Learn about using the subjunctive tense
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Lizzie: Hola hola, soy Lizzie. |
| Allan: Hey there everybody, I'm Allan. Meet my relatives - 3. So today, guys, we’re gonna look at a couple of ways that the present tense can be used in Spanish. |
| Lizzie: But our listeners should know how to use the present tense after 34 Beginner lessons, don’t you think? |
| Allan: Well, de acuerdo, but today we’re going to look at something that’s really, really cool and it’s called the sequence of tenses. |
| Lizzie: The sequence? |
| Allan: That’s right, la secuencia de tiempos, the sequence of tenses. And, aside from this, we’re going to listen to yet another conversation with Marcos, who’s at a party of Laura’s family. Today he gets introduced to David, who’s kind of a renown, hmm how can you say, a bit of ball-buster, a bit of a pain. |
| Lizzie: Como suelen ser los primos. |
| Allan: That’s right, you can’t choose your family. Ok, Lizzie, it’s about that time. |
| Lizzie: Listen closely to the following conversation, ok? |
| DIALOGUE |
| LAURA: ¡Oye, David! Quiero presentarte a Marcos, el amigo de Rosana. |
| DAVID: ¿Qué tal, Marcos? |
| MARCOS: ¿Cómo estás? |
| DAVID: Tú eres el norteamericano, ¿no? |
| MARCOS: Sí. Soy de Miami. |
| DAVID: Bueno, hermano, mientras estés acá, si necesitas que te revise los dientes, no hay ningún problema. |
| MARCOS: Ah, eres dentista... |
| DAVID: No, ¡soy veterinário! |
| LAURA: ¡Ay, jejeje... qué pesado! |
| LAURA: Hey, David! I want to introduce Marcos, Rosana's friend. |
| DAVID: What's up Marcos? |
| MARCOS: How do you do? |
| DAVID: You're the North American, right? |
| MARCOS: Yeah, I'm from Miami. |
| DAVID: Well, bro', while you're here, if you need me to look at your teeth, there's no problem. |
| MARCOS: Oh, you're a dentist... |
| DAVID: No, I'm a veterinarian! |
| LAURA: Oh, hahaha... what a pain! |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Allan: Sorry, Lizzie, la mitad de la familia de mi esposa son así. |
| Lizzie: ooh |
| Allan: Son super pesados aveces. Vas a una reunion tú tienes que estar con un chaleco antibalas. |
| Lizzie: ¿Tienes que tener correa, no? Para soportar. |
| Allan: Tener alta correa. Y tienes que dar tanto como tú recibes, no tomar ningún prisionero. So I'm just commenting that half of my wife’s family are just like that. You need a bulletproof jacket, a chaleco antibalas, whenever you’re going to a family reunion. And you’ve have to prepare to give back as much as you get. And Lizzie said tienes que tener correa, and that means “you have to be able to take a joke”. |
| Lizzie: Y bueno yo no tengo como que… digamos amigos que son pesados pero siempre en la vida te encuentras con gente así. Es inevitable. |
| Allan: Tienes que tener correa. |
| Lizzie: Sí. |
| Allan: Ok, friends, onto the vocab. Here we’re going to break down these words syllable by syllable so that you can hear exactly how each word sounds. |
| Lizzie: Vamos! |
| Allan: So let’s begin with… |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Lizzie: mientras |
| Allan: While. |
| Lizzie: mientras, mientras |
| Allan: Next we’ll hear… |
| Lizzie: dentista |
| Allan: Dentist. |
| Lizzie: dentista, dentista |
| Allan: Ok. Now let’s listen to… |
| Lizzie: veterinario, veterinaria |
| Allan: Veterinarian. |
| Lizzie: veterinario, veterinaria. veterinario, veterinaria |
| Allan: Ok, good. Now let’s hear… |
| Lizzie: pesado, pesada |
| Allan: Heavy, annoying. |
| Lizzie: pesado, pesada. pesado, pesada |
| Allan: Now we have… |
| Lizzie: diente |
| Allan: Tooth. |
| Lizzie: diente, diente |
| Allan: Ok, and finally… |
| Lizzie: presentar |
| Allan: To introduce. |
| Lizzie: presentar, presentar |
| Allan: Alright, friends, for today’s pronunciation tip we’re going to focus on sufijos. |
| VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE |
| Lizzie: sufijos |
| Allan: That’s right, sufijos. Suffixes. It’s in the vocab list of your PDF. So check out the word veterinario. |
| Lizzie: veterinario |
| Allan: Pay attention to this ending, ARIO. In English, we often translate this ending as ARIAN, as in veterinario, “veterinarian”, or bibliotecario, “librarian”. |
| Lizzie: Is this always the case? |
| Allan: No, sometimes we have to translate this ending different ways in order to refer to the person whose vocation it is to do something? |
| Lizzie: Por ejemplo? |
| Allan: Well, for example usuario, which is “a user”, as in the expression nombre de usuario, which means “your username”. |
| Lizzie: Mira tú pues… Muy bien, ahora al vocabulario. |
| Allan: Time to look at how some of these words were used today, Lizzie. Vayamos al grano. First, let me ask you, how do you say “tooth” in Spanish? |
| Lizzie: Simplemente decimos diente. |
| Allan: Right, diente. |
| Lizzie: And what do you call a person whose profession it is to care for other’s teeth. |
| Allan: Seria una dentista. |
| Lizzie: Una dentista so this means “dentist”. Notice that this is a feminine noun, la dentista. Now, Allan, if your dentist is a man would you say dentisto? |
| Allan: No, de ninguna manera. |
| Lizzie: No way. |
| Allan: Right, this is a good opportunity to remember that we can’t confuse the gender of a noun with the sex of a person. Just doesn’t always work that way. |
| Lizzie: Muy bien, sigamos. |
| Allan: Claro la proxima palabra es veterinario. Now we just looked at how to pronounce this one, but now let’s see how it was used. |
| Lizzie: David dice: no, soy veterinario. |
| Allan: Right. So David is definitely giving Marcos a bit of hard time. And this, guys, is pretty common in Latino families as in probably families all over the world. So David leads Marcos into believing that he is a dentista when actually he is un veterinario. |
| Lizzie: veterinario |
| Allan: So this, folks, is another cognate and all we mean by that is that it shares a common etymology. |
| Lizzie: Y ¿cómo se dice veterinario en ingles? |
| Allan: Decimos “veterinarian” or just “vet”. Now, let’s also point out that this is also one of those nouns in Spanish that has both a masculine and feminine form. |
| Lizzie: veterinario y veterinaria |
| Allan: Right el veterinario y la veterinaria. And to remember how this gender works, just add an adjective, el buen veterinario or la buena veterinaria. |
| Lizzie: Buen truco. |
| Allan: Gracias. Now just one more thing, we also have to point out that the feminine noun veterinaria also refers to the veterinarian’s office. Again, in English, we would probably just call this “the vet’s”, “Let’s take the dog to the vet’s”. |
| Lizzie: Excellente. Ahora dos palabras más. |
| Allan: Ok, which one’s first. |
| Lizzie: mientras |
| Allan: Ah, that’s a good one. In today’s lesson, it’s used as a conjunction. |
| Lizzie: Mientras estés acá, si necesitas que te revise los dientes, no hay ningún problema. |
| Allan: Right. So look at this, mientras estés aquí, “while you are here” - so this word mientras means “while”, and sometimes, like we see in this example, it’s followed by a verb in the subjunctive mood instead of the indicative mood. |
| Lizzie: Sí no me habia percatado. ¿Por qué es eso? |
| Allan: That’s a good question, let’s think about it. Here when we say “while you’re here” are we talking about “while you’re here” at this moment or is it more like saying “as long as you’re here”, expressing some kind of future time too? |
| Lizzie: I think there’s something of the future in it. |
| Allan: Hey, that’s right. That’s why need to use the present tense of the subjunctive mood here. |
| Lizzie: Ahora la última palabra. Pesado. |
| Allan: Right, definitely a good one to know. With this word you will really be able to defend yourself from belittling comments and things like that. |
| Lizzie: Este es un adjetivo. |
| Allan: Right, and that means we can say pesado or pesada. |
| Lizzie: That’s right, that’s the singular. And of course the plural is just pesados or pesadas. |
| Allan: That’s right. If you run into a lot of people who are a real plain. Plural, pesados or pesadas. So in today’s conversation, Laura, in response to David’s joke says Ay qué pesado! |
| Lizzie: Sí pues, que pesado es este Marcos. |
| Allan: And literally, guys, this means “how heavy”, but that’s not really what they’re trying to say, is it, Liz? |
| Lizzie: No way. |
| Allan: Hey, it’s kind of like saying “What a pain, what a jerk!” in a sense that she’s saying “a pain you are for giving poor Marcos such a hard time”. Now, Lizzie, this phrase, qué pesado!, when else would you have a chance to use it do you think? |
| Lizzie:¿ Acabo de limpiar la vereda y pasan dejando papeles? Son unos pesados. ¡Que pesados! |
| Allan: ¡Qué pesados! De verdad. Lizzie’s saying if she’s just cleaned her sidewalk in front of her house, for example, then somebody walks by and tosses a paper there. son unos pesados! And it makes you, ugh, those gun control laws, I just… No, that’s very frustrating, isn’t it, Liz? qué pesados! |
| Lizzie: qué pesados! |
| Allan: Ok, let’s cut to the chase and delve into the grammar. |
| Lizzie: Vayamos al grano. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Allan: Today’s topic: expressing need. |
| Lizzie: ¿Vimos en la conversación de hoy un ejemplo de esta expresión de la necesidad? |
| Allan: Pero claro que sí: si necesitas que te revise los dientes. |
| Lizzie: And how would you translate that? |
| Allan: “If you need me to look at your teeth.” So Lizzie, let me ask you, what’s the verb that’s expressing need or necessity here? |
| Lizzie: It’s necesitas. |
| Allan: And the person and the number? |
| Lizzie: It’s the second person singular, necesitas. |
| Allan: Aha, necesitas. So “you need”, si necesitas, “if you need”. But after this phrase we bump into the word que. This word tells us something. It tells us that another clause is on its way. Que te revise los dientes. Literally “that I review the teeth”, but, Lizzie, it’s not really fair to translate this phrase literally, is it? |
| Lizzie: No señor. |
| Allan: Por supuesto que no. It’s more like saying “that I look at your teeth”. Now, aside from the person and aside from the number, what distinguishes the usage of these two verbs, necesitas and revise? |
| Lizzie: Es el modo. |
| Allan: El modo. The mood. What’s the mood for each of these verbs? |
| Lizzie: Well, the mood of the verb necesitas is indicative and the mood of revise is subjunctive. |
| Allan: That’s right. We’re not talking about tenses, we’re talking about moods here, guys. So which verb expresses need or necessity? |
| Lizzie: necesitas |
| Allan: Aha, so this one’s in the indicative mode. |
| Lizzie: Así es! |
| Allan: And what about the other one? |
| Lizzie: That one’s in the subjunctive mood, revise. |
| Allan: What’s this verb in the infinitive? |
| Lizzie: Revisar. |
| Allan: Alright, guys, your new mantra - the sequence of tenses. |
| Lizzie: ¿Qué, ahora eres budista, Allan? |
| Allan: No, but this is going to be something that comes up time and time again. The verb or the first clause is in the present tense of the indicative mood, and that of the second is in the present tense of the subjunctive mood. You’re moving laterally from one mood to another while staying in the same tense. |
| Lizzie: La secuencia de los tiempos |
| Allan: La secuencia de los tiempos |
Outro |
| Lizzie: La secuencia de los tiempos |
| Allan: Learn Spanish with SpanishPod101. Go to our forum, sign up to the resource center. |
| Lizzie: Buena manera de concientizar a nuestra audiencia, Allan La Reu. |
| Allan: Oh, I'm feeling this warm, blue light here, in the studio today, Liz. Guys, really cool stuff today. And thanks, Liz. |
| Lizzie: Ahora al foro. |
| Allan: On to the forum. Check it out at SpanishPod101.com, ask questions, share your curiosity. Have you seen that thread that Nati opened? It’s called Nati’s list of diminutives. |
| Lizzie: Very cool idea. |
| Allan: Guys, this is exactly the kind of conversation that you need to be a part of. Look, you have to get involved. Let me tell you a very brief comment. Lizzie, you’ll find this very interesting. The other night I had dinner with a fellow. He’s from Beijing, Chinese guy, 24 years old, he had gone to Cuba for one year to study Spanish. And since that time he’s been floating around South America now, now he’s in Peru. He has an absolute perfect grasp of Spanish, even his accent. And sometimes for Chinese it’s a very, very difficult language to learn, Spanish, alphabet different, etcetera. But this guy, I asked myself, you know, “How did you learn so well?” He says, “Well, I just forgot about Chinese and I went out, and I made friends in Cuba, I’d go out dancing every night, I just became a part of it.” |
| Lizzie: Que bien. Pienso que hay personas, Allan, que tienen más disposición para unas cosas que para otras ¿no? Y de repente esta persona, este amigo tuyo pues tiene una muy buena disposición para el español ¿no? |
| Allan: That’s right. You know, part of it is just natural talent, but part of it is just pushing yourself into that situation. You gotta take the first step. |
| Lizzie: Well, that’s all for today. |
| Allan: Así es amigos. Take care, be well, study hard and we’ll see you again soon. Chao |
| Lizzie: Chao |
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