Talk:Spanish pronouns

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I gave a short explanation for the function of "cuyo." Please do change the information presented should it be found inaccurate. Thanks. -Yazeed

Hi. I'm the main contributor to this article. If anyone has any questions regarding Spanish grammar, I'd be happy to answer them, and incorporate the answer into the article. Fire away! — Chameleon 17:16, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Your articles on the Spanish language have been great reading. Being a native speaker from Buenos Aires, Argentina, I wanted to make a few comments on direct-object le/les in practice.

I have never heard in spoken language in Buenos Aires the phrase "no quería molestarle", we always say "no quería molestarlo"

In Buenos Aires we use "la halagó" for "he flattered her" but we never say "le halagó" for "it flattered her", we say instead "la favoreció"

Finally, we always say lo "llevaron al hospital"

This is my first contribution to Wikipedia so I wouldn´t dare mess with your article, but I certainly consider myself an authority on how I speak and probably have a pretty good idea on how peolpe from Buenos Aires use the language. User:Zorko

Well, thanks!

Firstly, I can tell you that the stuff about usage isn't my own opinion or experience. It's research that I cited. I don't personally know what people in Buenos Aires say. I suspect that more people than you think do indeed speak as indicated.

Let's do some original research. If I Google for "lo molesta a usted", restricting the results to Argentinian websites, I get 1 result; "la molesta a usted" gets zero results, but "le molesta a usted" gets 6 results. If Buenos Aires is like Argentina in general, then these limited results would seem to indicate that le is indeed used when it refers to usted.

As far as I can tell from Google, you're right about lo llevaron though.

Perhaps we could add your testimony, but mark it as anecdotal. I think we have to give priority to linguistic studies where we have access to them. That's not to say that you are wrong. Thanks for your input. — Chameleon 30 June 2005 01:07 (UTC)

I don´t deny my testimony is anecdotal. And even though I am a newbie here, it is perfectly clear to me that the article should cite sources.

I mentioned the usage I am familiar with because it might suggest the work you cite is not accurate.

As to your original research, there is a difference in meaning between "lo molesta a usted" (he bothers you) and "le molesta a usted" (it bothers you). Both are used here although we get very few results because the "a usted" at the end sounds a bit artificial. Notice that in the "no quería molestarle" example the subject is always animated ("quería" is the clue here) whereas in "le/lo molesta" it might or not.

I think that for searching in google for pages in Argentina you should use google.com.ar instead of adding site:ar to your query. This will return pages in Argentina even if they don´t use the ar domain (of which there are quite a few).

My own little research in google.com.ar using "lo/la/le escucho a usted" returns 9 results for "lo", 1 result for "la" and no results for "le"

I chose the verb "escuchar" because it is almost never used with an inanimated subject.

So, it would seem that what I classified as point b2) Indirectness for humans — contrast with inanimate things applies to Argentina (e.g. the Juan lo molesta / Eso le molesta distinction) but not b1 or b3. I imagine that b4 applies. Point a doesn't seem to apply though. — Chameleon 30 June 2005 03:26 (UTC)

It would also seem that you don't listen to women much in Argentina ;) — Chameleon 30 June 2005 03:28 (UTC)

Point a doesn't apply an neither does b4 (we say se lo lee mucho for both meanings).

In an attempt to get more evidence, I did yet another search, this time in the REAL ACADEMIA ESPAÑOLA: Banco de datos (CREA) [en línea]. Corpus de referencia del español actual. <http://www.rae.es> for lo/la/le escucho in Argentina.

Results were 10 cases for lo, 3 cases for la and a sigle case for le, which is not relevant to our discussion since it was le escucho decir.

This seems to agree with both what I say about usage in Argentina and your theory about our not listening to women.

OK, conclusion: loístas y machistas. — Chameleon 30 June 2005 13:09 (UTC)

[edit] Incomplete pronoun chart

"Se" is missing from the pronoun chart in the singular and plural third persons for inderect objects(without prepositions.) "Se" is used to replace le and les when there is a direct object pronoun and is used as a reflexive pronoun to refer to either direct or inderect objects of reflexive and recipricol verbs. For example: "Ellos se lavan los manos."-"They wash "Los manos" is the direct object and "se" stands for the indirect object, "(to/for)themselves." This kind of construction doesn't actually make much sense in English and the indirect object would not be used, but "se" is an indirect object for Spanish nonetheless. A better example in which the indirect object is reflexive that can be related to English is "Se da los dulces."-"He gives himself the candy.", or "Me doy los dulces."-"I give candy to myself." (These are just random examples.) 70.89.191.233 04:19, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Use of "cual?"

In article: "Los niños y sus madres, las cuales eran de Valencia, me impresionaron = "The children and their mothers, who were from Valencia, impressed me" (los cuales would have referred to the children too, and not just their mothers)"

Since this is a non-restrictive clause and the pronoun within the clause refers to the mothers, this appears to be saying that the children and mothers impressed the speaker but only the mothers were from Valencia. Is this right? Because it sounds like an odd statement. 69.28.40.34 19:25, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes, it's correct. Sadly English has no gender, so its not that clear in the translation. Try this:

"The child and his mother (she was from Valencia) impressed me". Mariano(t/c) 07:03, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] What is a circumstantial complement?

... as found in the table at the beginning of this article? What do the three forms represent in this column? Clearly, they are not interchangeable, given that the -go and -co (migo, nosco, etc.) forms come after the preposition con only. So what are the other forms for exactly? If they each have a separate function, this column should be divided into three columns, each with a meaningful heading.

Also, if "direct complement" and "indirect complement" mean direct and indirect OBJECT, then the table should say so, for clarity and also for consistency with the text below the table.

Wouldn't the table be simpler and just as correct with the following column headings only: Subject, Direct object, Indirect object, Object of preposition (except con), Object of preposition con? Tawagoto 02:12, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

You are right, the column is a mess. Of the three forms in the same column, the first one represent the declined pronoum for most prepositions (a, ante, contra, de, ..., por, sobre) The second seams to be for con (conmigo, contigo,...etc), while the last is the nominative case (don't know what it does there) Since we already have the indirect compliment with preposition, I guess the only thin missing is the with/con instrumental case value. Shall we change the column to that? By the way, having migo as a word by itself has no use at all. I'll change it to that, revert if not a good solution. Mariano(t/c) 09:23, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes, that's much better. Thanks.

Can "Complement" be changed to "Object", for consistency with the text below the table?

In the table, for consistency, I guess the alternate forms are "connosco" and "convosco" -- ?

I would think that "Indirect complement [object]" should have its own column. The two preposition columns would have a two-column-wide label at the top ("Object of preposition"), with the present two columns as is.

Sometime, the inconsistencies between the table and the text below it need to be worked on. Tawagoto 02:06, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Mmm, I think all 3 are Inderect object, without preposition, with any prep, and with con. Thus, I changed the text below to follow that idea. If you think something else should be change, you can give it a try. Mariano(t/c) 09:36, 18 October 2006 (UTC)