In the sentence, "Je vais me laisser tenter par la deuxième option qui a l'air vraiment intéressante à faire.", the adjective, intéressante, is féminine. I would have thought that this adjective is modifying the word 'air', which is masculine, rather than obliqely referring to the feminine noun, 'option'. Could you explain?
Question about agreement
- « Back to Q&A Forum
- « Previous questionNext question »
Question about agreement
Frank,
‘ avoir l’air ‘ is usually a fixed verbal expression, and is most frequently treated grammatically as a verb unit. It is not treated as the verb ‘ avoir ‘ followed by the noun ‘ l’air ‘ in this particular situation.
( After initial posting, found the 2nd link that discusses in much more detail, in French. Worth a look if you want further information )
The subject noun being modified by the adjective is ‘ la deuxième option ‘, hence feminine adjectival agreement.
One ‘trick’ is that you can replace ‘ avoir l’air ‘ with sembler or paraître, or follow with d’être, to check/verify the agreement .
https://www.wordreference.com/fren/avoir%20l'air
https://www.noslangues-ourlanguages.gc.ca/fr/cles-de-la-redaction/avoir-lair-accord-de-ladjectif-qui-suit
avoir l’air (accord de l’adjectif qui suit)
Article sur l’accord de l’adjectif qui suit l’expression avoir l’air.
– chose
Accord avec le sujet: Lorsque le sujet est une chose, l’adjectif s’accorde en principe avec le sujet. Avoir l’air a le sens de « paraître, sembler, avoir l’air d’être » :
Don't have an account yet? Join today
Find your French level for FREE
Test your French to the CEFR standard
Find your French level