The Everything Spanish Grammar Book: All The Rules You Need To Master Espanol (Everything®) (7 page)

With all other endings, you can probably assume that the noun is masculine. Unless, of course, it’s one of the exceptions to the rule.

Learn the Exceptions

Every rule has its exceptions, and there are a few nouns that don’t follow the general rules of grammatical gender:

Representing Gender

And what about nouns referring to people, which do have gender? In Spanish, nouns that represent people do match the gender of the person referred to. In some cases, the two words are completely different:

Other nouns simply change the ending:

And in some cases, both genders retain the same ending:

ESSENTIAL

Here’s another exception to remember: there are a few feminine nouns that take on the article
el
in the singular. The reason for this is simple: Feminine nouns that begin with a stressed “ah” syllable can’t take on the article
la—
the two “ah”s will get swallowed up into one sound—so to make the article clear, you switch to
el.
For example:
el águila
(the eagle),
las águilas
(the eagles).

Forming Plurals

Conveniently enough, in Spanish a noun is made plural by adding an –s or –es, just as you do in English. If a noun ends in a vowel, use the –s ending:

Nouns ending in a consonant take on –es to form a plural:

Dropping the Accent Mark

As you can see from the example of
matón/matones
, making a noun plural may affect the use of the accent mark. Remember, words ending with a vowel, S, or N generally have a stressed second-to-last syllable, and exceptions must employ the accent mark to show where the stress falls. Because
matón
is pronounced “mah-TOHN,” and not “MAH-tohn,” the accent mark is employed to indicate correct pronunciation. However, by adding –es the syllable “ton” becomes second-to-last, thus making the accent mark unnecessary in the plural.

Spelling Modifications

It’s also important to remember that adding the plural ending may affect the spelling of the word. For instance, a final Z will change to C, in order to avoid combination ZE, which does not occur in Spanish:
el pez
(fish),
los peces
(fishes).

QUESTION?

Other Exceptions

As you know, some English nouns don’t have a singular and a plural form. For example, the word “elk” can be either singular or plural. The only way to know is through context. A few Spanish words behave the same way. For example, a compound word where the second part of the word is plural will retain the same ending, whether the noun is singular or plural:
paraguas
(umbrella, literally “for water”) is
el paraguas
in the singular and
los paraguas
in the plural.

Other nouns only exist in the singular form, even though they refer to more than one person or object. The best example is “people” or
gente.
Although the noun refers to multiple individuals, the form both in English and in Spanish remains singular.

Definite Articles

English only has one definite article: “the.” The article is used with nouns to make them specific (or definite): the book, the job, the idea. In a sense, Spanish also has one definite article, but the article has four forms because it must agree in gender and number with the noun that it precedes:

Note that the masculine/singular form el may appear as a contraction:

The contraction is formed because the vowel at the end of the
preposition merges with the vowel at the beginning of the word el.
This does not occur with the other forms of the article:

Indefinite Articles

An indefinite article preceding a noun indicates nonspecific (indefinite) objects: A book is an unspecified book; an idea is an unspecified idea. In English, the definite article “a” (“an” before a vowel) is only used with singular nouns. If there’s more than just a book, we say “books” or give the number of books: two books, some books, a few books.

In Spanish, the indefinite article can be used with singular as well as with plural objects. Because it must agree in gender and number with the noun it precedes, the indefinite article also has four forms:

FACT

Choosing the Right Article

For the most part, articles in English and Spanish correspond to each other: “the” usually translates as
el, la, los,
or
las,
and “a” or “an” translate as
un
or
una.
However, there are some instances where article usage in Spanish differs.

Dropping the Indefinite Article

The indefinite article is not used as frequently as it is in English. One general rule is that when substituting “a” for “one” sounds strange, you drop it in Spanish. For example, you don’t need it when describing someone’s profession:

Ella es enfermera.

She is a nurse.

Quiero ser millonario.

I want to be a millionaire.

The indefinite article is also dropped in exclamations beginning with
qué:

¡Qué alegría!

What a joy!

¡Qué chiste más gracioso!

What an amusing joke!

The indefinite article is also dropped after
con
(with) and
sin
(without):

Escribo con pluma.

I write with a pen.

Sin duda, es la mejor idea.

Without a doubt, it’s the best idea.

Body Parts

In English, you would use the possessive pronoun “my” to refer to a part of your body. In Spanish, however, parts of the body are preceded by definite articles, whether you’re talking about your own body or about someone else’s:

Me rompí la pierna.

I broke my leg.

A ella le gusta cepillarse el cabello.

She likes to brush her hair.

As you’ll see in the following sections, expressions of possession also affect article use.

QUESTION?