passez l’aspirateur

Stephen B.B2Kwiziq community member

passez l’aspirateur

Hi, one of the examples includes “ passez l’aspirateur”. Presumably this means to use the aspirateur to clean. In English we would not use the direct translation using “pass”. Most often someone would say “do the hoovering”, or possibly “use the hoover” or “use the vacuum cleaner”. I may he wrong, maybe the sentence just means “pass me the hoover (as you are holding it)” but then the example makes less sense. Does passer l’aspirateur mean to use a vacuum cleaner?

Asked 10 months ago
CécileNative French expert teacher in KwiziqCorrect answer

Hi Stephen, 

Thank you for the question, I have changed the English translation of 'passer l'aspirateur' to the verb 'vacuum or hoover' in that example.

But you are correct 'passer l'aspirateur' is 'to use a vacuum cleaner'.

Bonne Continuation !

 

Jim J.C1 Kwiziq Q&A super contributor

Bonjour Stephen,

There have been many posts of this nature before on the Forum.

Passer/se passer/se passer de - the different meanings of the verb "passer" in French

I think the link above will help you to understand more fully.

Hope this helps

Bonne journée

Jim

passez l’aspirateur

Hi, one of the examples includes “ passez l’aspirateur”. Presumably this means to use the aspirateur to clean. In English we would not use the direct translation using “pass”. Most often someone would say “do the hoovering”, or possibly “use the hoover” or “use the vacuum cleaner”. I may he wrong, maybe the sentence just means “pass me the hoover (as you are holding it)” but then the example makes less sense. Does passer l’aspirateur mean to use a vacuum cleaner?

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