Learn about future tense
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Beatriz: Buen día, soy Bea. |
| Joseph: Joseph here. “Future of surprise.” |
| Beatriz: ¿Qué tal todos? What’s up? |
| Joseph: Sean bienvenidos a otra lección de SpanishPod101.com |
| Beatriz: “El español” on demand. |
| Joseph: Bea and Joseph back again for another Verb Conjugation Lesson. Bea, ¡qué gusto estar aquí contigo! |
| Beatriz: El gusto es mío, querido. |
| Joseph: ¡Bueno! Today, we have Lesson 14 – “The future of surprise!” |
| Beatriz: ¿Será posible lo que me cuentas? |
| Joseph: Is possible, all right! |
| Beatriz: ¿Me estarás tomando el pelo? |
| Joseph: No, no, para nada. So, both of these questions are exemplary of the kind of usage which we’re going to focus on today. |
| Beatriz: And which verbs, may I ask, are we going to look at? |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Joseph: We going to look at “poder”, “poner” y “valer”. |
| Beatriz: All right, “poder”, “poner” and “valer”. |
| Joseph: “Poder”, “to be able”,” can”. “Poner”, “to put”, “to place”. And “valer”, “to be worth”. |
| Beatriz: Okay, aún más verbos irregulares. |
| Joseph: Yeah, they are irregular verbs. And it looks like there’s quite a few irregular verbs in the future indicative, no? |
| Beatriz: Not as many as they are in the present. |
| Joseph: Now, just a quick note. This series, in particular, is designed to be used sequentially, especially for students who are just beginning to study Spanish. So, if it seems like we going too fast for you, jump back to the beginning of the topic or the beginning of the series. |
| Beatriz: Also, don’t forget to check out the premium audio. |
| Joseph: Definitely, a big part of learning verbs in Spanish is doing short exercises, drills really, to keep your conjugation skills sharp and keep those warehouses of verb forms and usage fresh in your memory. |
| Beatriz: You can’t expect it to happen in one day, even though each day that you study, you are making progress. |
| Joseph: Muy bien amiga mía, estudiamos entonces el tiempo futuro cuando se usa para expresar la sorpresa. |
| Beatriz: Vamos, ¡sorprendámonos! |
| Joseph: So, in previous verb conjugation lessons we said that that the absolute future signifies a future action independent of any other action. |
| Beatriz: Claro, por ejemplo, “te acompañaré”. |
| Joseph: “I will join you.” Right. Now, the thing is if I say something like, “¿Será posible lo que me cuentas?”, am I really asking if it will be possible or am I just using the future tense, here, for dramatic purposes? I mean to really express my surprise? |
| Beatriz: “¿Será posible lo que me cuentas?” Many times, when the future tense is used in interjections or questions, we not indicate a future action. |
| Joseph: Instead, we give astonishment, surprise or uneasiness to the expression. “¿Será posible lo que me cuentas?” And we can translate this usage as “Could what you telling me true? Could what you telling me be possible?” So, what’s the verb in the future tense here? |
| Beatriz: It’s “será”. |
| Joseph: “Será”, right. And the person? |
| Beatriz: Tercera persona, third person. |
| Joseph: ¿Singular o plural? |
| Beatriz: Singular, mi amigo. “¿Será posible lo que me cuentas?” |
| Joseph: Gracias. And what happens to the expression? If I change it to the present tense and say “¿Es posible lo que me cuentas?”? |
| Beatriz: It becomes less expressive. |
| Joseph: The sense of surprise has dwindled down to mere suspicion. So, it’s with the future tense that we can really express this astonishment, this surprise or even this kind of uneasiness. |
| Beatriz: “¿Me estará tomando el pelo?” |
| Joseph: And that means, “Could he be getting one by on me?” or, literally, “Will he be taking my hair?” “Tomar el pelo” is “to get one by”, “to deceive someone by some form of trickery or cunning”. |
| Beatriz: So, here, it’s like saying “Could he really be doing that?” |
| Joseph: Notice the sense of surprise – “Could he really be doing that?” Bea, how about another example? |
| Beatriz: ¡Qué sinvergüenza será ese sujeto! |
| Joseph: Right. And that’s like, “How shameless that guy is!” or “That guy is so shameless!” Again, we find the verb “será” conjugated in the future tense of the indicative mood, which means that the literal translation will be, “How shameless that subject will be?” |
| Beatriz: Can you think of one more? |
| Joseph: How about “esa criatura, ¡qué mal se comportará!”. “That child behaves so poorly!” Literally, “That creature, how poorly will he behave himself!” |
| Beatriz: Come on, Jo, you’re talking like an old man with your nieces. |
| Joseph: Ah, no, my nieces never misbehave. What are you talking about? |
| Beatriz: Again, we see the expression of surprise. “¡Qué mal se comportará!” |
| Joseph: So, Bea, I think it’s clear that this a very expressive use of the future tense. Do you think it will be more common to hear this come out of the mouth of an older person or someone who is younger? |
| Beatriz: Ah, I think it really is really relative. It could be either. |
| Joseph: So, there’s no clear cut distinction? |
| Beatriz: I don’t think so. For example, imagine that you are going on vacation - “¡qué bien estará allá en las montañas!”. |
| Joseph: Yeah, I’m not sure if that’s surprise or probability. You bring up a good point – there’s not clear cut lines between these usages, right? The future of probability could also be analyzed or interpreted as a future of surprise, right? |
| Beatriz: Yeah, this future of surprise is a big affirmation, you know? Like if you hear this sentence, like “esa criatura, ¡qué mal se comportará!”, you know that this child is going to behave poorly. |
| Joseph: Let’s say that we’re on a bus and the bus makes a million stops, right? We can say “¡qué tarde llegaremos!”. |
| Beatriz: Yeah, “¡qué tarde llegaremos!”. |
| Joseph: “We’re going to arrive so late!” |
| Beatriz: Yeah, you can say that. It’s a good example. In a situation when you are complaining also, right? It’s very common to use. |
| Joseph: So, if you are looking to complain in Spanish, feel free to use the future indicative. |
| Beatriz: Ahora la formación verbal. |
| Joseph: La formación verbal. How to conjugate verbs. |
| Beatriz: Are you ready? |
| Joseph: Am I? |
| Beatriz: Which verbs we will look at today? |
| Joseph: Today we have “poder”, “to be able”, “can”. “Poner”, “to put”,” to place”. And “valer”, “to be worth”. |
| Beatriz: Okay, aún más verbos irregulares, still more irregular verbs. |
| Joseph: Yes, a few more but I think that it will be a pleasant surprise that these irregular forms are quite similar to some others which we’ve already looked at. |
| Beatriz: So, where should we start? |
| Joseph: Let’s begin with the verb “poder”. Here, we’re going to see the stem “p-o-d-r”, followed by the regular endings of the future tense of the indicative mood. So, if you look at the infinite “poder”, right, we’re doing the same thing we did last time. We’re gonna remove that vowel, “e”, from the ending, we’re going to slide the “r” over and then just add the regular future endings. It’s really that easy. Bea, let’s run through the conjugation. |
| Beatriz: All right. “Poder”. |
| Joseph: “To be able.” |
| Beatriz: “Yo podré”. |
| Joseph: “I will be able.” |
| Beatriz: “Tú podrás”. |
| Joseph: “You will be able.” |
| Beatriz: “Él podrá”. |
| Joseph: “He will be able.” |
| Beatriz: “Nosotros podremos”. |
| Joseph: “We will be able.” |
| Beatriz: “Vosotros podréis”. |
| Joseph: “You all will be able.” |
| Beatriz: “Ellos podrán”. |
| Joseph: “They will be able.” Great. And how about a couple of examples with “poder” in the future tense of the indicative mood, so that really sticks? |
| Beatriz: Okay, “¡por fin podré manejar en la carretera!” |
| Joseph: Okay. “I will be able to drive on the highway at last.” Very good. So, “yo podré”. Notice it’s not “o poderé”. For you Portuguese speakers, don’t confuse this, “yo podré”. |
| Beatriz: Okay, “tú podrás salir de noche”. |
| Joseph: “You will be able to go out at night.” So, again, you see the formation, pretty standard, even though it’s an irregular. Don’t be intimidated by the term irregular. It’s just a form of categorizing the verbs and, as you’ll see very shortly with the verb “poner”, the formation of irregulars is often similar, also. |
| Beatriz: Okay. |
| Joseph: So, let’s move on to “poner”. Let’s go through that conjugation. |
| Beatriz: Okay, the verb “poner”. |
| Joseph: “To put.” |
| Beatriz: “Yo pondré”. |
| Joseph: “I will put.” |
| Beatriz: “Tú pondrás”. |
| Joseph: “You will put.” |
| Beatriz: “Él pondrá”. |
| Joseph: “He will put.” |
| Beatriz: “Nosotros pondremos”. |
| Joseph: “We will put.” |
| Beatriz: “Vosotros pondréis”. |
| Joseph: “You all will put.” |
| Beatriz: “Ellos pondrán”. |
| Joseph: “They will put.” So, again, with the verb “poner”, just like we saw with “poder”, we’re going to remove that “e” from the infinitive ending, right? So, we get “p-o-n”. And then we add a “d”. And then the future endings. So, “yo pondré”, “tú pondrás”. Bea how about an example with “poner” in the future Indicative? |
| Beatriz: Okay, “yo pondré la mitad del dinero”. |
| Joseph: Okay, great. So, “poner” can also mean ”to contribute”, like to put down money, right? So, “Yo pondré la mitad del dinero” - “I will put down half of the money.” |
| Beatriz: Okay, “tú pondrás una buena cara”. Por ejemplo, estás con una cara como de diablo y tu madre te dice, “cuando llegues pondrás una buena cara”. |
| Joseph: Bien dicho. Well, in this sense you are saying “tú pondrás una buena cara”, “You’ll put on a good face,” right? How would you translate that? “You’ll put on a good face, you’ll pretend to be happy”, something like that? |
| Beatriz: “Ellos se pondrán chompas”. |
| Joseph: Okay, so, “poner”, when we use that reflexively like that, it’s “to put on”, right? So, “They will put on sweaters”, “chompa” in Perú “se pondrán suéteres”, right? “They’ll put on sweaters.” Okay, how about the verb “valer”? |
| Beatriz: All right. |
| Joseph: So, with the verb “valer”, which means “to be worth”, we’re going to see a very similar change, just like we saw for “salir”. What we’re going to do is to remove the “e” from the infinitive ending. Then we’re going to replace that with a “d” and then add a future endings. So, again, you see that even though these are irregular, you see a pattern from “valer”, “valdré”. Notice that - from “poder”, “podré” from “poner”, “pondré”. So, Bea, should we go through the conjugation of “valer”? |
| Beatriz: Let’s go. “Valer”. |
| Joseph: “To be worth.” |
| Beatriz: “Yo valdré”. |
| Joseph: “I will be worth.” |
| Beatriz: “Tú valdrás”. |
| Joseph: “You will be worth.” |
| Beatriz: “Él valdrá”. |
| Joseph: “He will be worth.” |
| Beatriz: “Nosotros valdremos”. |
| Joseph: “We will be worth.” |
| Beatriz: “Vosotros valdréis”. |
| Joseph: “You all will be worth.” |
| Beatriz: “Ellos valdrán”. |
| Joseph: “They will be worth.” Great. So, Bea, how about a couple of examples with this one? |
| Beatriz: It’s tough one, right? But, for example, let’s say “valdrá la pena que llegues temprano”. |
| Joseph: Right. “It will be worth it to arrive early.” So, one thing we should know about the verb “valer” is that it’s most commonly used in what’s called... |
| Beatriz: La tercera persona. |
| Joseph: La tercera persona. Hay otro nombre también, se dice... |
| Beatriz: Impersonalmente. |
| Joseph: Impersonal. And what this means is that it’s most common to use it in the third person singular, “valdrá” in the future, “vale” in the present of the indicative. And another expression which we have to mention, you just used it in your example and I have to say this is probably the most common way to hear this word is “valer la pena”. Literally, “to be worth the pain”, “to be worth the suffering”, and we’ll just translate it as “to be worth it” in English, right? So, “vale la pena” – “It’s worth it”, “valdrá la pena” – “It will be worth it.” |
| Beatriz: Okay, por ejemplo, hay otro que se usa mucho en mi país, en el Perú. Es una expresión que se usaba antiguamente refiriéndose a la riqueza prehispánica de un Perú de oro y plata. Por ejemplo, refiriéndose a un grupo de niños que van a ser exitosos. Por ejemplo, el grupo de coristas del Perú, que eran exitosos antiguamente y se decía de ellos, “ellos valdrán un Perú”. |
| Joseph: That’s very interesting. I’d never heard that one before. So, as Bea says, there is an old expression in Perú, “valer un Perú”. And what you are saying is “to be worth a Perú”, and this comes from the richness that the Spanish found as the conquest was going on. |
Outro |
| Beatriz: ¡Qué rápido pasa el tiempo! |
| Joseph: Flecha veloz. That’s all the time we have for today. |
| Beatriz: Thanks for joining us. |
| Joseph: Bueno Beatriz, ha sido un gusto. Gracias por acompañarnos. |
| Beatriz: El gusto es mío. Y nos vemos en la próxima lección. |
| Joseph: Hasta luego, gracias. Nos vemos pronto. |
| Beatriz: ¡Chao, chao! Bye-bye! |
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