We're just learning how to use adjectives and I am a little confused.
"A blue piece of paper"
I know a piece of paper is "une feuille de papier". And blue is "bleu"
Since feuille is feminine you would say bleue but papier is masculine. Where does the bleue go? I hope my question makes sense
I would say:
"une feuille de papier bleu"
as far as I can see the "blue" pertains to "paper" not the "piece" - thus the masculine form.
Thank you both for using the Jiskha Homework Help Forum.
correct! If it modified "une feuille" it would be bleue. But, as it modifies "le paper" it is bleu.
Mme
A little "review" on adjectives, so perhaps you will be less confused.
When you learn the nouns, learn the gender; that means is it le (masculine) or la (feminine) and that means l' words (l'histoire, for example) will be a bit more difficult.
French adjectives agree in gender (masculine or feminine) and number (singular or plural) with the noun(s) or pronoun(s) they modify. An adjecive modifying two or more nouns of different genders is in the masculine plural. Most adjectives (not all) have 4 forms = masculine singular, feminine singular, masculine plural, feminine plural.
Examples: petit, petite, petits, petites
actif, active, actifs, actives
heureux, heureuse, heureux, heureuses
cher, chère, chers, chères
gris, grise, gris, grises
riche, riche, riches, riches
The feminine singular of asjectives is regularly formed by adding -e to the masculine singular. If the masculine already ends in mute "e," the feminine is the same (riche, riche)
The plural is regularly formed by adding -s to the masculine or feminine singular. If the masculine singular ends in "s" or "x," the masculine plural is the same (gris, gris; heureux, heureux)
The feminine of adjectives ending in "x" o r "f" or "er" is formed by changing "x" to "se," "f" to "ve," and "er" to ère (heureux, heureuse; actif, active; cher, chère.
Like anything else, this will make more sense as you practice!
Mme
Merci!
de rien; c'est mon plaisir!
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Your question makes perfect sense! When you have a noun phrase that consists of multiple words, such as "une feuille de papier" (a piece of paper), and you want to modify it with an adjective like "blue" ("bleu" in French), you need to make sure that the adjective agrees with the gender and number of the noun it is describing.
In this case, "bleu" is the masculine form and "bleue" is the feminine form. Since "feuille" (paper) is feminine, you would use the feminine form of the adjective, which is "bleue". The word "papier" (paper) doesn't change its gender or number, so it remains the same regardless of the adjective.
So to say "a blue piece of paper" in French, you would say, "une feuille de papier bleue."
If you were talking about multiple blue pieces of paper, you would use the plural form of the adjective, which is "bleues". For example, "des feuilles de papier bleues" would translate to "some blue pieces of paper."
Remember that in French, adjectives usually come after the noun they modify, unlike in English where they usually come before. So the word order would be: "une feuille de papier bleue" (a blue piece of paper) and "des feuilles de papier bleues" (some blue pieces of paper).
I hope that helps clarify things for you!