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Questions answered by our learning community with help from expert French teachers
14,461 questions • 31,313 answers • 934,405 learners
The first refers to the nature of what you are inquiring about: is it a person or a thing? Qui est-ce… is for people and Qu'est-ce… is for things.The second refers to the grammatical function of the unknown person or thing in your question: is it the subject or the complement of a verb? …est-ce qui is for subjects and …est-ce que is for complements.Examples:
Qui est-ce qui fait X ? → Who is doing X?
The first qui indicates that you're asking about a person ("who"), while the second qui implies that the unknown person performs the action of the verb: this person is doing X.
Short form: Qui fait X ?
Qui est-ce que tu as vu ? → Whom did you see? or commonly Who did you see?
The qui indicates that you're asking about a person ("who" or "whom"), while the que implies that this unknown person is the complement of the verb "to see": the unknown person got seen, and tu is the one who saw them.
Short form: Qui as-tu vu ? (requires inversion)
Note that the English language requires (theoretically, in formal contexts) two different words to ask about people: Who = Qui + qui while Whom = Qui + que.
Qu'est-ce qui fait X ? → What is doing X?
The que (elided to qu') indicates that you're asking about a thing ("what"), while the qui implies that this unknown thing performs the action of the verb: the thing is doing X.
No short form in everyday usage.
Qu'est-ce que tu as vu ? → What did you see?
The first que (elided to qu') indicates that you're asking about a thing ("what"), while the second que implies that the unknown thing is the complement of the verb "to see": tu is the person who saw something, the unknown thing is what got seen.
Short form: Qu'as-tu vu ? (requires inversion)
Bonjour!
Is the below sentence correct in terms of usage of que/qui vs ce que/ce qui?
Je m’assieds dans une chaise sur le balcon qu'est attaché à mon appartement.
For some reason the "qu'est" doesn't look right to me but i dont know why. If any other errors, appreciate the correction on those as well.
Merci d'avance!
I know certain kinds of weather are expressed with a direct verb, like:
* il pleut
* il neige
* il tonne
But there seems to be multiple ways of describing other kinds of weather, like "it's sunny." I've heard:
* il y a du soleil (which is the example in this lesson)
but also:
* c'est ensoleillé
I've heard both:
* il y a des nuages
as well as:
* c’est nuageux
Are all these versions correct? Is one preferred or in more common use than the other?Thanks!
"Je voudrais un coca ... "by the male "Voudrais" sounds different from the female in "Bonjour, je voudrais un coca... "Is it a regional accent?
"the verb must agree with the gender and number of the person."
Can you please explain the discrepancy between these two sources of information? Thanks.
Bonjour!
Why does "J'en vaux vraiment la peine" have en whereas "Ça vaut la peine" doesn't? I've encountered the latter phrase before but with en (i.e. Ça en vaut la peine).
Will appreciate further clarity on this :)
Merci!
I am confused by some of the answers to quiz questions in this lesson. For me, the construction "Il faut ..." translates well into "One must ..." in English. While we don't use "One must ..." much in modern English, it indicates that we're talking about a general proposition: It means I / you / he / she / we / they must. But some of the quiz answers here seem to say that "Il faut ..." indicates something less than a requirement that should apply to everyone, barring any qualification that might be given in the text, and barring any clarification that might be given by the context. "Il ne faut pas marcher sur la pelouse," for example, means something like "It's forbidden to walk on the grass," or "No one should walk on the grass," not just "You mustn't walk on the grass," doesn't it? What am I missing?
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