The Everything Spanish Grammar Book: All The Rules You Need To Master Espanol (Everything®) (10 page)

Aquellos chicos son interesantes. Aquéllos son interesantes.

Those guys are interesting. Those ones are interesting.

Definitely Indefinite

Another set of pronouns, which may also be used as adjectives or adverbs, are the indefinite pronouns. Indefinite pronouns are used to refer to nouns in terms of their quantity or order. Some of these pronouns only have one form; others exist only in singular or plural form but change according to gender; yet others must agree in both number and gender with the noun they modify or replace.

Most indefinite pronouns that only have one form are singular in number:

However, there are two pronouns that are plural:
demás
(the rest) and
todos
(everybody).

Another group of indefinite pronouns indicates gender but only exists in the plural:

The rest of the indefinite pronouns are generally used as adjectives and should agree in number and gender with the noun they modify:

ESSENTIAL

Practice Makes Perfect

Provide the right subject pronouns in Spanish:

Choose the right form of address
(tú, usted, vosotros, ustedes)
for each person:

Fill in the correct direct object pronoun:

1.
Tú compraste una minifalda linda.
___________________
Tú
compraste.

2.
Ellos están buscando a sus tíos.
___________________
Ellos
están buscando.

3.
Veo a ustedes desde la ventana.
___________________
veo desde la ventana.

4.
Ella encontró a nosotros en el bar.
Ella
___________________
encontró en el bar.

Fill in the correct indirect object pronoun:

1.
El doctor
___________________
tapó a Mariano las rodillas.

2.
Nuestra tía
___________________
regaló a nosotros muchos
juguetes.

3.
Nosotros
___________________
decimos a ustedes la verdad.

4.
Mi mamá
___________________
dijo a mí que debo estudiar
muy bien.

Fill in the correct possessive pronoun:

1. Los llaves de Elena son ___________________
llaves.

2.
El coche mío es
___________________
coche.

3.
Los estudios de nosotros son
___________________
estudios.

4.
El cuarto tuyo es
___________________
cuarto.

5.
El dibujo de Mario es
___________________
dibujo.

6.
Los proyectos de Antonio y Selena son
___________________
proyectos.

To check your answers, refer to the answer key in Appendix D.

C
HAPTER
6
Adjectives and
Adverbs

ADJECTIVES AND ADVERBS are parts of speech that modify (or describe) other parts of speech and don’t have meaning on their own. Adjectives modify nouns; qualifying adjectives (adjetivos calificativos) describe the noun’s qualities and traits; and determinant adjectives (adjetivos determinativos) signal the noun’s number, order, or location (determinant adjectives are identical to determinant pronouns, except in the way they are used in the sentence). Adverbs have four possible roles: an adverb may be used to modify a verb, an adjective, another adverb, or a verbal phrase.

In Agreement

Adjectives must agree with the nouns they modify. When you learn a new adjective as a vocabulary word, you’ll see it presented in the masculine/singular form. Additionally, most adjectives have a plural form, and many have feminine/singular and feminine/plural endings as well.

Frequently, an adjective’s masculine/singular form will end in –o. If such is the case, its three other forms are –a, –os, and –as. Take a look at the adjective
rojo
as an example:

Almost all other adjectives end with a consonant or –e
.
These adjectives generally don’t change to reflect gender—that is, they only have two forms: singular and plural. The plural form is constructed by adding –es to adjectives that end in consonant and –s to adjectives that end in –e:

Don’t forget that adding –es in the plural may necessitate a change in the use of accent marks or a spelling modification. One common change occurs with adjectives that end –z. Because sounds “ze” and “zi” almost never occur in Spanish, the spelling is modified to –ces to reflect correct pronunciation:

A Few Exceptions

Although the majority of adjectives behave according to the few simple rules described here, a few exceptions do exist. Some adjectives end in –a regardless of whether they modify a feminine or a masculine noun, and therefore only have two forms. This is especially true of adjectives that end with –ista, –asta, and –ita (though not when the ending –ita is used to signal a feminine diminutive):

As you can see, adjectives
optimista, entusiasta,
and
cos-mopolita
end in –a even when they modify masculine nouns like
pensamiento, aficionado,
and
ambiente
. In the plural, the ending would be –as:

FACT

Another set of adjectives make up an exception to the rule that adjectives ending with a consonant only have two forms. In fact, adjectives that end in –
dor
, –
ón
, –
ín
, and –
án
actually have four forms: