the impersonal “it”.
Now, if you wanted to talk about the window which is also feminine and you wanted to say “It was broken.” You could say “Elle s’est cassé.” Now, notice that this is reflexive which is used in French instead of the passive voice in English. This is used when you don’t know how the window broke. The children say that no one broke the window - it broke all by itself....
“Ça” specifically means “that”, “this” or “it”, and “ce” or “ c’ “ can mean “this” or “that” or “it” (In certain other sentences it can be translated as “she” or “he” depending on what follows.). In French they don’t like to use “Ça” with “a” or “est” directly after it for the sound. So it is used in other expressions.
“A cassé” is the passé composé which means “has broken”, but in English we can also use the more generic simple past “broke”. “C‘est cassé.” gives the status or condition of the item. “That is broken.”, while the previous focuses on the action that happened “That has broken...” or “That broke...”. You need to add a direct object. https://dictionary.reverso.net/french-english/a+cass%c3%a9
https://dictionary.reverso.net/french-english/Casser
There is even a reflexive form to use if you break your leg.