#Geeks (corrigez-moi svp)

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tribal obsidianBOT
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mortal osprey
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It's due to the phonetic rule.
Let's take the infinitive form.
Préférer
Since the bolded part is pronounced, the preceding é doesn't change. It's the same for préférons, préférais, etc.
However, we have préfère.
Here, the bolded part is silent, which causes the preceding é to shift to è.

limber stump
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Huh. Truth be told, I don't entirely know when to use é vs è

amber cipher
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It's phonology

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Préfèrent is pronounced the same as préfère, /pʁe.fɛʁ/

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That second syllable ends with a consonant so it's è

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In préférait/préférer it's /pʁe.fe.ʁe/, the r goes with the next syllable, so now the second one has an é

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@limber stump

limber stump
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Neat, good to know.

hexed hollow
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The idea here is that when you have a closed syllable (a syllable that ends in a consonant) the vowel is open; when you have an open syllable (a syllable that ends in a vowel) the vowel is closed.
È is open E and É is closed E. When we look at préférer, the second syllable is open (pré • fé • ré) so we keep the vowel closed by writing it with an É. When we look at préfère, however, that last vowel becomes mute and ‘closes’ the second syllable (pré • fe__r__). Because of that, the vowel becomes more open; it changes from É to È.

mortal osprey
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There are two exceptions: Simple future and present conditional.
For example you get "je préférerai" in simple future and "je préférerais" in present conditional.
The explanation is, these tenses are formed by combining the infinitive form with respectively the present and imperfect forms of the verb avoir. Thus "préférerai(s)' was seen as "préférer//ai(s)".
However that separation went away a good while ago with the consequence that the pronunciation of those form changed but the spelling with é stuck.
For what's worth, in 1990, the Académie française said it was also fine to spell them with the è, so you can also get "préfèrerai(s)".

hexed hollow
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This phenomenon also happens to a number of verbs where a change in syllables cause a change in accents. For example, in the verbs « acheter (to buy), amener (to bring) », the second syllable (a • che • té, a • me • né) is a schwa – if you speak English, it’s the sound you make when you say the first syllable of about and the word bird. In the singular present conjugations, however, the loss of that final vowel makes the second syllable closed so the vowel turns from a schwa (neutral E) to an open E. Because of that, we put an accent here: j’achète, tu amènes.

mortal osprey
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The only exception to this pattern is -eyer. The first e is remains unchanged due to the y, however the phonetic rules still apply.