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"J’en ai" / "d’y aller"

  Tags: Grammar | French
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outcast
Bilingual Heptaglot
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China
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 Message 1 of 8
27 June 2012 at 11:18pm | IP Logged 
As a response to the question: "As-tu l'intention d'aller au match?"

(Oui, j'en ai l'intention / Oui, j'ai l'intention d'y aller)

What is the deal with this. Are both accepted? Do they mean the same thing? Is one preferred over the other? Is one preferred in a certain situation?

There is surprisingly little in literature about it.


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balou67
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 Message 2 of 8
27 June 2012 at 11:55pm | IP Logged 
Both are right, both are common.

In "j'en ai l'intention", "en" (of it) = "d'aller au mach"
In "j'ai l'intention d'y aller", "y" (there) = "au match"

It's up to you whether you want to talk about what you intend to do, or about the place
you intend to go to.

EDIT: what I just said sounds a little too strict. The 2nd answer sounds more frequent,
informal (but works well in formal situations too).

Bonus : "d'y aller" in everyday life has only two syllabes : [dya-lé], as in English
"dya know".

Edited by balou67 on 28 June 2012 at 12:06am

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emk
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 Message 3 of 8
27 June 2012 at 11:59pm | IP Logged 
I'm not sure exactly what level of detail you're looking for here. Since you speak
French, I'm guessing you don't want the simple answer.

At a beginner level, roughly speaking, "en" and "y" are pronouns representing
prepositional phrases. They can be expanded as follows:

"Oui, j'en ai l'intention" = "Oui, j'ai l'intention de ___"
"Oui, j'ai l'intention d'y aller" = "Oui, j'ai l'intention d'aller à ___"

For a more detailed explanation of the rules, see
this article. Note
that only certain kinds of phrases beginning with "de" and "à" may be replaced.

There's also a number of fixed idioms like "s'en aller" which don't really seem to have
a "de" form, but you'd have to confirm that with a native speaker.

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outcast
Bilingual Heptaglot
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 Message 4 of 8
28 June 2012 at 12:38am | IP Logged 
Thanks to both of you. Yes, I want the more detailed explanations. I'm at the point in my languages (except Mandarin) where I'm focusing on the more obsessive details. :)

"s'en aller" when I first encountered it some months ago seemed odd, but now it makes complete sense to me, especially in a Spanish context.

It is nothing more than "irse [de ahí]". "En" standing for "de ahí", but Spanish tends to omit this if the context is clear (this is not always the case and "de ahi" is more or less required or it sounds strange).

"dya-le"... yup, I know. French syllables jump from the first of a word to the last of the prior. Very important to pronounce correctly!

EMK, thanks for the link. I already read it, in fact it was the source of most of my personal notes on the grammar of "y/en".

It would seem there is no material difference, except what balou67 suggested, and makes sense to me, of the emphasis on intention vs location, which is worth keeping in mind. Thanks.


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vermillon
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 Message 5 of 8
28 June 2012 at 11:53am | IP Logged 
If I may join, I feel that none of them would come as an answer to "As-tu l'intention d'aller au match?". I would only say "Oui", "Non", "peut-être" or some other possibility adverb.

I would answer "Oui, j'en ai l'intention" probably with the reinforcing adverb "bien" : "j'en ai bien l'intention!". But I would answer that to the question "Tu vas voir le match?", and certainly not to a question already asking if this is my intention.

As for "j'ai l'intention d'y aller", I don't think I would use it as an answer, but more in the general conversation (talking about the match, for instance, but not in answer to a question).

I don't think that helps in terms of grammar, but perhaps in terms of "naturalness" of usage.
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LaughingChimp
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 Message 6 of 8
28 June 2012 at 5:07pm | IP Logged 
balou67 wrote:
Bonus : "d'y aller" in everyday life has only two syllabes : [dya-lé],


I thought it's a phonetic rule. Was I wrong?
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Spiderkat
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 Message 7 of 8
28 June 2012 at 6:42pm | IP Logged 
balou67 wrote:
...
Bonus : "d'y aller" in everyday life has only two syllabes : [dya-lé], as in English
"dya know".

That must be a regional or some kind of fansy new generation thing because I don't see any reason to change the proper way [dy-alé] to [dya-lé] which sounds very odd.


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vermillon
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 Message 8 of 8
29 June 2012 at 12:39am | IP Logged 
It's quite clear that if you said "J'ai l'intention d'y aller", you would pronounce 3 syllables in "d'y aller", because "J'ai l'intention de" sounds quite high on the scale of register.

However, if I said (as I do normally when I speak French) "j'ai pas envie d'y aller", I would definitely say [dyalé]. Addmitedly, I'm not yet a quarter of century old, but I think this is quite common.


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