.stefanigermanotta

[silent prawn]

Please be patient

Our volunteers look into many questions every day; sometimes it takes them a little while to answer.

Pro tip: you can rename the thread title with `.tr <thread name>`

Make it descriptive, including relevant context, but also to the point. This way you improve your chances of getting a more relevant and specific answer.

[stiff acorn]

Être and avoir is a different question actually

Basically, objects come in two varieties, direct and indirect. Direct means that there is no preposition while indirect means that there is.

Je vois Louise
Je parle à Louise

Notice how the object is still « Louise » but the second phrase has the preposition « à » ? That makes it an indirect object. On the other hand, the absence of a preposition in the first sentence indicates that it’s direct.

COI and COD just describe what objects a verb can take. COI means that a verb takes an indirect object whereas COD means it takes a direct one. Some verbs take only COIs, some take only CODs, some may take both.

COIs don’t code for gender. It doesn’t matter whether the second sentence is « Louise » or « Philippe », both will become « lui » :
Je parle à Louise => Je lui parle
Je parle à Philippe => Je lui parle
This is also the case in the plural.
Je parle à Louise et à Adèle => Je leur parle
Je parle à Philippe et à Marc => Je leur parle
-# In some cases, gender will play a role but this is a general explanation

Conversely, CODs do code for gender. If I change the object to « Philippe », the object pronoun changes as well.
Je vois Louise => Je la vois
Je vois Philippe => Je le vois
This also applies in the plural:
Je vois Louise et Adèle => Je les vois
Je vois Philippe et Marc => Je les vois
Now, hold on, you might say, in the plural they’re both « les » so why is it still important?

Well, gender agreement is more important whenever you’re dealing with compound tenses: i.e. tenses where you have an auxiliary verb and a past participle like passé composé, plus-que-parfait, futur antérieur, etc. You see, when the object is located after the verb, there’s no gender agreement but if it’s before we will have it in the past participles.

J’ai vu Louise => Je l’ai vue.
As you can see, the past participle « vu » will change if the direct object is before the noun. It’ll agree with that object so if the object is feminine plural, the participle is also feminine plural. Let’s fill out the rest:

J’ai vu Philippe => Je l’ai vu
J’ai vu Louise et Adèle => Je les ai vues
J’ai vu Philippe et Marc => Je les ai vu_s_

I don’t know how far you are so there’s where I am stopping

[marsh prairie]

Thank you! I’m at A2 french, and I wish to know when to use AVOIR and ÊTRE for Mrs and Dr Vandertramp

[stiff acorn]

Ah well for that it’s just memorisation unfortunately

I will say though that être verbs don’t take any objects (generally) if you are concerned with COI/COD they’re not important for être verbs

[marsh prairie]

Okay, noted. Thank you!

OH WAIT

[marsh prairie]

I was talking about passé compose!!!

omg sorry

[stiff acorn]

Ahhh

Well because être verbs outside of pronominals don’t take objects, their past participles agree with the subject

Do you remember how adjectives work, how they change form according to what they are modifying?

Like,
Philippe est beau
Louise est belle
Philippe et Marc sont beaux
Louise et Adèle sont belles

It’s exactly the same idea with être verbs in compound tenses. They agree with the subject. Past participles are just adjectives dressed up as verbs so like in the beau/belle/beaux/belles example, we can have:
Philippe est parti
Louise est partie
Philippe et Marc sont partis
Louise et Adèle sont parties

[autumn stream]

Un COI is a COI because it uses à, not the other way around

[lost geyser]

sont parties 🪩 💃 🎉

[autumn stream]

Like what defines a coi is that it uses à

for COI need to put à?

Well when you make it a pronoun you drop the à

[lost geyser]

COI is the same as a dative case basically

[autumn stream]

Uh sure

[lost geyser]

use à to make it dative

done

[autumn stream]

Idk if they speak a lang that uses cases

[lost geyser]

actually idk who we're explaining to but that might give it more sense

yeah idk either

they have singapore as tag

malay barely has noun-grammar as it is

[autumn stream]

Don't they speak English and Chinese mostly

[lost geyser]

same problem either way

[autumn stream]

Yea

[lost geyser]

ok so, english malay chinese and tamil are official
and tamil does have a dative

[autumn stream]

Oh rly?

Isn't that a lang from India?

Yea southern india

[lost geyser]

yep

[restive wigeon]

I do think using accusative and dative for COD/COI would greatly simplify discussion when comparing to other languages

Especially given that not all objects marked with à are dative/COI: some of them are "true" prepositional objects that cannot be replaced with indirect object pronouns (example: je pense à lui)