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Pronoms relatifs
Par exemple…
Le médecin que je connais fait des The doctor (whom) I know does
visites à domicile. house calls.
In English, the relative pronoun is often optional, but in French it is always
required.
Another example:
J’ai vu la maison qu’il va acheter. I saw the house (that) he’s going to
buy.
Il va acheter la maison que j’ai He’s going to buy the house (that) I
vue.** saw.
Le théâtre est une des choses que The theater is one of the things I
j’aime bien. really like.
Une des choses que j’aime bien, c’est One of the things I really like is the
le théâtre. theater.
Qui = subject
Qui, on the other hand, replaces the subject of the subordinate clause, whether
it’s a person or a thing.
Par exemple…
J’ai un fils qui joue au tennis. I have a son who plays tennis.
Here’s another look at the very first example with que: you can word it another
way to replace the subject rather than the object:
Voici le livre qui était sur la table. Here’s the book that was on the table.
The subject of the second sentence is le livre, so when combining the two
sentences into one, it becomes qui.
Par exemple…
Je pense à ma sœur. Elle vient de déménager en France.
Ma sœur à qui je pense vient de My sister I’m thinking about just
déménager en France. moved to France
Note that you can also say Je pense à ma sœur qui vient de déménager en France,
where qui is the subject of the subordinate clause. It’s just a matter of figuring
out what you’re replacing with the relative pronoun.
Le collègue avec qui j’ai pris un pot a The colleague I had a drink with was
été viré le lendemain. fired the next day.
Alternatively, the “qui as subject” version: J’ai pris un pot avec un collègue qui a été
viré le lendemain.
L’ami chez qui j’ai mangé est chef de The friend whose house I ate at is
cuisine. a chef.
In summary: Que vs Qui
Some teachers will tell you that the difference is much simpler: "Qui is always
followed by a verb, que is followed by any other part of speech." While that’s often
true, it falls apart when inversion comes into play.***
Par exemple…
l’appartement que mes parents ont acheté the apartment my parents bought
The fact that we’ve inverted the subject and verb does not change the
grammatical function of the relative pronoun. It’s still que, regardless of what
comes after it, because it’s still a direct object. (If you changed it to qui, the
meaning would change to "the apartment that bought my parents.)