The Journey to Fluency

27. In college studying Spanish and Japanese, but mainly Spanish for now. Aspiring future translator. Eager to share the language journey with others! Spanish, Japanese, Swedish, dabbles in way too many others.

[somethinginworl]

[datasoong47]

[atii-uqaulahaluanngilutit]

My favorite response to “that’s not a word” is “then why do you know what it means?”

[deanwinchesterapologist]

as we move into the final stretch of the "school year" i would like to reiterate that the world is beautiful and there's more to life than college. very soon we will lay in the grass and stare into the night. okay

[spanishskulduggery]

hi - I’ve had trouble finding a satisfactory answer online for this: why is it that some adjectives precede the noun theyre describing? for example, “un buen profesor” or “la nueva maestra”. i love your blog and it’s helped me so much! thank you!!

Someone else asked a similar question that I have saved in my drafts I've been working on. I'll give you a short version before I go back to my drafts

Most adjectives go after the noun [el gato negro "the black cat", la luna llena "full moon" etc]

When regular adjectives go before the noun it reads as very exclamative and flashy, as if that adjective were in bold or italics. Full on extra emphasis [as in: El maravilloso mago de Oz "the wonderful wizard of Oz" which reads as "the wondrous" or "the marvelous" rather than simply "great" or "wonderful" in a traditional sense]

Some nouns change meaning depending on adjective placement; nuevo/a, and bueno/a are like that

More below...

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Another basic example: es una historia larga "it's a long story" vs. es una larga historia "it's a SUPER long story"

In the case of nuevo/a if it comes after the noun it means "brand-new" like "never been used before"

If it comes before the noun it tends to mean "newest" or "latest"

As an example:

la nueva maestra = the new teacher [f] / the teacher [f] who was just hired la maestra nueva = the new teacher / the rookie teacher

If I saw la nueva maestra I would tend to think "just hired", if I see la maestra nueva I get the sense she's a teacher who doesn't really know how to teach but that might just be me

Other adjectives like this are mismo/a where la misma cosa is "the same thing" vs. la cosa misma "the thing itself"

A really common one is triste like if you see triste in front it means "dreadful", if you see it behind it's just "sad"

And there's antiguo/a, bueno / buen, buena, grande / gran, viejo/a, mismo/a, nuevo/a, mal / malo/a, triste, etc.

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In the case of bueno/a which is honestly more confusing, this is the way I was taught:

un buen amigo = "a good friend" = he was good as a friend

un amigo bueno = "a kind friend" = he was a good person who was also my friend

Similarly there's malo

un mal amigo = "a bad friend" = a friend who is not a good friend

un amigo malo = "a bad friend" = a friend who is a bad person

But there are certain expressions or set "collocations" [a set word phrase] that use them a certain way like un buen augurio "a good omen" vs. un mal augurio "a bad omen / an ill omen"

[spanishskulduggery]

@argentinosaurus made some very good points in the tags! And please let me know if I am misunderstanding what's being said.

"Adjectives that precede the nouns they're modifying usually indicate a certain emotional response. compare: un hombre pobre vs un pobre hombre. [un hombre pobre "a man who has no money / a poor man" vs. un pobre hombre "an unfortunate man / a poor man"]

there's emotion there"

The rest talks about more grammatical matters which I don't know how many people know the linguistic terms so I'm hesitant to totally include it in full without a constant explanation on my part

But essentially they're saying that in a phrase like tomo el café frío "I drink cold coffee", the adjective frío is directly modifying café as a "premodifier" would in English - describing what the noun is, a quality of the "coffee"... your basic adjective function

The second - tomo frío el café - uses the adjective in a way that in translation is what we would call "an object complement" or "objective complement". This basically means that you're using an adjective to describe a noun in terms of a change or a modification of its original state... basically it reads as "I drink coffee cold"... meaning "I drink coffee when it has become cold"

In essence: "cold coffee" describes what it is, "coffee cold" describes what it has now become

[and important note this isn't an adverb like we aren't saying a person drinks their coffee "coldly" which makes it sound like the person is doing it without emotion... the "cold" still complements/modifies the "coffee"]

...But for our general purposes in Spanish, they're right in saying that un pobre hombre elicits a more emotional response. And in something like la Antigua Grecia "Ancient Greece", it makes sense in terms of it's not antiguo/a meaning "former", it refers to a Greece that has now become "Ancient" to us

That's how I'm understanding it, and that might help people understand it more completely in the linguistic sense

[ramosotero]

Quick grammar tip for Spanish: want to put two adverbs together to describe the same verb? For example in English, "She worked quickly and efficiently", how would you do this in Spanish?

For the first adverb, you just leave the adjective in its feminine form, or if it's an adjective that doesn't change form (like firme), as it is, without the suffix -mente. Then, the word 'y', and then finally the second adverb as you would normally do it. Following the example I gave above in English, I found a guide called "Cómo leer rápida y eficazmente" (How to read quickly and efficiently). This way, you're not repeating the suffix -mente and your speech flows better :)

[phonaesthemes]

🤨

[silenttranslator]

I read my first translation in my class this week and everyone really seemed to like it! It was definitely nerve-wracking but I'm so glad that everyone liked it. Maybe I'm better at it than I give myself credit for.

[spanishskulduggery]

Oh and as far as “collocations” with certain adjectives it tends to be certain specific things. As an example, bello/a “beautiful” is often placed behind nouns; la mujer bella “the beautiful woman”. If you put it in front you sound poetic and extremely flattering la bella mujer “the BEAUTIFUL woman”

…And then you have a collocation which is a set phrase you can’t say a different way: las bellas artes “the fine arts”

Keep reading

[rumman]

mutuals are people u wanna eat bread dipped in olive oil with

[levourdalak]

[etirabys]

love too make models and advance human knowledge

[hindisoup]

[silenttranslator]

Getting past that inner self-doubt of "I don't know this language well enough to speak" and then tripping yourself up is really difficult. I'm trying to somehow get past that mindset but ugh, it's so hard to get out of your own head.

[adhd-languages]

Hey! If anyone wants anything translated Spanish-English or vice versa, send me a message or ask!

I’m by no means a professional but it’s also free so just keep that in mind.

—

Hola! Si hay alguien que quiera algo traducido (Inglés a español o viceversa), envíeme un mensaje o ask.

No soy profesional de ninguna manera jaja. Pero es gratis. Así que no se queje.

[silenttranslator]

"Cien años de soledad" Vocab, Part 1

Welcome to the first annual* vocab list from Gabriel García Márquez's magnum opus!

*not actually annual, probably like every week or something

For some reason, I'm crazy and decided to read though this novel in Spanish to try and better my skills. While it's considered one of the best novels ever written, I've also heard horror stories about its difficulty, so I'm going to be creating a vocab list of things I didn't know while reading to not only help myself but anyone else who comes across this! Let's get started.

aldea (nf) - small village; this word comes up a lot in here so far

cañabrava (nf) - reed

diáfano (adj) - diaphanous, translucent, clear (as of sky), bright (as of light)

lecho (nm) - bed, riverbed

pulido (adj) - polished

carecer (vi) - to lack, to not have; in context here, used with "de nombre" to describe the time period, "many things lacked names"

desarrapado (adj) - ragged, shabby

alboroto (nm) - noise, din, racket

montaraz (adj) - rustic, coarse

gorrión (nm) - sparrow

truculento (adj) - gruesome, horrifying

espantar (vt) - to scare (away)

desenclavar (vt) - to pull out, to remove (forcibly)

desbandada (nf) - jailbreak, (figurative) stampede

pregonar (vt) - to announce, to proclaim

desaforado (adj) - enormous, boundless, immeasurable

desentrañar (vt) - to figure out, to unravel; used here in the context of pulling gold out from the ground

imantar (vt) - to magnetize; used here as a participle "lingotes imantados"

sobrar (vi) - to be left over

empedrar (vt) - to pave, to fill

empeñarse en (v.pron+prep) - to insist on

palmo a palmo (adv. expr.) - in by inch, meticulously

conjuro (nm) - spell, incantation

cascote (nm) - (piece of) rubble

calabazo (nm) - pumpkin, gourd

desarticular (vt) - to break (up), to take apart, to dislocate (medical term)

colgado (adj) - hanging, fixated by, frozen (computer term)

relicario (nm) - reliquary, locket

rizo (nm) - curl, ringlet (of hair), loop

And that was just the first paragraph! That's one thing I've noticed about his writing style, he LOVES very long, drawn out sentences and paragraphs. At this rate, every post might be just one paragraph... We'll see what happens.

Hopefully this is a helpful list to everyone! Look forward to the next lengthy vocab list!

[peistudies]

Why learn a foreign language, you ask?

Understanding and speaking the language will at some point inevitably make you feel like a spy/important person… - Bonus points for when you can eavesdrop on public conversations.

Have those fun little moments when you catch mistakes in your target language on signs, merchandise and in media. (Especially if it’s Japanese or Chinese… People love to butcher those). 

Imagine what your crush would think if they suddenly realize you speak a different language 3 months after meeting you. They may gasp, exclaim that you’re full of surprises, and go weak in the knees from your oh-so-mysterious demeanor (bonus points if it’s French or Italian). 

Fulfill your study aesthetic dreams, because you finally have something to theme a new blog around. Time to splurge on a pretty notebook and nice pens and work on that handwriting. Get the desk set up nice and cute, grab yourself the most beautiful coffee mug you can find. You’ve just become that girl. And you love it. Can’t forget to mention the messy buns, glasses (don’t have to be prescription), cat ownership and plants. 

Increase your chances of escaping eternal loneliness TEN FOLD because learning a language just opened doors to millions of people who couldn’t speak yours. 

Your personality may shift depending on which language you’re speaking, due to cultural and linguistic differences. So, by learning a new language, you will not only become more knowledgable about the world around you, but about yourself and people in general. 

Accurately understand books, shows, and all sorts of media in your target language. (No more relying on suspicious subtitles).

Feel satisfied in knowing that you’ve picked up quite a fun and rewarding hobby that can and will expand your life in every possible way.

[tealingual]

Reblog this if you’re a langblr that is studying/posts about • Finnish • English • Japanese • Swedish • German • Arabic

[silenttranslator]

I feel like I put myself in way too deep on this personal project. Why did I decide to start reading "Cien años de soledad"? Why didn't I pick something easier? Oh well. It's a long-term project, at least. I'll have to make update posts on how it goes.