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Spanish Grammar Rules: 7 Tricky Topics and How To Master Them
Spanish Grammar Rules: 7 Tricky Topics and How To Master Them
Verbs, sweet verbs! You were okay as long as you stuck to the present tense with regular verbs
such as cantar (to sing), comer (to eat) or escribir (to write). And then the unthinkable
happened: You ran into a wall full of irregular verbs.
No need to give up yet! Remember we can always divide a whole into smaller parts, and that
will make our life easier. So when it comes to irregular verbs (verbos irregulares), we can divide
them into four different groups: stem-changing verbs, irregular first person, stem-
changing and irregular first person, and completely irregular verbs.
Stem-changing verbs
Many Spanish verbs change their stem in the present tense indicative mood. Unfortunately,
there is no rule of thumb as to whether a verb will change its stem or not, and we have to learn
their infinitive and their stem change together. However, stem-changing verbs can be divided
into three subgroups, which will make the task much easier.
Here you have the three different subgroups with a conjugated verb as an example, and a list of
other verbs which behave in the same way.
The first and second person plural forms, nosotros and vosotros, do not change their stem, and
the endings are regular in all forms. Easy!
e ie
Similar verbs: cerrar (to close), empezar (to begin), entender (to understand), perder (to lose),
querer (to want/love)
o ue
Similar verbs: contar (to count), morir (to die), recordar (to remember/remind), volar (to fly)
ei
Similar verbs: competir (to compete), corregir (to correct), despedir (to say goodbye), rer (to
laugh), servir (to serve)
Sometimes only the first person singular is irregular. This group of verbs is pretty easy to learn,
because you just have to memorize the infinitive and the irregular first person.
Even inside this group we can find patterns that repeat themselves, the two most important
being zco and go.
-zco verbs
-go verbs
Here is where we have the real party! There are some verbs in Spanish which not only have an
irregular first person, but also add a stem change to that.
Fortunately, there are not many verbs that behave this way. But the ones we have are pretty
common, so lets take a look and learn them for good!
There are a couple of verbs that are completely irregular, and boy do they know how to have
fun! The two most common of these verbs are ir (to go) and or (to hear). Here they are:
Ir (to go)
voy vamos
vas vais
va van
Or (to hear)
oigo omos
oyes os
oye oyen
There is another very basic and irregular verb, ser (to be), which together with its brother
estar (to be) keep making the learning road a bit bumpy for most of you. Lets have a look at
them:
Say what? Spanish has two different verbs that mean to be? Yes! And, well, actually there is a
third Spanish verban impersonal formthat can also be translated as to be: haber hay. Its
used to say there is/are, but more on that another day.
Ser and estar are not only irregular verbs, but using one instead of the other can drastically
change the meaning of a sentence. This is why its so important to learn when to use which to
be verb.
For a more in-depth look at these two verbs, weve written an entire post dedicated to the topic,
or continue on for a quick summary of the basics:
Use ser when identifying or describing people and things, when talking about jobs and
nationality, and when talking about belonging. Take a look at the following examples:
On the other hand, use estar when you want to express physical or geographic location,
feelings, and states/conditions (something temporary).
Then there are times when the same adjective can be used with both ser and estar. Sometimes,
the difference is that when used with estar its more temporary, and with ser, more stable. But
many times the meaning of the sentence will change dramatically.
Ser Estar
Ser aburrido to be boring Estar aburrido to be bored
Ser bueno to be good Estar bueno to be tasty or sexually attractive
Ser cansado to be tiring Estar cansado to be tired
Ser listo to be clever Estar listo to be ready
Ser moreno to be dark-haired Estar moreno to be suntanned
Ser seguro to be safe Estar seguro to be sure
Ser vivo to be lively Estar vivo to be alive
As you may already know, in Spanish there are two simple past tenses: the imperfect and
the indefinite.
The good news is that the imperfect is quite easy to learn and behaves pretty well. The bad
news is that the indefinite can give you a headache from time to time, especially if you are
dealing with irregular verbs.
Were going to focus on the usage of these tenses, which is the tricky part, and not conjugation.
Besides, you can always easily look up conjugations if you dont have those down yet.
So generally speaking, use the indefinite when you are talking about completed, mostly
one-time actions that started and finished in the past. You will normally have a definite
beginning and end of the action, although they do not necessarily need to appear on the
sentence.
On the other hand, use the imperfect when the actions were not seen as completed, were
repeated, or if they can be translated as used to. Think about traveling to the moment in
time described by the imperfect, and you would see an action in progressnot finished. Note
that this past tense is often used for descriptions.
De pequeo, visitaba a mi abuela cada domingo. (I used to visit grandma every Sunday when I
was a child.)
This is a repeated action in progress for an indefinite number of years.
Los verbos de cambio, or verbs of change, are a group of verbs that can be roughly translated
as to become. Each should be used in a specific context, though. The most important are:
Hacerse: used for changes that have been accomplished thanks to ones own effort and
for ideological choices
Se ha hecho rico. (He has made his fortune.)
Se ha hecho judo. (He has become a Jew.)
In general terms, prepositions are easy to understand because they practically work in the same
way both in English and in Spanish. There are, however, two Spanish prepositions which are
easily confused since they both translate to for in English: por and para.
Take into account the following guidelines, and you will never, ever confuse them again:
Use por for the following purposes:
For frequency and velocity: tres veces por semana, 30 kilmetros por hora.
With the meaning of along or through: pasear por la calle, mirar por la ventana.
With the meaning of because of: por el fro, por la fata de tiempo, por tu culpa.
For exchanges and sales: cambiar uno por otro, comprar una camisa por 35 dlares.
To express actions that still need to be completed: los platos por fregar, la casa por
barrer.
To express duration in time: por dos horas, por tres aos, por mucho tiempo.
Finally, there are many expression with por that you need to learn by heart. Here you have
the most common ones:
With the meaning of in order to: para llegar a tiempo, para ahorrar dinero, para
estar seguro.
With the meaning of intended for: para m, para ti, para la fiesta de cumpleaos.
When you want to specify a future moment in time: para el lunes, para maana, para
la semana que viene.
You may already know the direct pronoun substitutes the direct object and answers the
questions Who? or What?, while the indirect pronoun substitutes the indirect object and
answers the questions To whom? or For whom?.
Here you have a table with all the direct and indirect pronouns:
If we ask What does Antonio send? the answer is cartas. There is your direct object.
According to the table above, the direct object pronoun for third person feminine plural is las, so
when you do the change in the sentence you will have the following:
Remember that we always insert the pronoun in front of the verb, unless in the case of two
exceptions explained farther down.
To whom does Antonio send letters? To Mara (a Mara). Mara is your indirect object, which
according to the table will be substituted by le (third person feminine singular):
Antonio le enva cartas.
(Antonio sends letters to her.)
It can feel confusing when we need to use both direct and indirect pronouns in the same
sentence. But follow these rules and youll get it right every time:
I always remember the Spanish order of pronouns with the word RID: reflexive, indirect, direct.
As you can see, indirect pronouns always come before direct, like in this example:
*Wait! I thought wed said the indirect pronoun was le, so why did it change to se? Well,
check out rule #2:
2. When we have two pronouns in a row beginning with the letter L, change the first
one (indirect) to se.
3. If you have a negative sentence, the negative word always comes directly before the
first pronoun.
Exceptions
There are two situations when the pronouns can act differently. If you have a conjugated verb
next to an infinitive in the sentence, you can choose if you want to put the pronouns either
before the conjugated verb or attached to the infinitive/gerund:
Finally, if you have an imperative form, you need to attach the pronouns to the end of it:
7. Gustar: To Like
Gustar and other similar verbs constitute a group of special verbs that do not act normally.
Lets first take a look at how we use to like in English sentences:
I like dogs.
I = subject
like = verb
dogs = direct object
So when talking about likes in English, we use the subject plus the verb (to like), followed by the
object that is liked. But this is not the case in Spanish!
Take a look at the Spanish equivalents of our first two examples, and pay special attention to
the literal English translations:
See the difference in how the sentence is constructed? In I like dogs, I is the subject. But in
the Spanish equivalence, dogs is the subject. So our English object becomes the Spanish
subject! Now just give yourself a minute to wrap your head around that.
Once you understand the difference, its not too difficult, but initially getting used to the change
in structure can take some time.
There are two very important things that you need to remember if you want to use gustar and
other similar verbs:
1. The English subject will always correspond to the Spanish indirect object:
2. The verb in Spanish will always have one of two possible forms: singular (gusta) or
plural (gustan). When the subject is singular (the thing that is liked), use gusta, and when the
subject is plural, use gustan.
There are sometimes situations when we want to emphasize who is doing the liking. In those
cases, we may add a prepositional phrase with a at the beginning of the sentence:
If this is the first youve seen of gustar, stick with the information above until youre comfortable
with the construction.
For curious and more advanced learners, know that there is a similar verb in Spanish,
gustarse, which is a reflexive verb. Many people use it incorrectly thinking this is the real
infinitive of the verb gustar, but it is not!
As a reflexive verb, the verb gustarse has the same direct object and subject:
Finally, you may be wondering how you can say in Spanish that you like somebody. This is
probably the most complicated part of all this, but pay attention and you will be flirting in Spanish
in no time!
Just take a look at these examples and explanations to get the picture:
And now you are ready to go! Remember that Spanish grammar is not a monster. There may be
times when you feel lost (which is natural, by the way), but if you keep in mind the above rules,
life will be easier for you.
Heres something to try: Step away from this post, let it all sink in, practice by watching your
favorite shows and movies in Spanish, and then come back and re-read this article in a week or
two. I think youll enjoy how much clearer it all is!
And now give yourself a well-deserved pat on the back, because youre that much closer to
having tackled Spanishs trickiest grammar topics. Well done!