When is the French subjunctive used and how is it formed?

The subjunctive is a verb form which is used to express uncertainty, a feeling or a mood. It is used frequently in French: common expressions such as 'je veux que' (I want...), 'il faut que' (it's necessary to...) and 'il est important que...' (it's important that...) trigger the subjunctive, because they express something that isn't categorically true. For example, we would say 'il est important que nous le fassions' instead of 'il est important que nous le faisons' because 'we do it' isn't something that is definitely happening. 'Nous fassions' is the subjunctive form of 'faire', an irregular verb in the subjunctive. In the subjunctive, faire is conjugated as follows:je fassetu fassesil/elle/on fassenous fassions vous fassiezils/elles fassent As you can see, it's a very irregular verb. Other common irregular verbs in the subjunctive include avoir (j'aie, tu aies...), être (je sois, tu sois...) and pouvoir (je puisse, tu puisses...). Outside of irregular verbs, to form the subjunctive you take the ils/elles form of the verb and remove the -ent ending, replacing it with one of these:je: -etu: -esil/elle/on: -enous: -ionsvous: -iezils/elles: -entFor instance, 'nous aimons' becomes 'nous aimions' and 'tu aimes' stays as 'tu aimes'.