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Accord
Grammatical agreement is a vast topic – and one of the banes of French students. While in English we have a few nouns, pronouns, and adjectives that indicate gender and number (e.g., waiter/he/him/his and waitress/she/her/hers), in French, agreement is found in 5 of the 8 parts of speech. Here are the various types of French agreement with examples and links to in-depth lessons.
Adjectives
All the different kinds of French adjectives (demonstrative, possessive, negative, etc) have to agree with the nouns that they modify.
Par exemple…
| Cette femme est belle. | That woman is beautiful. | |
| Nos enfants sont très inventifs. | Our kids are very creative. |
Articles
Each of the three types of French articles (definite, indefinite, partitive) have a masculine singular form, a feminine singular form, and a plural form.
Par exemple…
| le garçon, la fille, les enfants | the boy, the girl, the kids | |
| un pull, une jupe, des vêtements | a sweater, a skirt, some clothes | |
| du pain, de la tisane, des épinards | some bread, some tea, some spinach |
Nouns
Most French nouns have a singular form and a plural form. Nouns that refer to people or animals also have a masculine form and a feminine form.
Par exemple…
| un ami, une amie des amis, des amies |
friend friends |
|
| le caissier, la caissière les caissiers, les caissières |
cashier cashiers |
Compound Nouns
Making compound nouns plural is somewhat more complicated.
Par exemple…
| une pause-café des pauses-café |
coffee break coffee breaks |
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| le haut-parleur les haut-parleurs |
loudspeaker loudspeakers |
Personal pronouns
Subject pronouns, object pronouns, and all the rest have different forms for each grammatical person.
Par exemple…
| Elle te voit. | She sees you. | |
| Je peux vous les envoyer. | I can send them to you. | |
| Montre-le-leur. | Show it to them. |
Impersonal pronouns
Five types of impersonal pronouns (demonstrative, indefinite, interrogative, negative, and possessive) must agree with the nouns they replace in gender and number.
Par exemple…
| Où sont tes gants ? Ceux-ci sont à moi. | Where are your gloves? These are mine. | |
| Les miens sont dans la voiture. | Mine are in the car. | |
| Chacune d’entre vous doit les porter. | Each of you has to wear them. |
Verbs
Verb agreement in the compound tenses and moods is probably the most difficult – take a look at verb agreement for details.
PwLF super list of agreement lessons
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