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"J'ai écouté la prof." How would you say "I listened to her." ?

chris w.C1Kwiziq Q&A regular contributor

"J'ai écouté la prof." How would you say "I listened to her." ?

The answer given is je l'ai ecoutee. Why isn't it Je lui ai ecoutee, as we are listening to her? Ah, is is because it's not a transitive 'to', ?

This question relates to:French lesson "Special cases when the past participle agrees (in number & gender) when used with 'avoir' in the compound past in French (Le Passé Composé)"
Asked 2 weeks ago
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Maarten K.C1 Kwiziq Q&A super contributor Correct answer

Chris,

 ‘ lui ‘ is an indirect object pronoun, but ‘ écouter ‘ is transitive (direct), so needs a direct object pronoun.

 ‘ Je l’ai écouté(e) ‘ - no difference in pronunciation in French, so the gender is only known by context in speech. In compound tenses though, the gender is evident in written form because of the past participle agreement as per the rules covered in the lesson you linked.

This is one of those cases where ‘ equivalent ‘ verbs, ‘ écouter ‘ and ‘ ( to ) listen ( to ) ‘ follow different grammatical rules in English and French.

 https://www.wordreference.com/fren/%C3%A9couter

 https://www.larousse.fr/dictionnaires/francais-anglais/%C3%A9couter/27553

 https://www.larousse.fr/dictionnaires/anglais-francais/listen/592489

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chris w. asked:

"J'ai écouté la prof." How would you say "I listened to her." ?

The answer given is je l'ai ecoutee. Why isn't it Je lui ai ecoutee, as we are listening to her? Ah, is is because it's not a transitive 'to', ?

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