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- "My birthday is in November."
"My birthday is in November."
Translation:Il mio compleanno è in novembre.
23 Comments
The definite article ("il" in this case) is generally used before possessive adjectives, except when referring to a family member in the singular. "il mio compleanno" -- my birthday. mio fratello -- my brother. I miei fratelli -- my brothers
I wish I had seen this comment earlier. It just couldn't understand what was going on with those articles. Eventually I found the rule you mentioned in another site (oneworlditaliano btw, it has helped me with grammar). It also said that when the possessive is 'loro' you always put the article -even in singular. So it is: il loro figlio - their son, i loro fratelli - their brothers. I think Duolingo should put a note clearing that out. It would save a lot of time.
Why is in used instead of a in this instance? A relevant discussion regarding this said that "a" is used for a definite point in time,while in is more abstract. Is this correct?
In my opinion, you use "a" when you talk about months in general, not a particular month. For example: "I am leaving to Brazil in a month". But, when you talk about specific month, you use "in": "I am leaving to Brazil in November".
Is it correct to say either "a novembre" or "in november"? If so, would a native speaker of Italian prefer one over the other?
872
I put 'ed a novembre' (with the accent above the 'e') because of the two vowel sounds. Understood that this could be used at your own discretion, but it wasn't accepted by Duo. Any thoughts please?
È = is, e = and, ed = and (before vowel). Duo let's you skip the accent, but in this case you put "and in November" instead of "is in November"
I wondered that, as I thought we'd had that expression to translate from Italian in a previous exercise, but it was marked wrong here. Perhaps it means I was born in November rather than my birthday is in November? Perhaps a native speaker of Italian could help?
- 295
Grainemhaol, ed would not be correct here because it means "and." The e in this sentence is actually è which means "is." This doesn't ever have a "d" added to it.
One is trying to be Spanish (mi cumpleaño) and the other is Italian (il mio compleanno). I make this mistake all the time!
No, because compleanno is a male word. Your gender changes the sentence only when you talk about yourself, for example with adjectives ("sono vecchiA ma bellA"), but nouns have their own genders.
- 567
why couldn't you say "La mia compleanno è in novembre" ? Why do we always have to assume the masculine form?
