get-by-in-spanish.com

Personal pronouns are needed much less in Spanish than English. Yet, In most courses personal pronouns are lesson 101.

In Synergy Spanish  we use them very little. Here’s why it’s best not to use them as much as in English.

Personal pronouns are used for emphasis, for example;

Quiero ir - I want to go

Yo quiero ir - I really want to go

So, if you use them the way you do in English, you will sound like a very insistent person.

In Synergy Spanish we only use them only to clarify if there is any ambiguity.

for example;

Quieren encontrar un hotel.

Quieren could mean;

1) They want to find a hotel. (a group of men, men and women, or all women)

2) You (all) want to find a hotel.

So, we use the pronouns to clarify who is being talked about.

Ellas quieren encontrar un hotel - they (all females) want to find a hotel

Ellos quieren encontrar un hotel - they (all males or mixed group) want to find a hotel

Ustedes quieren encontrar un hotel - you (all) want to find a hotel

In spoken Spanish it will mostly be obvious who is being talked about. So, even in the above example, more often than not, the pronouns won’t be necessary.

It pays to be careful where you get your advice about speaking Spanish.

I have seen this happen so many times, native speakers giving bad advice about Spanish.

I’m not sure why it happens, some people like to criticize to make themselves sound big I guess.

You know, although native Spanish speakers will always speak better than someone who learned as an adult, they often have no idea how to teach it.

In fact, native speakers often have a disadvantage as teachers.

Why?

They have never had to learn the language as an adult and so they never really had to think about it.

This is true with me, I am a much better Spanish teacher than an I am as an English teacher, because I have been through the learning process.

one of my students got some horrible advice from some friends. Here’s his email to me.
 

Hola,

I have questions about something in Lesson 2.

I WANT TO SEE HIM

Method 1: Lo quiero ver

Method 2: Quiero verlo

You recommend using Method 2.  I have some Spanish speaking friends that disagree.  They say that it is not correct and much better to use Method 1.

I am sure that you have considered this before making your recommendation of Method 2.  And, as this occurs so close to the beginning, I am sure that it must be fundamental and the subsequent lessons build on it.  My questions are:

1) Is there a significant difference between the two methods and can someone, at a later date, easily unlearn what might be considered a convenient, but “incorrect” or “not preferred” gramatical structure?

2) Will there be other similiar situations - Method 1 (preferred) v Method 2 (convenient) - throughout the course?
Saludos,

Wilf

Hi Wilf

Frankly, I don’t get why your friends would tell you that.

Both methods are grammatically correct and used every day by Spanish speakers.

Here’s a way to prove it.

Type into google

“Lo quiero ver”

then type in

“Quiero verlo”

Make sure it’s in parenthesis, that way Google will only give you the hits on the exact phrase.

I did it out of curiosity and this is the result I got.
 
“Lo quiero ver”
Resultados 1 - 10 de aproximadamente 45,900 de “Lo quiero ver”. (0.15 segundos

“Quiero verlo”
Resultados 1 - 10 de aproximadamente 107,000 de “quiero verlo”. (0.08 segundos

45000 vs 107000, method 2 wins in real world use.

That’s why we use method 2 in Synergy Spanish, it’s easier for a beginner to use and and it’s how people speak.

Sometimes, Spanish can get confusing. That’s why I created both an audio course and a step by step action guide with Synergy Spanish.

Frankly, I could create my course in about 20% of the time if I made them just audio, but that wouldn’t be as effective.

Yes, I know people sell courses and use catch phrases like, no books, just audio as if that makes it better.

Sure, I think it’s more fun to listen to audio, and we all know how dull textbooks can be. Just because textbooks are dull, doesn’t mean a step by step action guide has to be dull.

If it helps you discover how to use more Spanish and get more from the audio lessons, all the better.

Here’s a question from a student. You’ll see that if I didn’t have an action guide for her to refer to she could get overwhelmed.

Hola Marcus,

My question is this:  If “mos” in spanish means “we” and its placed at the end of the word such as in podemos and queremos then why is “nos”  placed at the beginning of the word in gusteria and gusta when it’s usual place seems to be at the end of the word.  I can understand the “nos” placement at the end of the word because (us) is usually a sentence ender like in ayudarnos (help us) but to put it in front of a word such as in gusta, and gusteria it’s like saying “us like and us would like rather than we (mos) like. If “mos” means “we” then why isn’t “mos” placed at the beginning of gusteria and gusta instead of “nos?”  How would you know when to use mos in front of a word versus using nos in front?

Also, if mos stands for we than why isn’t it placed in front of the word such as:   mos pode rather than podemos the way nos gusteria is placed in front - why is one word meaning “we”placed in front and another word meaning “we” placed in the body of the word yet they both stand for “we”? This is my confusion - Help!

Penny

Hi Penny

Actually, it is covered in easy steps throughout the Synergy Spanish action guide Synergy Spanish

However, here is a quick overview

When you say, nos gustaria,

what you are literally saying is

to us = nos

it would be pleasing = gustaria

to us it would be pleasing = nos gustaria

However, we use nos gustaria as, we would like, because that is closer to the way it really is used.

Hope this helps

Best regards