Look at these sentences:
Il existe soit en bleu, soit en rouge.
It exists either in blue or in red.
Tu peux avoir soit du fromage, soit un dessert.
You can have either cheese or dessert.
Pour Noël, j'aimerais soit une tablette soit un nouveau portable.
For Christmas, I would like either a tablet or a new mobile phone.
Note that to say ''either...or...'' in French, we use soit...soit...
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Examples and resources
Q&A
Ron
Kwiziq community member
15/10/17
Bonjour Jose,
Was there a question involved with your post? I do not find that type of question in the lesson.
Chris
Kwiziq community member
24/10/17
The correct answer is "soit les vacances soit le travail". Here you are talking about vacation and work in general terms: either vacation (in general) or work (in general). "Des vacances" uses the partitive "de" and refers to (some vacations). Similarly for "du travail".
-- Chris. (not a native speaker)
John
Kwiziq community member
15/05/18
The question is when do you use, for example, des vacances instead of les vacances, or du travail instead of le travail. In one of the examples we had du fromage but un dessert.
Laura
Kwiziq language super star
5/08/17
Bonjour Lisa,
The liaison after soit is optional.
Aurélie
Kwiziq language super star
20/06/17
Bonjour Richard !
It depends on whether you're using a verb followed by the preposition "de" or not.
E.g. "Je me sers *d'*un outil." (I'm using a tool.) -> "Je me sers soit d'un marteau soit d'un tournevis."
"J'ai vu Paul." (I saw Paul.) -> "J'ai vu soit Paul soit Thomas."
"Tu as besoin *de* quelque chose." (You need something.) -> "Tu as besoin soit d'un crayon soit d'un stylo."
I hope that's helpful!
À bientôt !
John
Kwiziq community member
28/08/17
Can you say "Tu as besoin DE soit un crayon soit un stylo"?
Laura
Kwiziq language super star
21/12/15
Bonjour Malcolm,
Yes, technically "soit" is the subjunctive of être, meaning "be." But the French conjunction soit ... soit needs to be understood as a set phrase. If it helps, you can think of if as "whether it be ... or it be ..."
Terri
Kwiziq community member
18/12/17
Where might I find the mini quiz for this lesson? I seem to have lost several mini quizzes today. Thank you, Terri
Paul
Kwiziq community member
17 June 2018
0 replies
Soit.....soit
May I please suggest adding some more examples to this lesson; for example, usage with verbs. Thanks.