Verbs and Related Basics

Below you’ll find an introduction to key Spanish verb types and their uses, and some examples particularly relevant to the Experience Industries. But before that, some other basics are best outlined here for the non-linguist, because there are a few important points to note to use verbs correctly in different situations.

Although in spoken Spanish, personal pronouns are often missed out, you do need to be aware of how they are used and what they look like in Spanish – the equivalents of I, me, you, we, us, they, etc in English. Firstly, the subject pronouns are used when a person is the one ‘doing’ the action. In English these are I, you, he/she/it, we and they, for example I kick the ball, you catch the ball. The Spanish equivalents, used with the different forms of the verb (conjugations) are

yo (I); tú (you, familiar singular); él/ella (he and she respectively); nosotros/as (we, m/f); vosotros/as (you, plural m/f); ellos/ellas (they – male and female respectively). In addition there is a more formal usted form (you, polite sing.) and ustedes (you, polite pl.).

Object pronouns are used when something is happening to or involving someone. In English, this is me, you, him/her, us and them – so, as you can see, we use fewer pronouns. In Spanish the equivalent object pronouns also change depending on whether whether who you’re referring to is being directly affected by what’s happening – the direct object. For example, if a coach says to a gymnast “I will catch you”, I is a subject pronoun and you is the direct object in that sentence.

In Spanish, the direct object pronouns (for I, you, him/her, us, you (pl.) and they) are me, te, le/la (him/her), nos, os, les/las. In addition, lo and los is used for ‘things’ (i.e. ‘it’ and ‘them’) rather than people, e.g. I threw it, or I collected them. For the polite forms, lo is used for the singular and os is used for the plural.

Indirect object pronouns are used when something involves a person but is not affecting them, e.g. when telling someone, the ‘someone’ isn’t affected (at least in grammatical terms!) In contexts like this, Spanish uses a slightly different set of pronouns: me, te, le (for either him or her), nos, os, les (for ‘them’, whether male, female or both).

Just to complicate things a little further, when a preposition is used (e.g. speaking to someone) the pronoun is different still. For me and you (e.g. he is speaking to me, this gift is for you), Spanish uses mí and tí, e.g. ‘to me’ is a mí, and ‘for you’ is para tí. The other pronouns in this case are largely the same as the subject pronouns (e.g. a él, con ella, para nosotros, de vosotras, con ellos).

However, ‘with me’, with you’ (e.g. ‘you can work with me’) and the less commonly used ‘with himself/herself’ (e.g ‘she has taken a cellphone with her’) have a special form in conmigo, contigo and consigo respectively. The rest, ‘with him’ (e.g. are you going with him?’), ‘with us/you (pl.)/them’ take the form con él, con ella, con nosotros/as, con vosotros/as, con ellos/as.

Reflexive verbs mostly use the above pronouns, but please see that section for more detail. There are also some regional variations in Latin America for example.

The main verb forms – a reminder

Verbs may be regular, following neatly the sequence of ‘endings’ below, or they might be irregular, meaning that at some point they deviate form these rules – some significantly, others just a little. Below is the simple present tense of three examples, relevant to the Experience Industries of the main types of verb, known as ~ar , ~er and ~ir verbs.

It’s worth learning these standard formats because the vast majority of verbs are ~ar, with maybe only 30 % across ~er and ~ir. Not all of these are regular, of course, and it has been reported that perhaps a little over 40% are irregular in one way or another. These irregularities don’t have to be a barrier to learning and communication, especially when you realise that some verbs you’ll never use at all, while those you do use frequently will become very familiar. In any case, slight mistakes are entirely forgivable and to be expected. As long as you can get your point across, it’s ‘job done’!

… Some of the more useful regular verbs (at least largely regular) are listed below.

Irregular verbs vary from the regular formats in different ways and they are seldom completely irregular. Some, like abrir (open) or escribir (write) are regular in the present tense but deviate in another such as a past participle (abierto, escrito). This means once you identify and practice an irregular verb you need to be aware of any irregularities you can expect to encounter.

You’ll also notice some patterns in irregularity, such as word endings for similar verbs in similar situations, such as agradecer (to thank/be thankful for) follows a pattern similar to conocer (to know/be familiar with).

The examples below illustrate some different variations amongst irregular verbs – the first three tables show variation in the present tense, sometimes just the yo form, sometimes more widespread, like cerrar – the first example. The next tables illustrate variations elsewhere.

Reflexive verbs largely follow the pattern below, and more examples are listed elsewhere on this site, but three examples are shown below for reference. In short these verbs indicate an action where the person(s)/subject(s) doing the action are affecting themself/ves. For example, bañarse (to bathe oneself) is different from bañar, which indicates something/someone else is being bathed.

The examples given below are all irregular, but the focus here is on patterns that make up a reflexive verb. There are examples of regular reflexive verbs of course such as bañarse, marcharse (to go away/leave), but you’ll find the majority are ~ar verbs, and in fact any verb that has the possibility of doing something to oneself can have a reflexive equivalent.

… And finally, three of the most important verbs – the verbs ‘to have’ tener and ‘to be’ – ser and estar in the simple present tense. Tener is widely used either alone or in phrases such as to have to (tener que), and to describes states like being cold, excited, etc.

As previously explained ser and estar are used for more and less permanent contexts respectively, although the original logic of this is in some respects no longer valid. They would have developed, for example, at a time when someone’s career path or profession would be largely unchanged throughout their lifetime, hence use of ser for professions as well as more intrinsically permanent characteristics like colour or size. The use of estar for location, how we are feeling, and other temporary ‘states’, does of course make sense.

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