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A d j e c t i f s  p o s s e s s i f s - Possessive Adjectives   

Possessive adjectives are the words used in place of articles to indicate to whom or to what something belongs. Their usage is similar to English, but there are some differences in form.

The following table shows the forms of French possessives.

French has many more possessives than English. For singular subjects (I, you, he/she/it), there are three forms of the possessive. The gender, number, and first letter of the noun possessed determine which form to use.

	MY	YOUR	HIS, HER, ITS
masc: pen	mon stylo	ton stylo	son stylo
fem: watch	ma montre	ta montre	sa montre
vowel: friend	mon amie	ton amie	son amie
plural: brothers	mes frères	tes frères	ses frères

When a feminine noun begins with a vowel, the masculine possessive is used in order to keep from saying something like ma amie, where the flow of the sentence would be broken.

An important difference between French and English is that it is the gender of the noun that determines which form to use, not the gender of the subject. This is particularly difficult when talking about him/her/it. Son, sa, and ses can each mean his, her, or its depending on the context.

son lit can mean his bed, her bed, or its bed (e.g., the dog's)

When describing two or more nouns, a possessive adjective must be used in front of each one

his brother and sister = son frère et sa soeur

Plural subjects (we, you, they) have only two forms: singular and plural.

Note: the possessive adjective is never used with body parts in French. You can never say 'my hand.' Instead, the French use pronominal verbs to show possession with body parts:

Je me suis cassé la jambe - I broke my leg (literally, I broke the leg of myself).
Il s'est levé la main - He raised his hand (literally, He raised the hand of himself).