Angie

[orchid latch]

Please be patient

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[tawdry token]

alone it means nothing

[nova marlin]

hey angie
actually, this construction is not complete. I have a good idea of what it's from, but can you give the full sentence?

[tawdry token]

but it's probably the beginning of the passé composé with a reflexive/pronomial verb

[nova marlin]

yup, there probably is a past participle after that

[edgy kelp]

yee sure, it's from this percy jackson book i was reading, the sentence including the word after it was "Je me suis retourné"

do you need more of the sentence or is that ok?

[nova marlin]

that's fine

[tawdry token]

that's enough, but for future reference you should include the entire clause you're asking about

[nova marlin]

do you remember how passé composé works angie?

[edgy kelp]

yea i know how it works

[nova marlin]

this is what you have here
je me suis retourné
suis => auxiliary to form passé composé
retourné => past participle

you may be wondering why "me" is here (gonna explain), but apart from that is that fine?

[edgy kelp]

yea i'm following along so far :)

[nova marlin]

can you guess what verb this is?

[edgy kelp]

i have no idea if imma be real😭 But I'm guessing it's a play on the word "me"

[nova marlin]

oh, I thought you were going to guess "retourner" x)
the verb in this case is "se retourner"
have you seen pronominal verbs, with a "se" or "s' "pronoun before them?

[edgy kelp]

uhhh, I've just started to learn about Se,Sa,Son, but i know that it means his,her, and theirs, depending on the word after it

[nova marlin]

nope
that's "son/sa/ses", but "se/s' " is different

a category of verb in French is what are called pronominal verbs.
in the infinitive, they have a "se/s' " pronoun before them
they can mean different things (gonna go back on that later)
when you conjugate a pronominal verb, you need to change the pronoun to match the subject
je => me
tu => te
il/elle/on => se
nous => nous
vous => vous
ils/elles => se

you might have seen "s'appeler" for instance, which means "to be named"
je m'appelle (my name is/I am named)
tu t'appelles
il s'appelle
nous nous appelons
etc

see how the verb is preceded by a pronoun matching the subject?

"se retourner" means to turn around, to turn over
with je, in present tense, it would be "je me retourne" (I'm turning around)
in past tense, you need an auxiliary. All pronominal verbs use "être" as an auxiliary
so "je me suis retourné" (I turned around)

I think I may have lost angie

[edgy kelp]

srry smt happened irl i'll be right back

promisee

backk

[edgy kelp]

ohhhh

wait that makes sm sense

😭

[nova marlin]

s'appeler is probably the first pronominal verb learners are confronted to, but usually they don't know why there's a m' in je m'appelle

[edgy kelp]

thx for explaininggg, i was rlly confused before pftt

[edgy kelp]

here you said the se/s pronoun can mean different things, is it ok if i ask what you meant by that?

[nova marlin]

many times, pronominal verbs indicate an action done to oneself
se retourner => to turn oneself over => to turn around
s'habiller => to dress oneself => to dress up

that said, it can have a number of alternate meanings
it can convey passive voice: se manger => to be edible
it can convey a reciprocal action: se disputer => to argue (with each other)
it can even mean something completely different: se trouver => to be located (trouver means to find)
or it can even only be used as a pronominal verb: s'enfuir => to run away (enfuir on its own does not exist)

[edgy kelp]

ohhh, and is the way to differentiate all these different possible meanings via context soley or is it also based on certain words?

[nova marlin]

technically each pronominal verb is its own verb with its own meaning
but apart from idiomatic ones with completely different meanings, you can make an informed guess and often be right

it's kinda like learning the meanings for "turning in" or "turning on" in English after learning "turning" and other modal verbs
sometimes it's obvious, sometimes it's not