Learn French: Je n'achète pas ce fromage. - I am not buying this cheese.

Je n'achète pas ce fromage.

I am not buying this cheese.

Breakdown of Je n'achète pas ce fromage.

not (used before the verb)

pas

not (used after the verb)

this (before a noun)

Questions & Answers about Je n'achète pas ce fromage.

Why do we use ce here for "this"?

Ce is the masculine singular demonstrative adjective (meaning "this" or "that"). We use it here because fromage (cheese) is a masculine word and it starts with a consonant. If the masculine word started with a vowel, we would have to use cet instead.

I thought words ending in "e" were usually feminine. Why is fromage masculine?

While it is true that many French words ending in "e" are feminine, words ending in the letters -age are almost always masculine! That is why we say le fromage and use the masculine ce instead of the feminine cette.

Why is there an apostrophe in n'achète?

The standard negative phrase in French is ne ... pas. However, the verb achète starts with a vowel. When ne comes right before a vowel or a silent "h", the "e" drops and is replaced with an apostrophe to make pronunciation smoother. So, ne achète becomes n'achète.

The translation says "I am not buying", but isn't achète just "buy"?

Yes! French only has one present tense, which does the job of two English tenses. Je n'achète pas can mean "I do not buy" (a general habit) or "I am not buying" (an action happening right now), depending entirely on the context.