Spanish Grammar Guide

Nouns (e.g.: cosa, perro, amor, mesa, mujer, hombre, etc.)

In this section: Description, Questions, Exercises

Questions

Questions about Nouns

Q: Why is it Yo compré las verduras and NOT yo compré los verduras?

R: Determiners (and adjectives) that describe a noun must agree in gender and number with the noun they modify.

Q: Why is it dos jóvenes and NOT dos jovens?

R: Nouns that end in a consonant add -es to form the plural. Remember to add the accent to preserve pronunciation for nouns that end in -n and have stress on the second last syllable.

Q: Why is it yo leo un libro and NOT yo leo una libra?

R: The word for "book" is un libro. Una libra means "a pound", e.g.: La niña pesa cincuenta libras. Review the list of nouns that change meaning in their feminine and masculine forms.

Q: Why is it somos los Escobar and NOT somos los Escobares?

R: Family names don't have a plural marker in Spanish.

Q: Why is it el estudiante tiene muchos lápices and NOT el estudiante tiene muchos lápizes?

R: When the plural marker -es is added to nouns that end in z, the z turns to c. The general rule is: change z to c before e. This rule also applies to verbs whose stem ends in z, e.g.: empezar, cazar (yo empecé a trabajar).

Q: Why is it el agua está fría and NOT la agua está fría?

R: Feminine nouns that begin with a stressed "a" sound use masculine singular determiners (el/un). All other modifiers including plural determiners and adjectives appear in the feminine form to agree with the noun, e.g.: Las aguas frías.

Tags: determiners anglicism masculine feminine singular plural
In this section: Description, Questions, Exercises

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