February 2014 Grammar Lesson: The French Pronoun Y
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How to use the pronoun Y in French
The pronouns Y and En follow the same kind of logic. It’s a double logic meaning for
each pronouns there are 2 main points to understand.
1 – Y replaces a PLACE.
A place is introduced by a preposition of place which can be “à” but also “sur, sous, en, au, aux…”:
• Je vais à Paris = j’y vais
• Je vais en France = j’y vais
• Je vais au Japon = j’y vais
When you study this, the key is to know well the rules on prepositions of places in French.
2 – Y also replaces A THING (never a person) introduced by “à, au, aux, à l’, à la”
• Je pense à mon travail = j’y pense
• Je rélféchis aux problèmes internationaux – j’y réfléchis
The “à, au, aux, à la à l’” often comes from the verb meaning that this particular verb is going to be
followed by “à”, and that is why you’d be using a “à” there. This is the case for my examples “penser
à” and “réfléchir à”. So, in order to master Y, you should really learn the most common verbs followed
by à in French. And train on making sentences using Y with these verbs.
Note than when a verb is followed by à + PERSON, you need to use an indirect object pronoun (me, te,
lui, nous, vous, leur):
• Je parle à Pierre = je lui parle
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Or a stress spronoun: “moi, toi, lui, elle, nous, vous, eux, elles”
• Je pense à lui – I think of him
You cannot guess, you have to know which verb’s construction asks for which pronoun – indirect
object or stress… another difficulty of French…
3 – Il y a states the existence of something – there is, there are
• Il y a des livres sur la table – there are some books on the table.
• Il n’y a pas de vin – there is no wine
• Il n’y a plus de bon vin blanc – there is no more good white wine
4 – “Il y a” to talk about the weather
We also use “Il y a” a lot for expressions of weather
• Il y a + partitive article + noun
• Il y a du soleil – (there is some sun) = it’s sunny out
• Il y a de la neige – (there is some snow) – it’s snowy out
5 – The glidings with the expression “il y a”
The “a” is the verb “avoir” and can be conjugated: “il y avait, il n’y aura pas…”
The pronunciation in glided spoken French is quite different from the written form:
• Il y a = ya
• il n’y a pas de = yapad
• il n’y aura pas de = yorapad
To train on the pronunciation of “il y a” in spoken French, like my facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/frenchtoday which will give you access to the free download
of my 30 minute long audio lesson + PDF on Mastering French weather vocabulary.
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