ILTS World Language: Spanish (260) flashcards

32 cards. Read the term and the definition here. The deck at the top of this page is optional.

Ser vs. estar

Ser expresses identity, origin, nationality, profession, and event time. Estar expresses location, temporary condition, and progressive aspect. Choosing the wrong verb changes meaning: es aburrido (boring) vs. está aburrido (bored).

Preterite vs. imperfect

Preterite reports completed, bounded actions (Ayer fui al mercado). Imperfect describes background, habitual actions, ongoing states, and age or time (Todos los días iba; tenía diez años).

Subjunctive trigger mnemonic

Wishes, Emotion, Impersonal expressions, Doubt/denial, Ojalá, and future-time conjunctions (cuando, hasta que) require the subjunctive: Espero que vengas; cuando llegues, hablamos.

Por vs. para

Por marks cause, exchange, duration, and movement through. Para marks purpose, destination, deadline, recipient, and opinion. Example: Lo hice por ti (because of you) vs. Lo hice para ti (for you).

Masculine -ma nouns

Nouns of Greek origin ending in -ma are masculine despite the -a ending: el problema, el tema, el sistema, el clima, el programa, el idioma, el mapa.

Impersonal and passive se

Impersonal se removes the agent: Se habla español aquí. Passive se agrees with the noun: Se venden casas. Both avoid naming who performs the action.

Pronoun placement rules

Object pronouns precede conjugated verbs (me lo da) but attach to infinitives, gerunds, and affirmative commands (dámelo, quiero dártelo). Negative commands place pronouns before: no me lo des.

Cuyo agreement

Cuyo means 'whose' and agrees in gender and number with the noun that follows it, not with the possessor: el autor cuyas obras leemos; la casa cuyo dueño conozco.

Accent rule for esdrújulas

Words stressed on the antepenultimate syllable always carry a written accent: música, teléfono, pájaro. Words ending in vowel, -n, or -s stress the penultimate syllable by default.

Cohesive connectors

Sin embargo and no obstante signal contrast; por lo tanto and en consecuencia signal consequence; en cambio signals substitution; a pesar de signals concession; además adds information.

False friends to watch

Actual means current, not 'actual'; realizar means to carry out; largo means long; éxito means success; asistir means to attend; sensible means sensitive; embarazada means pregnant.

Inferring meaning from affixes

Prefixes re- (again), des- (undo), in- (not), sub- (under) and suffixes -ción (action), -dad (quality), -mente (adverb), -oso (full of) reveal unfamiliar word meanings.

Referent tracking

Pronouns lo, la, le, su, and dicho refer to previously named nouns. Reading comprehension questions often test whether you can identify which noun a pronoun replaces.

Author's purpose signals

Evaluative adjectives, modal verbs (debería, hay que), rhetorical questions, and statistics indicate persuasion. Chronological preterite narration with dates indicates informing or reporting.

Literary devices in Spanish

Metáfora (implicit comparison), símil (explicit comparison with como), personificación (human traits to objects), hipérbole (exaggeration), ironía (opposite meaning), anáfora (repeated opening).

Main idea location

In expository Spanish prose the thesis typically appears in the opening paragraph or is restated in the conclusion. Middle paragraphs supply evidence, examples, and concessions.

Formal email frame

Open with Estimado/a Sr./Sra. + apellido, state purpose (Me dirijo a usted para...), develop, close with Atentamente or Cordialmente, then sign. Use usted forms throughout.

Register markers

Informal register uses tú, diminutives, and exclamations. Formal register uses usted/ustedes, conditional politeness (¿Podría...?), and full titles instead of first names.

Accent pairs changing meaning

Written accents distinguish el (article) from él (he), mi (my) from mí (me), si (if) from sí (yes), mas (but) from más (more), aun (even) from aún (still).

Argumentative paragraph structure

State a thesis, support it with two or three reasons and evidence, concede a counterpoint with si bien or aunque, rebut it, and close with a conclusion that restates the position.

Personal a

A direct object that is a specific person or domesticated animal takes the preposition a: Veo a María; Busco a mi perro. It is omitted for things and nonspecific people.

Spanish punctuation conventions

Questions and exclamations open with inverted marks (¿ ¡). Dialogue in narrative often uses dashes (-) rather than quotation marks. Decimals use a comma and thousands a period.

English interference errors

Common errors include using realizar for 'to realize', actualmente for 'actually', asistir for 'to assist', and omitting the personal a or overusing possessive adjectives with body parts.

Spanish b and v

In Spanish, b and v represent the same bilabial phoneme. Spelling must be memorized; pronunciation does not distinguish haber from a ver in rapid speech.

Yeísmo

Most Spanish varieties merge ll and y into a single palatal sound, so llave and yave sound alike. Distinction survives in parts of the Andes and rural Spain.

Voseo

Use of vos instead of tú with its own verb forms (vos tenés, vos sos) in Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, and parts of Central America. It coexists with tú in some regions.

Ustedes vs. vosotros

Spain distinguishes informal plural vosotros (habláis) from formal ustedes (hablan). Latin America uses ustedes for both registers, with third-person plural verb forms.

Softening politeness strategies

Diminutives (un cafecito), conditional (quisiera pedirle), and imperfect (venía a preguntar) soften requests and refusals in everyday Spanish conversation.

Discourse markers in speech

Pues, bueno, o sea, entonces, and es que manage conversation: they signal hesitation, reformulation, or explanation rather than carrying literal meaning.

Nebrija 1492 grammar

Antonio de Nebrija published the first grammar of Castilian in 1492, the same year Columbus reached the Americas, marking the start of Spanish codification and expansion.

Siglo de Oro authors

Cervantes wrote Don Quijote (1605, 1615); Lope de Vega wrote Fuenteovejuna; Calderón wrote La vida es sueño; Quevedo and Góngora led conceptismo and culteranismo.

Modernismo and Rubén Darío

Nicaraguan poet Rubén Darío led Modernismo with Azul... and Cantos de vida y esperanza, blending French symbolism and Parnassianism into a renewed Spanish poetic language.