#recognizing pronoun use cases

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red copperBOT
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floral ibex
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clearly a begginer btw

red copperBOT
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recognizing pronoun use cases

unkempt crag
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Well the difference between en and dans isn't simple
They both translate to in in most cases, that's why translating prepositions doesn't always work

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À is used for cities for example
À Paris, À Madrid, À Séoul...

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Chez X means at X's place

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Chez moi = at my place/house
Chez David = at David's place

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À is used for countries, but when they start with a vowel it's en to get the liaison

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Are you familiar with liaison?

floral ibex
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no, sorry, could you clarify please?

unkempt crag
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In some cases, when two words being put together leads to having to pronounce two vowels in a row, a silent consonant is gonna be pronounced so it flows better

floral ibex
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OOOH

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yeah yeah

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i know what you mean

unkempt crag
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En is normally just a nasal vowel, but en Autriche has the n pronounced

floral ibex
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so like instead of À Iran it'd be En Iran?

unkempt crag
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Yeah

floral ibex
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i just didn't know the term for that that's useful thanks

unkempt crag
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Wait don't we say en Syrie too

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En Russie

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Ig they're feminine

floral ibex
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oh? maybe it's a gender thing

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yeah

unkempt crag
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Au Botswana

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Au Brésil

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Yeah

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So en if fem or vowel, à if masc and consonant

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But yeah that's just for countries

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For physical things, like "in the box", it's generally gonna be dans

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Dans la boîte

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Dans la voiture

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Dans le train

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En is used for languages too

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En français, en espagnol, en allemand, en russe, en japonais

floral ibex
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this clears things up a lot thanks

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what about in cases what where it doesn't mean "in"? i've seen À be used for "to" . is this just something i'll pick up with experience in speaking?

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cuz it feels like an important hurdle you know?

unkempt crag
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À is generally like to

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"J'ai envoyé le mail à la mauvaise personne "

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À can also be like at
À la maison, au restaurant

floral ibex
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alright thanks, just need one more clarification and i'll be done

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de du des, from my understanding most of the time ty mean "of" but as before, there seems to be exceptions

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also merci becoup, you've been a massive help

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i couldn't find a straighforward answer in a lotta places 😭

heady viper
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Du is also of the

floral ibex
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ah i see

unkempt crag
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Yeah du can be a partitive article and des can be the indefinite plural article

heady viper
unkempt crag
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But they can also be de+le or de+les respectively

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La porte du magasin

floral ibex
unkempt crag
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No

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They could be both things

heady viper
unkempt crag
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Depending on the sentence

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Let's just focus on de rn

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Articles aren't the topic here

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De is of

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As far as i can think

floral ibex
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alr alr, my mb

unkempt crag
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But like we don't have possession with 's so de is really common

heady viper
unkempt crag
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La poignée de la pote

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Porte

heady viper
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You also need to make sure you’re using the correct one don’t you

floral ibex
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thanks that seems important to keep in mind

floral ibex
heady viper
floral ibex
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it rly helps to have it laid out for me like this

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so it's meaning mostly depends on how it's being used, like with most of these huh

sharp olive
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One thing to be aware of is that prepositions are relatively random between languages and often don't follow any particular rules - often, it's just a matter of knowing what preposition to use with a specific verb. In certain contexts, there can be more complex rules, such as countries vs cities

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But a lot of it is just memorization and getting a feel for it

heady viper
sharp olive
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"dans" usually implies being physically inside of something, or otherwise surrounded (can be metaphorically)
"En" has a LOT of different uses
"À" is usually "to"

unkempt crag
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And misleading

sharp olive
heady viper
sharp olive
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It's not simple if it's misleading

unkempt crag
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Just think of partitives as a separate thing

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De alone isn't a partitive

sharp olive
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Partitives are basically separate from "de", the preposition

unkempt crag
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But du and des can be combinations with de too

sharp olive
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And they can interact in odd ways

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J'ai besoin de + du beurre
Becomes "j'ai besoin de beurre" as the preposition blocks the partitive

heady viper
unkempt crag
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You say de is some
That's just never the case

sharp olive
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"de" is never "some" on its own

unkempt crag
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Du, de la and des have de in them but de alone isn't some

heady viper
unkempt crag
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And partitives and des both translate to some so it's not super helpful

heady viper
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I worded it poorly

unkempt crag
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Yeah exactly

heady viper
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My b

floral ibex
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hmm

unkempt crag
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No?

floral ibex
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any advice on properly memorizing these cases

sharp olive
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Huh?

unkempt crag
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You just need de in that case because of the verb

floral ibex
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oh

sharp olive
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LawlessFrench has good articles on the most common usages

floral ibex
heady viper
unkempt crag
sharp olive
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But you won't really get a feel for them until you see them enough

unkempt crag
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Practice as much as you can

sharp olive
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An example of prepositions just being random:
Jouer + role
Jouer à + game
Jouer de + instrument

floral ibex
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alright, i appreciate all of this guys thanks, i understood most of it and i'm able to include them in my everyday speech

unkempt crag
heady viper
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Quick question, are feminine and masculine nouns just actually completely random

unkempt crag
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Not completely

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Nouns written with an e at the end tend to be feminine
And words in -ité are fem, in -ion are fem, etc

sharp olive
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Lion

heady viper
# unkempt crag Not completely

Cuz at the very beginning someone told me if it ends in e it will be feminine well that didn’t work out very well huh

unkempt crag
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Yeah i mean the suffix -ion/tion

sharp olive
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Yes

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Lol

unkempt crag
heady viper
unkempt crag
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It's French tho

sharp olive
unkempt crag
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We have a saying to say that if rules don't have exceptions they aren't valid

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L'exception qui confirme la règle

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But i mean English spelling is even worse so eh

sharp olive
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Far worse

heady viper
sharp olive
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French is pretty consistent

heady viper
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I wish I wasn’t born in the states

sharp olive
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But by virtue of being a language it's always going to have at least a few oddities

heady viper
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Prepositions are still a struggle

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Especially after verbs

unkempt crag
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with verbs you just learn prepositions with the verb and you're set no?

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donner à, aller à

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monter sur

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se préparer à

sharp olive
unkempt crag
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well monter can also be direct transitive but then it's basically a different verb

heady viper
unkempt crag
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use anki

heady viper
unkempt crag
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an app

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ankidroid on android

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you get to note things you learn and it'll help you memorize them

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it helped me pass my exams

heady viper
unkempt crag
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oh on ios yeah

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check on pc

heady viper
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Maybe I’ll use this

spiral crest
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@terse ember Answers are best given in the thread that Nostradamus creates, as they would otherwise hide unanswered questions. Thanks for understanding. :D

sharp olive
unkempt crag
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Don't try chatgpt

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Please