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Post by Darcy on Sept 29, 2009 14:46:34 GMT -5
As you wrote in the thread about jour vs. journee, etc., "l'an dernier/prochain and l'année dernière/prochaine" I too have always placed dernier and prochain after the noun. Just a couple of minutes ago I received an email from a French person, now living in the US, and he wrote: "la prochaine reunion". Are there different rules for the usage of dernier and prochain or did my friend just make a mistake? (he's been known to make mistakes ) Thank you for your patience and your great help with all our questions, Anne!
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Post by Anne on Sept 30, 2009 7:47:05 GMT -5
La prochaine réunion (next meeting) is right. One also says la prochaine fois (next time).
I guess that the rule could be that prochain is after the noun when the noun is about a precise time : l'année prochaine, le mois prochain, la semaine prochaine, dimanche prochain. But when the noun is plural, then the adjective is after the noun (les prochaines semaines, etc ...).
In all these examples, prochain can be replaced by dernier, it works the same.
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Post by Darcy on Sept 30, 2009 21:26:21 GMT -5
But when the noun is plural, then the adjective is after the noun (les prochaines semaines, etc ...).
les prochaines semaines or les semaines prochaines?
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Post by Anne on Oct 1, 2009 6:08:56 GMT -5
Sorry Darcy, I should have re-read what I wrote : the adjective is before the plural noun, just as in my example.
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Post by MaisonMetz on Oct 1, 2009 11:24:16 GMT -5
Darcy -
From my notes in a long ago French class, this is the distinction:
la semaine dernière - last week (just passed) la dernière semaine - the last week (of a series)
Jo
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Post by mossie on Oct 1, 2009 12:52:08 GMT -5
And our old French master told us French was a logical language, not a hopeless muddle like English , excepting, possibly, a few irregular verbs Now I know he was telling us a fairy story ;D ;D ;D Annette, do as I do, stumble round with my ten words of French and a dumb smile, they'll soon put you right.
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Post by sistereurope on Oct 1, 2009 20:02:51 GMT -5
Oh Annette, I hear that! ;D
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Post by Darcy on Oct 2, 2009 7:45:08 GMT -5
Thanks, everyone! Now, if only some of these rules would stick to this old brain!
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