Hola… I’m back after recovering from my last case of subjunctivitis, a grammatical condition which causes frequent brain freeze and has impeded me from completing an effective post in the last two weeks. The thing is, I want to be totalmente seguro about what I’m writing before I submit it to the world, so I’ve spent […]
Grasp the Basics…
Understand the Structure…
Get Serious…
El subjuntivo y el futuro
¡Feliz año nuevo! Last post, we explored some of the ethereal purposes of the Spanish subjunctive. We fairly well established that it is used whenever the speaker will not or cannot commit to a fact. Whenever doubt, desire, uncertainty or the imposition of one’s will over another come into play, the subjunctive appears. Until now, […]
El subjuntivo – la continuación
Last week, we entered the nebulous world of the subjunctive and I attempted to make sense of its somewhat subjective purpose. Today I want to delve deeper. We’ll look at sentences which I call bi-subjunctual (that’s not a real word, BTW). That is, sentences which can take either the subjunctive or the indicative and which […]
El subjuntivo – “¡qué miedo!”
Hola y bienvenidos nuevamente a JT’s Spanish. I’ve had several requests to go deeper into certain grammatical concepts that are the bane of our angloparlante existence and today, I’m going to try and darles gusto by exploring the most confusing of all grammatical aspects in Spanish: the “subjunctive” (I wanted to write this in some […]
Salir
Today I want to examine a very common verb which, like many high frequency verbs, has a plethora of meanings. Its primary English equivalents are to leave or to go out, although, as we’ll see, these translations don’t cover all of its possible uses. The verb is salir and its basic, present-tense conjugation look like […]
Tener prisa, apurarse, apresurarse, etc.
It seems that life is all about rushing around and, for many of us, there’s never enough time in the day to accomplish everything. While sitting in traffic the other day, in a hurry as usual, it occurred to me that the Spanish-speaking world doesn’t share our cultural propensity for cramming as many tasks into […]
Gástarselas, arreglárselas, vérselas, etc.
Today we’ll explore a number of colloquial expressions which, to some degree, transcend grammatical comprehension. Rather than over-analyze them, I’ll ask you to keep an open mind and simply accept these terms as part of the language. If you commit them to memory, they’ll become great allies in your efforts at self-expression. With a small […]
No se me da…
The verb dar is a power verb and one of the first that Spanish students learn. In its most basic form it translates as “to give,” as in the sentence Yo le doy a la manzana a mi madre. As with any hyper-used verb, however, it carries a seemingly endless array of meanings. While this […]
Imperfect Subjunctive vs Imperfect Indicative
Today I thought I’d take a stab at a concept which took me ages to comprehend and which, I hope, I have finally mastered in conversation. If you’re a beginning student of Spanish, this post may not be for you. If, on the other hand, you have already delved into the black hole which is […]
Competer, atañer, incumbir
In English, we use the word concern a lot… especially when we have concerns (“preocupaciones” in Spanish). The verb concernir does exist and is occasionally used in formal situations. Its meaning, however, doesn’t transmit the degree of worry with which we often use it in English: “The Apocalypse is coming and I’m very concerned!” In Spanish, we […]