Personal Pronouns & être / avoir
Personal Pronouns & être / avoir
English speakers already say the subject pronoun every time ('I eat', never just 'Eat' to mean 'I eat'), so this habit transfers directly to French. The real work here is two irregular, high-frequency verbs — être (to be) and avoir (to have) — that simply have to be memorized.
Grammar Comparison
Grammar Comparison
The subject pronoun is required — same habit as English
Je mange. (not just 'Mange.')
I eat. (not just 'Eat.')
This is one of the more comfortable matches between English and French: both languages require a subject pronoun in almost every sentence (unlike, say, Spanish or Italian, which can drop it because the verb ending already signals the subject). The catch is that French verb endings also change by person even though the pronoun is still spoken — so you can't skip the pronoun just because the ending is 'informative enough', the way you sometimes can in pro-drop languages.
être (to be) — irregular, memorize whole
je suis, tu es, il/elle/on est, nous sommes, vous êtes, ils/elles sont
I am, you are, he/she/one is, we are, you are, they are
être is one of the two verbs you'll use constantly, and it's fully irregular — the six forms don't share an obvious root the way regular verbs do, much like English 'to be' (am/is/are) is irregular too. Notice on takes the same verb form as il/elle (on est), even though on usually means 'we' in casual speech — there's no English equivalent for a word that means 'we' but grammatically behaves like 'it'. These six forms simply need to be memorized cold.
avoir (to have) — irregular, memorize whole
j'ai, tu as, il/elle/on a, nous avons, vous avez, ils/elles ont
I have, you have, he/she/one has, we have, you have, they have
avoir maps directly onto English 'to have' as a true possession verb, conjugated by subject — so the logic is familiar even though the six forms are irregular and need their own memorization. Note je becomes j' before avoir's vowel (j'ai), the first of many elisions you'll meet — French drops the 'e' of je, le, la, ne, de, and others before a vowel sound, something English spelling never does. avoir is also the auxiliary for most compound tenses later, so getting these six forms solid now pays off.
Vocabulary
Vocabulary
| French | Pronunciation | English |
|---|---|---|
| je / j' | zhuh | I |
| tu | tu | you (informal) |
| il | eel | he / it |
| elle | el | she / it |
| on | ohn | we (casual) / one, people |
| nous | noo | we |
| vous | voo | you (formal / plural) |
| ils | eel | they (masc./mixed) |
| elles | el | they (all fem.) |
| être | EH-truh | to be |
| avoir | ah-VWAHR | to have |
| je suis | zhuh swee | I am |
| j'ai | zhay | I have |
| il y a | eel-YAH | there is / there are |