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We know that regions, states or counties have genders in French, see Continents/countries/counties/regions/states are masculine, feminine or plural in French (Gender).
Note that while we always use to in English for these places, in French we use different prepositions for one or the other.
- à with cities, see À = To/in and De = From/of with cities in French (French Prepositions of Location)
- en/au/aux with countries and continents, see En/au/aux = In/to with countries and continents (French Prepositions)
Using "en" or "dans" with regions, states and counties in French
Look at these examples:
Here is the rule to express in or to:
- You use en with feminine regions/states/counties (usually ending in -e)
- You use dans le with masculine regions/states/counties starting with a consonant or aspirated h.
- You use dans l' with masculine regions/states/counties starting with a vowel or mute h.
Note that en is also acceptable for reasons of pronunciation:
EXCEPTIONS:
These states use au instead of dans le:
Note that the province of Le Québec behaves like a country in French:
Cases of Swiss cantons
Here are the main rules to talk about Swiss cantons:
- If the canton's name is the same as its main city (Genève, Berne, Bâle, Zurich, Saint Gall, etc), then you use dans le canton de, in order to avoid any confusion with the city itself:
Notre hôtel dans le canton de Saint Gall était super !Our hotel in the canton of St. Gallen/Gall was great!
Except for the canton/city of Appenzell
- If the canton's name is different (Tessin, Argovie, Thurgovie, etc), then you follow the regular rules:
Nous passons nos vacances en Argovie.We're spending our holiday [US:vacation] in the canton of Aargau.
Je vais passer deux semaines dans les Grisons.I'm going to spend two weeks in the canton of Graubünden/Grisons.
Exception: Valais is masculine, but
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