- Forum >
- Topic: French >
- "Une personne mange une pomme…
18 Comments
If the word(fo example-pomme) has an "e" at the end, is that a way to tell that it is feminine? I have been trying to figure out how to tell if a word is masculine or feminine.
903
There are some indications, but of course no generalization is perfect. The best way to know if a noun is masculine or feminine is, as Sitesurf says below, to learn it when you learn the word. Just memorize the gender.
Timor mortis conturbat me.
Gah! Every time she says "un pain" I write "une pomme" and every time she says "une pomme" I write "un pain"! Anyone have tips on how to distinguish between the two?
You have to accustom your ears and your mouth to sense the difference. therefore, I suggest you go to Google/Translate, type "un pain, une pomme" on the French side, then click on the small loudspeaker, listen, repeat, listen, repeat, listen, repeat...... again, again, until you hear the difference and pronounce it correctly (hearing your own voice).
I heard 'pain'. But that's likely to happen in real life too, so here goes!
I go by if she says une or un before the word to know if it is pomme or pain. Hope that helps
I put "A person eating an apple" - no 's and I got it wrong. I don't understand that. We wouldn't say "a persons eating an apple" but "people are eating an apple". Why is my translation wrong?
"une personne" is "a person". In French, it happens that it is always used in singular, even if the person is a man.
Tenses are involved with verbs, to position the action in time: present, past, future, etc.
There is no link between the gender of a subject noun and the tense of the verb.
"manger" is the infinitive form = to eat. "mange" is the conjugation of 3rd person singular.
this is the conjugation of verb manger at the present tense:
je mange, tu manges, il/elle/on mange, nous mangeons, vous mangez (polite and plural), ils/elles mangent.
When does personne become nobody or no one?How would one say: "No body eats an apple" Or perhaps "Nobody can eat just one!"
- 903
When the sentence is negative, so "Nobody eats an apple" would begin "Personne ne mange" (no article) rather than "Une personne mange".
I feel like if I accidentally type "and apple" it should be correctly recognized as a typo...
"Person" can be a translation for "personne(s)" if there is a determiner.
The negative "personne" does not have a determiner but the sentence must also have "ne" before the verb.
