Spanish: An Essential Grammar

Table 1.1 continuedLetter Name Pronunciation Examples rere between vowels or after b, c, d, g, p, t a single tap of the tongue ...

before consonants: as s(especially in Spain) explicar , extenso in Mexico: sometimes like Spanish j México , Oaxaca y i griega a ...

Stress and written accents The correct pronunciation of Spanish depends not only on being able to reproduce the correct sound fo ...

When words are stressed in ways that do not conform to the above rules, the stress is indicated by a written acute accent: cámar ...

When there is a combination of a strong vowel and one or two weak vowels they constitute a single syllable (a diphthong or triph ...

tu your tú you (subject pronoun) el the él he, him (after prepositions) se himself, herself, itself, sé I know, be (imperative o ...

With nouns and adjectives referring to political and religious affiliation: Es jefe de los conservadores. He is leader of the Co ...

Punctuation Table 1.2 contains a list of common punctuation marks with notes on their use. Table 1.2 Spanish punctuation marks . ...

Used to divide words at the end of a line. Used to join nouns: misiles superficie-aire‘surface to air missiles’. Used to form co ...

In order to use nouns correctly in Spanish, we need to know their gram- matical gender (which is usually arbitrary and unrelated ...

The plural of nouns ending in a consonant This is usually obtained by adding -es. This includes words of one syllable or a final ...

Nouns which do not adopt a distinct plural form Nouns with a final unstressedsyllable ending in -s, and those which end in -xdo ...

The plural of compound nouns Compound words consisting of a verb or preposition and a plural noun have no distinct plural form: ...

Words derived from Latin ending in -tor -umare found with and without the addition of -s, although an alternative recommended fo ...

Nouns used both in the singular and plural include: el/los bigote/s‘mous- tache’, el/los pantalón/pantalones‘trousers, pants’, l ...

For many masculine nouns ending in a consonant, especially -or, -ón, -és and -ín, the feminine equivalent is formed by adding-a: ...

Fixed gender nouns Some nouns have a fixed gender regardless of the biological gender of the person they denote: la persona pers ...

Determining gender from noun endings Nouns ending in-oand -a Those ending in -oare usually masculine, while those ending in -aar ...

Feminine endings other than -a Nouns with the following endings are usually feminine: -ad, -tud, -ción, -sión, -umbre and -ie. M ...

el Amazonas the Amazon el Aconcagua Mt Aconcagua el Titicaca Lake Titicaca el Atlántico the Atlantic Note: Exceptions occur when ...