Today I overheard a coworker talking to someone and they made the statement that "Spanish is super easy actually!". Which I find funny because I've seen that same coworker whip out the interpreter every time a Spanish speaking patient opens their mouth. But that got me thinking.

I have been studying Spanish off and on for a few years and am slowly making progress but nowhere near conversional. I am just now getting to the point where it doesn't sounds impossibly fast and I can understand a good amount of what I hear but, I wouldn't say learning it has been necessarily easy.

Sure, the shared alphabet, short vowels, and the straight forward phonics help make it easier to learn than say, Chinese or Arabic. I would say it is maybe easy to learn how to speak like a toddler, but hard to learn how to communicate beyond "¿Donde está el baño?

What are your thoughts?

Hi everyone,

Posted here before but just want to gauge opinions.

I've started to push myself to do around an hour a day now of Spanish. This is reading (with direct English translation) La Sombra Del Viento- 2/3 pages a day. I can read a good bit but sections that are very descriptive, I struggle so helps having the translation.

I do a bit of duolingo, around 10-15 minutes or so which I think helps.

Finally I watch about 30 minutes of dreaming Spanish intermediate videos.

I am going to start speaking to ChatGPT as I don't have any Spanish tutors/talking partners yet but I will eventually move to this.

I was in Spain recently and realised how far off I was in terms of understanding and speaking. I could ask the basics but relaised my mistakes as soon as I walked off. Also, the accent is

For too long, I had simply done a small bit a day and although progressed, I think it was far too slow.

Minus the lack of speaking, is there any suggestions or what do people think of my method? I do practise verb conjugations but mainly just say these out loud.

Thank you

That was the first full-lrength novel I read in Spanish! I loved it, though it was hard going at first. Then I switched to using the kindle app on my iPad, to read the electronic version. This has a pop-up dictionary: click on a word and up pops the meaning! But do't click on every word, it will be overwhelming. See if you can make a guess at the meaning from the context. The same word is likely to come up again, and each time you will get a closer understanding. Do look up words that are holding you up, though. You can also select an expression such as contra mares y viento (against all odds). In e-reader apps you can make lists of the word you looked up, with their meanings, which you can use to study. And check out Quizlet.com to make your own flashcards and language games: free!. ¡Es fenomenal! By the way, I live in Barcelona now and have been to most of the real and fictional locations in the novel.

So from a black person perspective, you can say, that man is finnnneeeee and for me, it’s different than saying, attractive cute and etc

I want some slang that means the same thing and has the same vibe. When a woman says, that man is finnneeeee, it means something more than, “the guy is cute or attractive or handsome”, it’s also not overtly sexual. It’s like a non-workplace way of saying that man is handsome, and elevated way of saying that man is hott without an overt sexual meaning.

I’m struggling between wanting to translate what I want to express VS what gives the same vibe as a Spanish listener

Like guapo doesn’t sound fine lol. I need some slang, creativity but everything I’m finding sounds like metaphors

Hola, tengo 29 años y llevo alrededor de un año aprendiendo español en casa por mi cuenta. He acabado mi primera baraja de 1000 palabras pero principalmente he practicado la grammatica. No he visto mucho contenido en español porque aún no lo entiendo muy bien y al final me duele la cabeza. Me gusta leer y quizás por eso escribo mejor de lo que hablo. ¿Qué creéis que debería hacer?

Perdonad si hay algún error.

So I'm living in Spain and learning Spanish here, and I've heard people mostly use jugar (as far as I know, my spanish isn't great yet) but in some learning materials I'm using it's saying practicar is another verb used to mean to play, and it seems to be used in the same contexts? What am I missing here?

My mum has been texting me in Spanish since I started relearning it, which is sweet, except she writes like a teenager. Last week I got “xq no me contestas?? tqm” and stared at it for a good while.

“xq” is “porque” or “por qué”. The x stands for “por” because that’s how you read the multiplication sign in Spanish, which I’d never have guessed. Once I worked out that “tqm” means “te quiero mucho”, the message got a lot nicer. She also signs off with “ntp”, no te preocupes, right after telling me something worrying.

Nothing in my course or Praktika covered this, so I keep a note on my phone now.

The rest of it so far:

q = que / qué

tb or tmb = también

bn = bien

dnd = dónde

xfa or porfa = por favor (the x again)

dsp = después

bss = besos

nd = nada / de nada

Does anyone else have a family member who texts mostly in abbreviations, or is it just my mum?

I’m Peruvian and a native Spanish speaker. I recently matched with a Spanish guy from Barcelona on a dating app. We talked about what we do for a living and I told him I worked as a high teacher and also gave online Spanish lessons for foreign students as a side gig.

Then we started to chat on WhatsApp and I sent him a voice note in which I said “venir para acá” (to come here). He corrected me and said that the proper way to say it was “venir hacía aquí”. That’s obviously valid but as a South American, “venir para acá” sounds a lot more natural to me. I also told him that there are certain Spanish expressions that can sound unnatural (“ir a por __”) or redundant (“subir arriba/bajar abajo”) to most South Americans, but it doesn’t make them less valid forms of speech.

I had mentioned before that I wanted to move to Spain in the future and he told me that if I were to move to Spain and intent to teach Spanish here in a language academy, I had to teach standard (as in from Spain) Spanish because otherwise it would be as if a person taught Scots instead of English in England. I was like “Those are two different languages, not varieties of the same language, I don’t know if you’re aware 🙄”.

I told him that I’m Peruvian and I speak as such, using valid and common forms of speech in South America, and that I wasn’t going to accept his “criticism” nor going to change the way I speak. He told me I was mediocre for calling it criticism and that it should be a learning opportunity. I obviously unmatched immediately buy it was a weird and invalidating experience 🤦🏻‍♀️

Collected classical Spanish novels 14 public domain novels with short English summaries

La Barraca — Vicente Blasco Ibáñez · 1898 La Candidatura de Rojas — Armando Chirveches · 1909 La Coquito — Joaquín Belda · 1915 La Maja Desnuda — Vicente Blasco Ibáñez · 1906 La Nave de los Locos — Pío Baroja · 1929 La Tía Tula — Miguel de Unamuno · 1921 Los Muertos Mandan — Vicente Blasco Ibáñez · 1909 La Sirena Negra — Emilia Pardo Bazán · 1908 La Busca — Pío Baroja · 1904 Camino de Perfección — Pío Baroja · 1902 Despertar para Morir — Concha Espina · 1910 El Metal de los Muertos — Concha Espina · 1920 El Ocaso del Hombre — Bernardo Morales San Martín · 1920 Herencia — Clorinda Matto de Turner · 1895

Closing out a message thread with a contractor, someone wrote this:
¡Muchas gracias y ánimos con todo!

I would have written,
¡Muchas gracias y buena suerte con todo!

Is ánimos con todo regional to Central America?
Or is it a completely different meaning or context?

Edit: ánimas s/b ánimos

The title pretty much sums it up. I think I am somewhere between A1 and A2. I have heard that thinking in Spanish might help me, but since I make a lot of mistakes, I am afraid that it might actually hurt me instead.

Edit: thanks a lot everyone. Someone recommended that I read more instead of thinking in Spanish. I think the way I am going to go about it is reading simple stories and only thinking basic sentences. When I think of a sentence, I will write it down and check the grammar later.

Before you say I'm asking a dumb question, know that I just looked up how to say "banister" in Spanish for the first time, and the info is that they are regional terms. So I'm wondering if they are fully regional or used somewhat interchangeably across the Spanish-speaking world. Thanks.

¡Hola, compañeros de Reddit! Soy brasileña y principiante en español. Quiero hacer amigos hispanohablantes y descubrir música, YouTubers o cualquier contenido en español para sumergirme en el idioma a diario. Estoy haciendo un curso en línea a través de una institución federal aquí en Brasil, y a veces chateo con otra amiga brasileña que estudió español en español, pero tengo muchas dificultades con el idioma. Hablo inglés (nivel intermedio, B1, progresando a B2) y ya consumo mucho contenido en inglés; quiero hacer lo mismo con el español, ¡así que les pido recomendaciones de cualquier cosa en español que les guste!

My 71-year-old dad recently told me he wants to learn Spanish and I'm pumped. Currently, he only knows one word in Spanish, "hola," and he pronounces the ‘H,’ so he is truly starting from the very beginning.

I speak Spanish decently well (~B2 level) and he asked me to help him start this journey. I've done some research and independent mulling and created a rough game plan for him below:

• Month 1 only: Duolingo (to get a basic sense of what Spanish even is)
• Month 2 and beyond: Language Transfer course + a beginner Spanish textbook
• Month 3 and beyond: Dreaming Spanish YT Channel beginner videos
• Month 4 and beyond: Once-a-week iTalki tutor sessions
• Month 6 and beyond: Consumption of simple Spanish media

I also plan to talk/text with him in Spanish every so often. Would love to know, does anyone have any thoughts on this game plan or advice for him as he begins this journey?

Thanks y'all!

Disclaimer: I am not using AI to write these posts.

By popular demand (one Redditor asked me lol) I'm bringing you the many meanings and uses of the verb quedar. Let's dig straight in:

1. to be left / to remain / to be left over / to have (sth) left

- ¿Quedan asientos para nosotros? - Are there any seats left for us?

- Solo queda la fachada de la casa. - Just the front of the house remains.

- Quedó bastante pollo para alimentar a los perros. - There was enough chicken left over to feed to the dogs.

- No nos quedan huevos. Hay que comprar más. - We don't have any eggs left. We need to buy more.

- No nos queda tiempo para ir al museo. - We don't have time to go to the museum.

2. to be situated

- El restaurante queda a tres calles de aquí. - The restaurant is three streets away from here.

3. to meet

- ¿Dónde quedamos? - Where shall we meet?

4. to *agree to meet / to arrange to meet\*

- Quedamos en la puerta principal. - We agreed to meet at the front door.

- He quedado con mi abogado a las 10 de la mañana porque quiero pedirle consejo sobre el tema. - I've arranged to meet my lawyer at 10 am because I want to ask him for advice on the matter.

Important: These are in past tense, because even though the meeting will take place in the future, the arranging/agreeing was done in the past.

5. to fit / to suit

- La talla M aún me queda. - A medium still fits me.

- ¿Cómo le queda el nuevo corte de pelo? - Does her new hairstyle suit her?

6. to stay

- No me pidas que me quede si no vas a volver. - Don't ask me to stay if you are not coming back.

7. to end up (feeling)

- Quedamos muy tristes con la noticia de tu padre. - We were really sad to hear about your dad.

8. to come in / to finish

- Me dio una punzada y quedé última en la carrera de natación. - I got a stitch and came in last in the swimming race.

- Quedamos terceros. Por lo menos nos llevamos una medalla. - We finished third. At least we got a medal.

9. to look like

- Si no queremos quedar como idiotas, es mejor que lo pensemos bien. - If we don't want to look stupid, we'd better think about it carefully.

Made it this far? You'd better treat yourself to cookie :D

I know "nos vemos", but how often is this used, and are there other phrases that mean to meet up, but that you'd use with a buddy or friend group rather than a co-worker or any other formal setting?

I recently took the BYU FLATS Spanish exam and was frustrated by the lack of preparation resources on the internet, although other posters helped a bit.

When I took the exam I jotted down some notes and example questions from each section so you could have a better sense of what to expect.

The exam I took was 134 questions over 3 hours. About half of the questions had multiple parts. Every question is multiple choice. You can go back over all your answers at any point during the test, but you cannot have audio portions repeated. Time is generous but not unlimited. Fatigue was the bigger issue. The website works very well. One question I had I thought contained a mistake.

You need a mic, webcam, and your gov ID. Windows, Mac or Ubuntu. Chrome or Edge.

The exam is divided into 5 parts of roughly equal length

Part 1: Listen to a monologue or dialogue and answer in what location the speech might have taken place

- The prompts are around 30 seconds and represent the length of a short paragraph. They are presented in articulate, near native-pace speech. You cannot replay them, but you can read the questions first, which you should. The dialect is Madrid Spanish, so be comfortable with /th/ pronunciation of c, z.

- Focus on the nouns/verbs and extracting the basic meaning of each sentence. If you attempt to parse the grammar you will fall behind.

- Some example questions I noted were:

(1) A man and woman are at a police station reporting a robbery

(2) A man is reporting his symptoms to a doctor at an doctor's appointment

(3) A couple are at a super market buying groceries

(4) A man and woman are on a date at a restaurant

- The test makes modest attempts to fool the taker. For example, at the super market a couple talk about getting meat from a butcher, which sounds like a man at a restaurant a ordering steak from a waiter. The couple reporting the robbery at the police station state earlier they went to a museum. The man at the doctor's says he hurt his knee playing sports at the park.

Part 2: Listen to a monologue or dialogue and them listen to questions about the speech along with possible answers to those questions

- The only text available to you is "A) a. B) b. C) c." and so on

- This part is by far the most difficult. You must parse and then retain native-like speech for a sustained minute or so. I cannot offer an example here because I could not follow the questions well enough. The quality of the speech is similar to in Part 1A.

- The questions start easy and become harder. Near the end some answers differ only in the tone of the speakers voice (inquisitive, excited, matter-of-fact), or by subtle alterations in phrasing. Expect to lose the majority of your points here.

Part 3: Listen to a short audio prompt and then select a text response which fits

(1) "Your friend is very handsome." A) And healthy B) and nice, too C), Yes, he is my friend

(2) "When does tonight's play start?" A) It starts now B) it starts around 9 C) It starts at 9 exactly

Answering correctly requires interpreting that the speaker is referring to a play they are going to later, and that would not reasonably start now, and that such a question is looking for a precise time.

(3) "Why didn't you come to the party? A) Yes, I didn't go B) I was not invited C) I didn't go alone

Simply understanding 'they are talking about going to a party' is not sufficient

Part 4: Conjugation, declension, pronouns, prepositions

- The text portions of the exam are much more straightforward

- This section covers the grammar of verbs, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, and prepositions

(1) Ella dijo que ___ a venir. A) va B) iba C) vaya D) fue E) fuera

Concepts: subjunctive and indicative moods, irregular verbs, person and number

(2) ... voy a ___ pais, ___ nacion. A) la ... la B) el ... la

Concepts: gender indicated by spelling (-cion, -umbra, -idad, ..., and -ema, -ambre, -is, ...), exceptions to

(3) Eduardo ___ tarde estaba muy cansado se lavanto'. A) estaba B) fue

Concepts: sequence of tenses (imperfect --> preterit), irregular verbs, compound tenses

(4) El entrado' porque la puerta ___. A) estaba abierta B) era abierta

Concepts: Usage of esta and ser with personal and impersonal objects

(5) Veo nuestras motocicletas, pero do'nde' esta'n ___?. A) las suyas, B) suyas, C) suyas de ellos

Concepts: Pronouns used as Subject, DO, DO reflexive, IO, and with a preposition (conmigo, suyas, etc) and substantivized (las suyas).

- Other questions ask about: double negation, ningun vs nada, double pronouns, adjective forms, adjectives vs adverbs (buen vs bien)

- Special Attention to:

1 The particular use case of tenses, for example the present tense, not the future tense, is used to indicate the immediate future. A good textbook will enumerate these cases precisely.

2 That the subjunctive in a subordinate clause is determined by the tense of the ordinate. And that the subjunctive is used with the negation of an affirmative statement (I don't think that...). etc

3 The uses cases of the definite article (body parts, time, weights and measurements, etc).

4 Progressive constructions, passive constructions, psuedo-passive constructions (La ventana se rompio'), and impersonal constructions (Hay/Habi'a...)

5 The placement of pronouns with pronominal verbs across constructions

Part 5A: Read a short passage about a scenario and answer questions about it

- The test uses some misdirection in the vocabulary of the text.

Some topics were:

(1) A man is watching birds in the park

(2) A man is in an argument with his girlfriend

(2) A woman is is at dinner with her friends

Part 5B: Read pictures of advertisement, like that would appear in a subway car or newspaper classifieds, and use the extra-textual context infer the ad's meaning.

(1) There's a dating app ad. The text doesn't clarify whether the app is for friends or for romantic partners, but there's a heart icon and a couple embracing.

(2) There's an ad for a plumbing company. The ad promises good employment prospects and technical training

Resources:

I found the audio in the test very similar to the advanced exercises on the News in Slow Spanish language learning website. If you can understand the following sample as it is written and spoken you should have little trouble with the exam. All of the listening parts were no more difficult than this. Many questions were more simple, but all were presented at this pace.

This is the pace and clarity of speech used in the listening sections

I read Gilda Nissenberg's Complete Spanish All-in-One cover to cover, and did not find any grammar in the test not covered by the book. I think doing most the exercises in the book is sufficient practice for the written grammar parts. I recommend dedicating as much time to listening as reading.

The test is graded satisfactory/non-satisfactory for each of the first three semesters you would encounter in college. You don't receive any other feedback. I obtained satisfactory for Spanish 3 despite making a number of mistakes, not understanding some of the listening questions at all, and in fact not doing the last 4 questions because my internet cut out, so there is a good deal of forgiveness in the grading system.

I looked this up a few years ago and found some interesting people that others had recommended on reddit. Wondering what the scene is looking like now. I like cozy games, talk shows, some adventure rpg playing. I follow LOkohgaming already as well as some Spanish/ study with me peeps.

Comparativa: corrector ortográfico de Google (Docs/Chrome) vs Microsoft 365 en español latinoamericano/colombiano – ¿por qué Google es claramente superior?

Hello everyone!

I’m a C1 learner and really really really trying to get to a place where I can listen to native speakers without a ton of effort. However, I’m having a really hard time getting over the hump of native accents and dialects.

I would say I’m most comfortable with (some) Spain accents. For example, I’m able to listen to El Chisme Mitológico with relative comfort, depending on the day. But when I switch to another podcast that is hosted by, for instance, a Mexican native, it’s like I’m back at square one. Or even just switching to a podcast with thicker Spain accents like Nadie Sabe Nada, I struggle and have to dedicate 110% of my energy to understand.

Does anyone have any tips to help get over this rut? It’s been like this for a while and I’m getting discouraged.

Thank you!

Buenas. Para ponerlo en contexto, me refiero a lo que diríamos en inglés cuando queremos expresar una crítica, pero nos gusta la cosa en general y no queremos que se malinterprete nuestra idea en general. En otros casos, se dice antes de decir algo que pudiera resultar un poco controversial o algo que se pudiera malentendido…

Por ejemplo: “Don’t get me wrong—I think she is a great author—I just didn’t like her last novel.” ( “_____—creo que ella es una buena escritora—pero es que no me gustó su última novela.”)

Otras veces, algo así: “Don’t get me wrong, I definitely believe in God. However, I don’t agree with the Church’s actions.” (“________, sin duda creo en Dios. Sin embargo, no estoy de acuerdo con las acciones de la iglesia.”

La traducción literal sería “no me malinterpretes” y está bien. Pero, ¿hay alguna alternativa para decir lo mismo? Cómo lo dirías tú?

¡Gracias!

Cuando yo tenía siete años, mi familia se fue de vacaciones a Florida. Era la primera vez que iba a Florida y yo estaba muy emocionada. Mi familia manejó durante dieciocho horas hasta un lugar llamado Destin. Recuerdo que el viaje se me hizo muy largo, pero cuando olí el aire del mar y vi las palmeras, ¡valió la pena! Manejamos por un puente muy grande sobre el mar que era muy bonito. Lo que más recuerdo era la arena muy blanca. Después, nos encontramos con mis abuelos en un restaurante llamado Lulu’s. Desde entonces, mi familia regresa a Florida todos los años y siempre visita Lulu’s.

Soy estudiante y estoy aprendiendo español ¿Podrían darme consejos sobre el uso del pretérito y el imperfecto, o decirme qué partes suenan poco naturales? ¡Muchas gracias!

Hola a todos, estoy del sur de California y ahora estudiamente Communicative Disorders para mi especialidad. En mis trabajos en retail, oío y comprende español mucho, pero no hablo el idioma a menos que necesito ayudar una persona que no habla inglés.

Quiero tomar mis habilidades en español a mi trabajo futuro como una “SLP”, pero solo puedo hablar español como un niño que tiene 6 años. Estudié por cuatro años, pero no tengo una persona practicar el idioma con.

Quisiera aumentar mi nível porque vivo cerca de communidades que tienen muchas personas que solo hablan español o necesitan ayuda en español para subjectivos especificos. Oí de una de mis amigas que es común en Los Estados Unidos para los niños de immigrantes no hablan un nível alto porque ellos tuvieron que aprender inglés en la escuela. Entonces, sólo necesitas un nivel básico si trabajas en el servicio de compradores.

Pero, para una carrera como un “SLP”, ¿cual nível de proficiencia es nesecesario? No entiendo términos como “B1” y “A1” porque una persona puede hablar como un B2 en unas areas y como un A2 en otras.