CLASE 3. En la ciudad – In the town. Léxico

Determined Article

Common nouns in Spanish are normally preceded by an article. Definite article (el artículo determinado) is used with well-defined nouns. Spanish articles change in number and gender:

Spanish articles must agree in number and gender with the noun. Unlike in English, they must be used with the subject of the principal verb:

Los españoles son bajitos – ___ Spanish are small
La universidad de Madrid es famosa – ____ Madrid University is famous

As you can see, articles in Spanish are more frequent than in English.

Normally, you should not use articles with proper nouns, compare:

en el supermercado – in the supermarket
en la farmacia – in the pharmacy
en ___ Francia – in ___ France

Gender of Nouns

Nouns in Spanish have gender. Femenine nouns (sustantivos femeninos) usually end in -a, -d, -ción:

la farmacia
la hermana
la ciudad
la información

Masculine nouns (sustantivos masculinos) usually end in -o, -ma:

el banco
el hermano
el problema
el programa

Preposition en

Words with en preposition always mean location:

en el metro – in the subway
en casa – at home
en la mesa – on the table

As you can see, the preposition en can be translated in a lot of manners like in, at, on because Spanish doesn´t priorize the type of location (vertical or horizontal, open or close space) but the location itself.

With proper nouns and words casa (home), clase (class) the article is omitted:

en ___ España
en ___ Estados Unidos
en ___ casa
en ___ clase

To be at somebody should be translated as en casa de:

Estoy en casa de Ana – I am at Ana

Cardinal numbers from 10 to 31

We use only one word to write numbers until 30.

In order to ask How many or How much, you should use cuánto, cuánta, cuántos, cuántas. These words agree in gender and number:

– ¿Cuántos años tienes? – What is your age? (lit. How many years do you have?)
– Treinta y tres. Tengo treinta y tres años. – I am 33.

– ¿Cuántas hijas tiene Javier? – How many daughters has Javier?
– Dos: María y Cristina. – He has got two: Maria and Cristina.

– ¿Cuánto tiempo tienes? – How much time do you have?
– Veinte minutos. – Twenty minutes.

Dates

Days of month are represented by numbers with el article:

– ¿Cuándo es tu cumpleaños? – When is your birthday?
– El veinticinco.– The 25th.

In the formal language, you can use the number instead of the name of the month:

– ¿Cuándo es la Navidad? – When is Christmas?
– El veinticinco del doce = On 25th December

In Spanish we say the day of the month first, and then, the month.