Glossary
Vocabulary
French Grammar Glossary active voice when the subject performs an action.
| Term | Meaning | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| adjective | a word that modifies a noun or a pronoun. | grand, petit |
| adverb | a word that modifies a verb, an adjective, or another adverb. | Je lis souvent. J’ai beaucoup dormi. Je suis allé(e) rapidement à l’école. |
| antecedent | a word or group of words to which a relative pronoun refers. | |
| articles | small words that are generally classified as adjectives. They indicate that a noun or noun substitute will follow. | |
| auxiliary | verb one of two elements needed to form a compound tense. Also called a helping verb. | J'ai aller chez Tom, Je suis allé |
| cardinal numbers | the numbers we use for counting. | |
| cognates | words that are the same or similar in both French and English. | |
| conditional | a mood that expresses what a subject would do under certain circumstances. | |
| conditionnel passé | a mood that expresses what a subject would have done under certain circumstances. | |
| conjugation | the action of changing the ending of the verb so that it agrees with the subject noun or pronoun performing the task. | être: je suis, tu es, il est, ils sont, nous sommes, vous êtes |
| definite article | an article that indicates a specific person or thing: the house. | l'homme, la femme, le fil |
| demonstrative adjective | an adjective that precedes nouns to indicate or point out the person, place, or thing referred to: this, that, these, or those. | |
| demonstrative pronoun | a pronoun that stands alone to indicate or point out the person or thing referred to. | |
| direct object | answers the question whom or what the subject is acting upon and may refer to people, places, things, or ideas. May be a noun or pronoun. | |
| exclamation | a word or phrase used to show surprise, delight, incredulity, emphasis, or other strong emotion. | |
| false friends | words that are spelled the same or almost the same in both languages but have entirely different meanings and can be different parts of speech. | |
| future | a tense that expresses what the subject will do or is going to do or what action will or is going to take place in a future time. | |
| futur antérieur | a tense that expresses what the subject will have done by a future time. | |
| gender | indicates whether a word is masculine or feminine. | |
| idiom | a particular word or expression whose meaning cannot be readily understood by either its grammar or the words used. | |
| imperative | a verb form used to give commands or make requests. | |
| imperfect | a past tense that expresses a continuous, repeated, habitual or incomplete action, situation, or event in the past that was going on at an indefinite time or what used to happen in the past. | |
| indefinite adjective | expresses any, no, other, certain, some, each, the same, several, some, all, etc. | chaque, quelque, tout |
| indefinite article | refers to persons and objects not specifically identified. | |
| indefinite pronoun | expresses any, no one, none, other(s), other one(s), certain one(s), some, each one, everyone, the same one(s), one, several, someone, anyone, some, a few, something, anything, nothing, all, everything, anything, etc. | |
| independent (stress) pronoun | a pronoun used to emphasize a fact and to highlight or replace nouns or pronouns. | |
| indicative | a verb tense that states a fact. | |
| indirect object | answers the question to or for whom the subject is doing something and refer only to people. May be a noun or pronoun. | |
| infinitive | the basic "to" form of the verb. | pouvoir, dormir, assessoir |
| intonation | the act of asking a question by inserting a rising inflection at the end of the statement. | |
| inversion | the reversal of the word order of the subject pronoun and the conjugated verb in order to form a question. | je peux voir la menu => puis-je voir le menu? |
| noun | a word used to name a person, place, thing, idea, or quality. | la chaise, la femme, la table, la chemise |
| partitive | an article asking for an indefinite quantity (part of a whole: some or any). | |
| passé composé | a tense that expresses an action or event completed in the past. | |
| passé simple | a past tense that occurs primarily in formal, literary, and historical writings expressing a completed action. | |
| passive voice | when the subject is acted upon. | |
| past conditional | a tense that expresses what the subject would have done under certain conditions. | |
| past participle | a verb form expressing an action that has occurred in the past. | |
| pluperfect or plus-que-parfait | a tense that expresses what the subject had done. | |
| preposition | a word used to relate elements in a sentence: noun to noun, verb to verb, or verb to noun/pronoun. | |
| present participle | a verb form ending in -ing that expresses an action that is taking place. | |
| present tense | a tense that expresses what is happening now. | |
| pronoun | a word that is used to replace a noun (a person, place, thing, idea, or quality). | |
| reflexive verb | a verb that shows that the subject is performing the action upon itself. | |
| relative pronoun | a pronoun that joins a main clause (a clause that can stand alone) to a dependent clause. | |
| subject | the noun performing the action of the verb. | |
| subjunctive | a mood expressing wishing, emotion, doubt, denial. | |
| verb | a word that shows an action or state of being. |