Spanish: An Essential Grammar

Seas an indefinite subject

The reflexive pronoun secan be used as an indefinite or impersonal subject

equivalent to English ‘one’, ‘we’, ‘they’, ‘you’, ‘people’. The Spanish verb

is always 3rd person singular(see also 15.2.3):

Se cena muy tarde en España. People have dinner late in Spain.

Se cierra los lunes. We close on Mondays.

¿Se puede pasar? Can we come in?

Note: If the Spanish verb is already reflexive, the indefinite subject must be intro-

duced as uno/a: Uno se aburre de leer libros largos‘One gets tired of reading long

books’.

Reflexive verbs ‘to get/have something done’

With a few verbs the reflexive can be used to express the idea of getting

something done:

Quiero cortarme el pelo. I want to get my hair cut.

Tuvo que ir a Francia para He had to go to France to have

operarse. an operation.

Verbs reflexive in form but not in meaning

Some of the most common are:

abstenerse de hacer to abstain from doing

arrepentirse de hacer algo to regret doing

atreverse a hacer to dare to do

(com)portarse to behave

constiparse to catch a cold [SP], to become

constipated [LA]

enfermarse [LA] to fall ill

fugarse to escape/run away

jactarse de to boast about

quejarse de to complain about

Me abstuve de votar. I abstained from voting.

Se quejaron del mal servicio. They complained about the bad

service.

14.7

14.6

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2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

1011

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20111

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30111

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14

Reflexive
verbs

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