| Les Adjectifs Demonstratives | Demonstratives Adjectives |
| Masculine | Feminine | |||||||
| singular |
|
|
cette histoire | this story | ||||
| plural | ces miracles | these miracles | ces guerres | these wars | ||||
*When masculine nouns begin with a vowel or silent 'h', cet is used.
| Cet hôtel est bon marché. | This hotel is cheap. |
The above demonstratives are used with nouns and are technically adjectives.
| Les Pronoms Demonstratives | Demonstrative Pronouns |
Ce is equivalent to 'this' & 'that' however it is used only with the verb être. It is shortened to c' when être is in a form that begins with an e.
| -Ta nouvelle voiture est prête. | Your new car is ready. | |
| -C'est magnifique! | That's great. | |
| Regarde le coucher du soleil. | Look at the sunset! | |
| -C'est très beau! | It (the sunset) is very beautiful! |
The following demonstratives are used to point out objects.
| Singular | Plural | |
Masculine |
celui | ceux |
Feminine |
celle | celles |
Normally either -ci, indicating that the object is near, or -là, indicating distance, is attached to these pronouns.
| Celui-ci | this one (masculine) | |
| Celle-là | that one (feminine) | |
| Vouz préférez celui-ci ou celui-là? | Do you want this one (masculine) or that one (masculine)? |
Finally there is cela, and it's informal equivalent, ça. Both can be use to refer to objects as well as the indefinite- things like ideas and events. They are often used when making general statements about something.
| Le poisson, ça pue. | Fish, it stinks. |
or when an object is unknown.
| Je fais quoi avec ça? | I do what with this? |