How do you say "I'm good at"?

[Kelly]

e.g. "That's a subject I'm good at/in."

A direct translation would be (I think): "C'est un sujet que je suis bon à/en." That sounds off to me though--what's the proper translation?

[Erwan]

A proper translation is "Je suis bon à/en"

e.g. : Je suis bon en français. Je suis bon à l'école.

"That's a subject I'm good at/in." : C'est un sujet dans lequel je suis bon.

[Neil Coffey]

In general, French doesn't allow prepositions at the end of the sentence as in English. So you have to "turn the sentence round". As Erwan suggests, one way is to translate it literally as "It's a subject in which I'm good" (this sounds a bit odd/formal in English, but in French it's more common).

 

Another way is just try and find a verb that avoids the preposition. For example: "C'est un sujet/une matière que je maîtrise bien".

[Neil Coffey]

Strictly not identical to the English construction, but some near exceptions to the rule of "not allowing a preposition at the end":

- A few standard/generally acceptable expressions, e.g. "Tu viens avec?" = "Are you coming along?", "J'ai voté pour" = "I voted in favour (of it/them)", "Faut faire avec" = "You have to get used to/make do with it"...

- Some substandard/less accepted expressions such as "Celle que je suis avec" = "The girl I'm with" (this one from a Renaud song -- it's more a Mickey-take of substandard speech than an expression that would be used much among education speakers)

[Erwan]

The last expression "Celle que je suis avec" used by Renaud should not be used in French, in my opinion.

Renaud is known to take some liberties with the French grammar.

Apart from this song, I've never heard this expression.

[stu harris]

From years of inhabiting French IRC channels I believe I've picked up a vernacular expression for I'm good at...

 

Je m'y connais en....

 

Have I got that right Neil?

 

[Neil Coffey]

Yes -- I suppose strictly there's a slight difference in that "Je m'y connais en..." means something more like "I know a lot on the subject of...", "I'm well-versed on the subject of...", but it's obviously a similar concept.

 

Another expression that does spring to mind is "Je me défends (bien) en...", particularly with languages ("Je me défends bien en allemand").

[stu harris]

Oh, that's a good one. Merci Neil.

[Kelly]

Wow, super fast responses! Merci beaucoup! ;)

That's a really helpful discussion too. I knew it sounded wrong but I couldn't figure out how to make it work--thanks for the inversion tip and the "no prepositions at the end" rule!

 

Along the same lines, I'm wondering how you determine whether to use "à" or "en". Such as the way you used "à l'école" but "en français". Would it be "Je suis bon en ce sujet" or "Je suis bon à ce sujet"? It sounds to me like the first one is correct, but I don't like just going by my feeling/intuition.  Is there a rule to this? I think with verbs you would use "à" (such as, "Je suis bon à jouer le piano"--correct me if I'm wrong!) but with nouns I'm not so sure...

[Ed la mouette]

Generally speaking, "à" is used for locations or particular objects, and "en" for subjects : à l'école, je suis bon en français. Je m'y connais en musique : je peux te jouer un air au piano ("au" being the contraction of "à le").

By the way, when talking about locomotion, "à" is used for what we ride (on top of), and "en" for what we enter (inside) : à vélo, en voiture, à cheval, en métro, à pied, en avion.