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French "It’s enough" | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| Spinchäeb Ape Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 4472 days ago 146 posts - 180 votes  Speaks: English*, German | Message 1 of 16 30 November 2012 at 7:51pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I'm studying French via the Pimsleur method. It's a terrific program, but it's not perfect. It's done via audio only and does a great job building and reinforcing what you know. Unfortunately, it does not come with a transcript of what's on the recordings. I can usually just plug what he asked for in English into Google Translate and get the written form of what's said. It's not quite as easy this time.
On the recording, he says in English "It's enough." Then in French it sounds like "sess uffi." Google translate translates this as "C'est assez." That really doesn't look like it. My Ultralingua French/English dictionary lists "enough" as "assez." However, it also lists "be enough" as "suffire". Then right next to that, it says, "p.p. suffi." I'm therefore wondering if what's on the Pimsleur recording is either "C'est suffire" or "C'est suffi." My educated guess is that both "C'est assez" and "C'est suffi" are legitimate ways to say, "It's enough." Am I correct? Is there a difference in meaning? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| sctroyenne Diglot Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5393 days ago 739 posts - 1312 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: Spanish, Irish | Message 2 of 16 30 November 2012 at 8:12pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Close: it's "C'est/Ça suffit"
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| Spiderkat Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5814 days ago 175 posts - 248 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: Russian | Message 3 of 16 01 December 2012 at 12:15am | IP Logged | |||||
There's no such thing as "c'est suffit". The OP correctly guessed it. It's either "Ça/cela suffit !" or "C'est assez !" with some variations such as "Ç'en est assez !" or simply "Assez !". But there's also "C'est suffisant" depending on the context. 4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Spinchäeb Ape Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 4472 days ago 146 posts - 180 votes Speaks: English*, German | Message 4 of 16 01 December 2012 at 1:23am | IP Logged | |||||
Thanks to you both for your help. Can you think of a situation in which "C'est suffisant" would be preferred over "Ça/cela suffit"? Is it perhaps a little more formal? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| sctroyenne Diglot Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5393 days ago 739 posts - 1312 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: Spanish, Irish | Message 5 of 16 01 December 2012 at 1:38am | IP Logged | |||||
Yeah I had thought it was only ça/cela suffit but I did a quick google test to make sure and I did find a non-insignificant number of instances for it. So I guess it exists as a mistake? Edited by sctroyenne on 01 December 2012 at 1:41am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Spiderkat Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5814 days ago 175 posts - 248 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: Russian | Message 6 of 16 01 December 2012 at 3:23am | IP Logged | |||||
Just for my own curiosity, can you provide a few links to those instances because I didn't find anything related to "c'est suffit"? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Spiderkat Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5814 days ago 175 posts - 248 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: Russian | Message 7 of 16 01 December 2012 at 3:49am | IP Logged | |||||
It's just a different register. So, yes, I'd say it may sound as formal as "il/cela suffit" because most of the time you'll hear "ça suffit". 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| vermillon Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4680 days ago 602 posts - 1042 votes Speaks: French*, EnglishC2, Mandarin Studies: Japanese, German | Message 8 of 16 01 December 2012 at 10:48am | IP Logged | |||||
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It's not only a different register.
If you mean to say "it's enough!" in an annoyed fashion (i.e. "I've had enough!"), then you can say "Ça suffit!" (or "Cela suffit!" if you think of yourself as some kind of pedantic elite...), but not "C'est suffisant". "C'est suffisant" is merely the statement that something is enough for a certain task/situation. If you're traveling to France for a week and ask me how much money you should bring there, it would be perfectly correct to answer "400€ c'est suffisant". 4 persons have voted this message useful |
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