Basic Spanish: Introduction to Grammar - Personal Pronouns, Articles, and Questions, Exams of Spanish

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Basic Spanish – Introduction to Grammar Contents Personal Pronouns ....................................................................................................................................................................... 2 A few things to keep in mind: ............................................................................................................................................... 3 Definite articles ............................................................................................................................................................................. 4 Definite articles - El artículo definido ................................................................................................................................... 5 Indefinite articles - El artículo indefinido ............................................................................................................................. 5 Questions and Exclamations .................................................................................................................................................... 6 Questions ........................................................................................................................................................................................ 7 Examples ..................................................................................................................................................................................... 8 Adjectives ........................................................................................................................................................................................ 9 Examples .................................................................................................................................................................................. 10 Compound Sentences (conjunctions) ................................................................................................................................. 11 Examples .................................................................................................................................................................................. 12 "E" and Consonant Adjectives .............................................................................................................................................. 13 Possessive adjective ................................................................................................................................................................. 14 Page 1 Basic Spanish – Introduction to Grammar Personal Pronouns Spanish has six different types of pronouns. yo I tú you (singularfamiliar) usted you (singular formal) él, ella he, she nosotros, nosotras we vosotros, vosotras you (plural familiar) ustedes you (plural formal) ellos, ellas they(plural) Page 2 Basic Spanish – Introduction to Grammar Definite articles - El artículo definido masculine singular el el hombre the man el libro the book plural los los niños the boys los alumnos the students feminine singular la la mujer the woman la ciudad the city plural las las niñas the girls las mesas the desks Indefinite articles - El artículo indefinido masculine singular un un hombre a man un gato a cat plural unos unos niños some boys unos perros some dogs feminine singular una una mujer a woman una taza a cup plural unas unas niñas some girls unas casas some houses Page 5 Basic Spanish – Introduction to Grammar Questions and Exclamations You will have noticed by now that we use the funny upside-down question mark "¿". In Spanish, questions always start with that, and finish with the regular question mark. It is the same for exclamations; the funny upside-down exclamation mark "¡" precedes exclamations. This happens because Spanish does not reverse the word order to ask a question. While English says You are here /Are you here?, Spanish keeps the same order: Tú estás aquí / ¿Tú estás aquí? Whereas the English word order alerts you since the beginning that what you are going to read is a question, Spanish offers no such initial warning. To compensate for this, Spanish adds the initial question mark, so that you'll always be able to tell a declarative statement from a question from the moment you begin reading it. Questions in Spanish are mainly done by intonation (raising the voice at the end of the question), since questions are often identical to statements. Te llamas Richard means "Your name is Richard", and ¿Te llamas Richard? means "Is your name Richard?". Page 6 Basic Spanish – Introduction to Grammar Questions Español Inglés ¿Dónde? Where? ¿Quién? Who? ¿Qué? What? ¿Cuál? Which? ¿Cómo? How? (as in How does it work?) ¿Cuán? How? (as in How long is it?) ¿Por qué? Why? ¿Cuándo? When? ¿Cuánto? How much? ¿Cuántos? How many? ¿De quién? Whose? ¿A quién? Whom? ¿De dónde? Whence? ¿Adónde? Whither? ¿Para qué? Wherefore? Page 7 Basic Spanish – Introduction to Grammar Examples • Un hombre bueno A good man • Unos hombres buenos Some good men • Una mujer buena A good woman • Unas mujeres buenas Some good women The masculine O / feminine A rule is applicable to the vast majority of Spanish nouns. There are a handful of exceptions, though, but you'll get to memorize them Page 10 Basic Spanish – Introduction to Grammar Compound Sentences (conjunctions) Below are some little words that will make our sentences longer, and more meaningful. You use them just like you do in English. Also, everything we've written has been positive ("I do this, I do that"). To make it negative, we just add a word in front of the verb: no(meaning "not") or nunca (meaning "never"). For example, No juego al rugby (I don't play rugby"); Nunca como manzanas ("I never eat apples"). It's as simple as that. And Y Or O Because Porque But Pero Also También So Así Note Porque ("because") and Por qué ("why") are similar and easy to mix up; make sure you don't! Page 11 Basic Spanish – Introduction to Grammar Examples • Me llamo Chris y mi cumpleaños es el veinte de agosto. My name is Chris and my birthday is on the 20th of August. • Me llamo Raúl, pero él se llama Roberto. My name is Raúl, but his name is Robert. • No practica judo. He doesn't do judo. • Juego al fútbol americano y practico natación también. I play american football and I go swimming too. • No vivo en una ciudad porque las ciudades son ruidosas. I don't live in the city because cities are noisy. Page 12