Editing French grammar (section)

== Cleft sentences ==
[[Cleft sentence]]s are sentences that consist of two [[clause]]s, one of which is a copular clause and one of which is a [[relative clause]], also known as a cleft clause. The copular clause consists of a [[Copula (linguistics)|copula]] followed by the cleft constituent. Cleft sentences are found in many European languages, including French. In the sentence, {{lang|fr|c'est Stella qui lit Kant}} ('It's Stella who reads Kant') "{{lang|fr|c'est Stella}}" is the copular clause, "{{lang|fr|Stella}}" is the cleft constituent, and "{{lang|fr|qui lit Kant}}" is the cleft clause.<ref name=":1">{{Cite journal|last=DeCesare|first=Anna-Maria|date=2018|title=French Adverbial Cleft Sentences: Empirical and Theoretical Issues|url=https://doi.org/10.1075/bjl.00017.dec.|journal=Belgian Journal of Linguistics|volume=32|pages=86–120|doi=10.1075/bjl.00017.dec|s2cid=239399007|via=EBSCOhost}}</ref>

=== Types of clefts ===
While cleft sentences are common in European languages, the types of possible cleft sentences vary dramatically by language. Subject clefts, in which the cleft constituent acts as the subject of both the main verb and the cleft clause, are the most common clefts and are found in all languages that have clefts. {{lang|fr|C'est Stella qui lit Kant}} ('It's Stella who reads Kant') is an example of a subject cleft. In complement clefts the cleft constituent is a complement of both the main verb of the cleft clause and the non-cleft clause. For example, {{lang|fr|c'est Kant que Stella lit}} ('it's Kant that Stella reads'). The final type of clefts are adverbial clefts, which are the most common clefts in French, but are not found in all languages with clefts, such as German. In adverbial cleft sentences, the cleft constituent has an adverbial syntactic function. Therefore, the cleft constituent is not subcategorized by the cleft clause's main verb and it is not required in corresponding non-cleft clauses.

* Adverbial cleft sentence: {{lang|fr|C'est '''avec facilité''' que Stella lit Kant}} ('It is with ease that Stella reads Kant')
* Corresponding non-cleft clause: {{lang|fr|Stella lit Kant [avec facilité]}} ('Stella reads Kant [with ease]')<ref name=":1" /><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Karssenberg |first=Lena |date=Nov 2017 |title=French Il y a Clefts, Existential Sentences and the Focus-Marking Hypothesis |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0959269516000296. |journal=Journal of French Language Studies |volume=27 |issue=3 |pages=405–430 |doi=10.1017/S0959269516000296 |s2cid=152104152 |via=ProQuest}}</ref>