Breakdown of Mon père m'encourage à pratiquer le karaté.
mon
my (mon, ma, mes)
pratiquer
to practice
le
him, it (masculine direct object pronoun)
me
me, myself (object pronoun)
le père
the father
encourager à
to encourage to
le karaté
the karate
Questions & Answers about Mon père m'encourage à pratiquer le karaté.
Why is there an à after encourage?
In French, the verb encourager requires the preposition à when it is followed by an infinitive (an unconjugated verb like pratiquer). The structure to remember is encourager quelqu'un à faire quelque chose (to encourage someone to do something).
Why is the m' placed before encourage instead of before pratiquer?
Is the m' here a direct or indirect object pronoun?
It is a direct object pronoun. The expression is encourager quelqu'un (to encourage someone), with no preposition before the person. Since there is no à or de before the person being encouraged, you use the direct object pronoun.
Could I say m'encourage à faire du karaté instead?
Yes, absolutely! Both phrases are common. Notice the difference in articles, though: pratiquer takes a definite article (le karaté), while faire requires a partitive article because you are doing a portion of an activity (du karaté).
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