One of the pitfalls of learning a foreign language is approximating words and expressions in the source language to similar-looking or similar-sounding ones in the target language. This gives rise to some interesting phenomena such as faux amis (literally ‘false friends’) which are words with a similar appearance in both languages, but with different meanings and sometimes origins. For example, the word spelt ‘sensible’ exists in both French and English, but while it means ‘having common sense’ in English, in French it means ‘sensitive’.

A common mix-up that occurs quite frequently is with the expression ‘beaucoup de’, which can mean ‘many’, ‘a lot of’, ‘lots of’ or ‘plenty of’ and is followed by a plural noun. Expressions of quantity in French are usually followed by the preposition ‘de’ when the quantity is determined or expressed (‘I eat plenty of fish’ implies a certain amount, whereas ‘I eat fish’ does not). This is well-illustrated by ‘pas de’, ‘un peu de’ and ‘plein de’ (Il n’y a pas de sucre sur la table ; Je mets un peu de lait dans mon thé ; Elle était pleine d’entrain à la fête hier). There are of course exceptions to this, the most well-known of which is ‘la plupart de’: La plupart du temps, je quitte la maison très tôt et je rentre tard ; La plupart des étudiants travaillent tout en étudiant.

Students attempting to translate ‘many of’ and its variants for the first time (or without prior knowledge of the form required) may fall into the trap of approximating their translation to the English version. So, what do they do? They switch from ‘de’ to ‘des’, thinking that if the expression is followed by a plural noun then it is only logical for the noun to be preceded by a plural element. As a result, ‘lots of people’ becomes ‘beaucoup des gens’, which may not be obvious in speech but is clear in writing. But language (and especially grammar) isn’t always intuitive like that. If it were, we’d all easily be bilingual and trilingual and everything that follows!

The same pitfall can be observed when students attempt to translate beaucoup + personal pronoun. In this case, beaucoup is followed by ‘d’entre’ or ‘parmi’ which can both be translated as ‘among’. So ‘some of us’ becomes ‘beaucoup d’entre nous’ or ‘beaucoup parmi nous’ and not ‘beaucoup de nous’ as one might first think. The same is true of other expressions of quantity – Peu d’entre vous sont prêts pour l’examen → Few of you are ready for the exam.       

What might be shocking to some is that ‘beaucoup’ can in fact be employed with the partitive in a very specific subset of cases. But because of the unprecedented confusion this would inevitably cause, instructors and authorities the world over have decided that it is better for beaucoup de to remain invariable. So, this is what students learn. This is probably for the best since using the partitive doesn’t change the meaning of a sentence appreciably, and expressions like la plupart de can be used as substitutes in some cases. Consequently, beaucoup de will suffice in everyday usage.

So why does ‘beaucoup de’ (and other expressions of quantity) behave this way? A tempting hypothesis is that it is a deliberate attempt by the French to deter foreigners from learning their beloved language, but that explanation falls apart when you consider that English has its own quirks and can be challenging at times. The reason probably has something to do with the way quantities are expressed in French compared to English.

The partitive (du, de la, de l’, des) is preferred when talking about indefinite or unspecified quantities (it is worth noting that de is a preposition, while the partitive is made up of articles). E.g. J’ai de l’argent → I have money (I possess an unspecified amount of money; it could be $5 or $500). ‘De’ by itself (d’ before a vowel) is placed before quantities that are expressed in some way – Elle a acheté un kilo d’agneau → She bought a kilo of lamb; Cette fois-ci Nelly a mis assez de sel dans le ragoût → This time Nelly put enough salt in the stew (‘enough’ here could be seen as being indicative of some kind of quantity though not as explicit as un kilo).

‘Besoin’ and ‘envie’ are always employed with ‘de’ even if they are followed by plural nouns: J’ai besoin de conseils pour impressionner mon patron – I need some tips for impressing my boss; Tu as envie de bœuf ce soir? – Do you feel like beef this evening?

Somewhat counter-intuitively, the partitive is also used when talking about quantities of a specified nature. Here are examples to illustrate:

Beaucoup de jeunes ont des troubles du sommeil – Many young people have sleep disorders

Beaucoup des jeunes auxquels j’ai parlé ont des troubles du sommeil – Many of the young people I spoke to had sleep disorders

The difference between the two statements is very nuanced, and in reality, de could be used in the second as well as the first. The reason des can apply in the second example is because of the specificity attached to les jeunes. While in the first jeunes is not modified by a clause, the second is modified by auxquels j’ai parlé. So, the speaker is not just talking about young people in general, but specifically the young people to whom they spoke. This difference isn’t often understood, which is why instructors always counsel students to stick to beaucoup de only (in my experience, this decision is a sound one).