- In this video, we're going to be looking
at two very interesting words: "depuis" and "pendant".
Let's go!
(upbeat music)
Hello everyone and welcome to Coffee Break French
I'm Mark.
And I'm Pierre-Benoît.
- And in this video, as Pierre-Benoît mentioned,
we are looking at two very useful and very important words
based on Rachel's question.
Rachel got in touch and asked us what's the difference
between "depuis" and "pendant".
So, to answer this question,
let's begin by looking at two sentences,
one which uses "depuis" and one which uses "pendant".
Pierre-Benoît, can you give us these sentences?
Of course.
"Je joue au basket depuis 3 ans."
- Okay, "je joue au basket..."
Literally, "I play at basketball",
"...depuis 3 ans."
so, "I play at basketball since three years".
That's a strange translation,
but that's literally what it means,
it means "I've been playing basketball for 3 years".
Let's look at the alternative.
"J'ai joué au basket pendant 3 ans."
- Okay. So it's an alternative,
but it means something different.
"J'ai joué au basket pendant 3 ans."
So here, "we played basketball for a period of three years".
I think it might help if we look at...
Let's think of this as a kind of drawing,
I'm going to come up with a diagram here.
This is now, okay.
And there is Pierre-Benoît playing basketball.
You're very good at basketball, obviously,
and the ball goes straight in the net every time.
But, what we need to think about is the difference between
these two words, "depuis" and "pendant".
So let's take "depuis" first of all.
"Depuis" basically starts somewhere in the past
and it continues up to the present
and indeed, potentially beyond.
So, "I have been playing basketball for three years
and today I'm still playing basketball"
and that's the reason for the present.
- Yep. That's it.
If it's an action that started in the past
and it's still going on at the present, okay,
or in the present, then we need to use "depuis".
- Okay, so we've got the past here,
and then we've got "now" here; the present,
so "depuis" continues from the past into the present,
but that's different from "pendant"
because "pendant" would kind of happen here.
So, it started in the past
and it stopped in the past as well.
- Yeah, it's totally finished in the past,
and I think that's what people have to remember.
- So, "j'ai joué au basket pendant 3 ans".
that means "at some point in the past
for a period of three years, I played basketball".
"I played basketball for three years",
and it's the "for" translation that's
kind of tricky sometimes
because we start to think about different words,
but here we're sticking to "depuis" and "pendant".
"Depuis" starts in the past,
it took three years and it's now continuing on
and "pendant" started in the past,
it took three years and then ended at that point.
Let's look at another example
and that might help this whole idea.
"J'étudie l'espagnol depuis 5 ans".
- Okay, "j'étudie l'espagnol depuis 5 ans".
So "I", again let's do it literally first,
"I study Spanish since five years".
"I've been studying Spanish for five years".
So that's a "depuis" situation,
it starts in the past - for five years in this case -
and it continues up to the present and, who knows,
perhaps we'll continue studying Spanish in the future.
But there we've got "depuis",
it's "I have been studying Spanish for five years".
Let's look at the alternative.
"J'ai étudié l'espagnol pendant 5 ans".
- Okay, so, "j'ai étudié l'espagnol pendant 5 ans".
so "I studied Spanish for a period of five years
in the past, but then no longer studied it after that".
So there we have the difference between "depuis" -
something that started in the past,
continues up to the present -
and "pendant", which started in the past
and finished in the past.
Now Pierre-Benoît, let's think carefully
about these tenses here,
because we've got two different tenses,
one that's used for "depuis"
and one that's used for "pendant".
Can you explain what we mean?
- Yes, because here when we're using "depuis",
we need to have the present tense because the action is
obviously, as we've been saying,
it's continuing in the present.
- Okay, so with "depuis" then,
we've got the present tense linked to "depuis",
but for "pendant", we've got a different tense.
- Since we have an action that's totally finished,
it finished in the past, we need to use the past tense
and here it's a perfect.
Very good.
A perfect ending, a perfect solution.
So there we go.
We hope that that's answered your question, Rachel.
Thank you very much for sending it in.
Now if you've got a question like Rachel,
then just get in touch with us,
head to coffeebreakquestions.com
where you can leave your questions for us
and we'll hopefully be able to include your question
in a future episode.
Also, if you've enjoyed this video,
then give it a like and of course, subscribe
to the channel to get more learning videos
to help you with your French.
- And if you do have any examples
with "depuis" and "pendant",
just please post them in the comments.
Great. Well, thank you very much and see you next time!
Bye!
(upbeat music)