Spanish: An Essential Grammar

Nouns used both in the singular and plural include: el/los bigote/s‘mous-

tache’, el/los pantalón/pantalones‘trousers, pants’, la/las nariz/narices

‘nose’, la/las escalera/s‘stairs’.

Note:El celomeans ‘zeal’ and la escalerais also a ‘ladder’.

Mass (or uncountable) nouns

In Spanish there is a tendency to use certain nouns both as mass (i.e.

uncountable) nouns or abstract nouns in the singular, and also as plural

countable nouns. This contrasts with English which, for example, will not

usually tolerate ‘two breads’ whereas in Spanish dos panes‘two loaves of

bread’ is normal. Other examples are:

el jabón soap los jabones bars of soap

la tostada toast las tostadas pieces/slices of toast

la amistad friendship unas amistades some friends

Conversely, the English mass noun ‘furniture’ corresponds to a countable

noun in Spanish:

Tenemos que cambiar los muebles.

We have to change the furniture.

Gender

Nouns in Spanish are generally assigned either to the masculine or femi-

nine gender. Except in the case of nouns referring to persons or animals,

the gender of a noun is unrelated to biological gender.

Nouns referring to persons or animals

If a masculine noun ends in -o, often its feminine equivalent is derived by

changing the -ointo -a:

el abuelo grandfather la abuela grandmother

el zorro fox la zorra vixen

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Nouns

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