I was once an aupair for some French-speaking kids and so, in homage to them, I will give some examples of what kids might say in French:
Je n’aime pas le brocoli.
Je ne veux plus jouer avec toi.
Ma maman ne me laisse jamais faire ce que je veux.
Ma maman ne m’achète rien quand on fait du shopping.
Je ne veux personne dans ma chambre !
Je ne vais pas encore à l’école.
Je ne veux ni dormir ni me reposer.
Je n‘ai qu’une petite glace !
Basically, to be negative in French, you just have to place ne before the conjugated verb and pas or another negative expression after that same verb. In other words, you form a negative sandwich with the conjugated verb as the filling.
Some of the most common negative expressions include:
| ne…pas | not |
| ne…plus | no longer |
| ne…jamais | never |
| ne…rien | nothing |
| ne…personne | no one |
| ne…pas encore | not yet |
| ne…ni…ni… | neither…nor… |
| ne…que | only |
You can see from the above examples that ne…ni…ni and ne…que don’t follow the same pattern as the other expressions. Instead of following the conjugated verb, ni and que are placed before the word they modify.
Most negative expressions in French are adverbs. However, rien and personne are pronouns that can also be used as a subject or object in a sentence. So, when used in these ways, rien and personne are placed in the normal subject or object position. Ne is still placed directly before the verb. Examples:
Rien ne se passe. (Nothing happens)
Personne ne joue avec moi. (Nobody plays with me).
Be careful! Although you can’t make a double negative in English, you can in French. Just make sure you place ne before the verb, omit pas when using other negative expressions in the same sentence and place the negative adverbs before the negative pronouns. You might see something like this:
Personne ne fait jamais rien! (Nobody ever does anything!)
What negative sentences can you come up with? Please share in a comment!
