Breakdown of Il y a de la poussière parce que nous sommes en train de couper la pierre.
nous
we / us (object pronoun)
il y a
there is / there are
parce que
because
de la
some (partitive, feminine)
couper
to cut
être en train de
to be in the middle of (doing)
la poussière
the dust
la pierre
the stone
Questions & Answers about Il y a de la poussière parce que nous sommes en train de couper la pierre.
Why use nous sommes en train de couper instead of just nous coupons?
While nous coupons can mean both 'we cut' and 'we are cutting', using the expression être en train de emphasizes that you are in the middle of an action right now. It acts like the English progressive aspect ('we are currently cutting') to focus on the ongoing process.
Why is couper not conjugated to match nous?
In the phrase être en train de, the preposition de must always be followed by an infinitive (unconjugated) verb. You only conjugate the verb être to match the subject (nous sommes), leaving the main action verb (couper) in its dictionary form.
Why does the sentence say de la poussière instead of just poussière?
In French, nouns almost always require an article. Because dust is an uncountable substance, we use the feminine partitive article de la to mean an unspecified amount of it, which translates roughly to 'some dust' in English.
Why do we use the partitive de la for dust, but the definite article la for stone (la pierre)?
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