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Five Minute Study - SPANISH and ENGLISH compared Guía de la gramática inglesa...
En estas lecciones breves se comparan el inglés hablado y coloquial con el español con el fin de ayudar al estudiante a apreciar tanto las diferencias como las similitudes lingüísticas entre los dos idiomas.
Prepositions (4)
Spanish Personal "a" and English translations 2
Here are some exceptions in the use of the Spanish personal a. Although it is usually used before a person when a direct object it is not usually placed before the verb to have (or have got) for possession, in Spanish: tener.
Tengo dos hijos I've got two children
But there is another use of tener when personal a is used. The meaning is based on the idea of how somebody treats or uses another person:
Tiene a sus hijos como esclavos She treats her children like slaves
Tengo a mi mujer a régimen I'm keeping my wife on a diet
The verb querer in Spanish has two meanings: to want and to love. When it means to love, we use personal a:
Quiero a mi mujer I love my wife
Quiero una mujer para limpiar la casa I want a woman to clean the house
However, with personal pronouns, we have to use personal a:
Yo te quiero a ti (used to emphasize "you" and not somebody else. Otherwise, we could say: (Yo) te quiero.) I love you or I want you
So, to avoid confusion, the second example would be phrased in another way:
Yo quiero que tú vengas a limpiar I want you to come and clean
When there are two person objects in a sentence as direct and indirect object, a Spanish sentence drops the personal a before the direct object and uses a in front of the indirect object:
Voy a presentar Paco a Carmen (not a Paco)
So this type of sentence translates in a similar way in English:
I'm going to introduce Paco to Carmen
Envié mi madre al médico (not a mi madre) I sent my mother to the doctor's
When we refer to nouns which represent groups of people, we also use personal a in Spanish:
Hay que evitar a la multitud We must avoid the crowds
Con esta política Francia ha puesto a Inglaterra en un apuro (Here Inglaterra means the English) With this policy France has put England in a predicament
But compare:
Odio Inglaterra; es un país tan frío y húmedo (Here Inglaterra means the country not the English) I hate England; it's such a cold and wet country
Finally, there are situations when we use personal a before non-human and non-animal objects. Learners of Spanish must remember that this language is very flexible as to the order of the parts of a sentence (syntax). Consider this relative clause in English:
Software that protects your PC
Learners of English should know that English has a fairly rigid syntax. This is:
Subject + verb + object eg.: Software that protects your PC
But Spanish syntax can be:
Subject + verb + object or, Direct object + verb + subject
So, to avoid ambiguity (ie. which is the subject) we place a before the direct object when the verb comes before the subject:
Un software que protege a su PC Subject + verb + object Software that protects your PC
Without a the sentence would mean:
Your PC that protects software Subject + verb + object Un software que protege su PC Direct object + verb + subject
Here are some more examples of where the subject comes after the verb in Spanish. But note that the syntax in English never varies.
No sé si esto puede dañar al equipo I don't know if this could damage the equipment
La huelga afectó al tráfico The strike affected the traffic
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