Unstressed object pronouns are used in Spanish to sustitude direct and indirect objects, it's one of the trickies structures in Spanish and even native speakers can missuse them, so you must be carefull when dealing with them. They can be translated sometimes as: me, you, him, her, it, us and them, however you must be aware that they don't have exactly the same meaning.
To be able to use correctly unstressed object pronouns you must be able to recognize fastly when a phrase contain either an object or indirect object. An direct object is the object which receives the action of a verb, it can be discovered by asking ¿what? ¿whom? to the verb. Example: Pepe eats fish | Pepe come pescado (what does Pepe eat?)
do (direct object) = fish = pescado
Exercises: Find out the direct object of the following phrases:
> Juan loves Maria | Juan ama a María
> Carlos fixes computers | Carlos repara computadoras
> The policeman saw the thiefs / El policia vio a los ladrones
The indirect object is whom take the action of the direct object, and it can be discovered by asking ¿to whom? ¿for whom?. Example: Lucas buys a watermelon for Sandra / Lucas compra una sandía para Sandra
do (direct object) = a watermelon = una sandía
io (indirect object) = for Sandra = para Sandra
Exercises: Find out the direct and indirect object of the following phrases:
> Margarita made coffe for Marcos / margarita hizo café para Marcos
> Alba gave some tips to her son / Alba dio unos consejos a su hijo
> The boss told the workers to arrive earlier / El jefé dijo a los trabajadores que llegaran más temprano
Once you're able to identify the existence of an direct|indirect object in a phrase you will be able to use the appropiate pronoun. Use the following table to identify which pronouns can be used:
http://i.imgur.com/kYv9S0p.png
Example: Pepe eats fish | Pepe come pescado
do=fish=pescado, pescado refears to an animal in third person singular (he, the fish), therefore you must use 'lo' and replace the phrase as follows:
Pepe lo come (most of the times, the object pronouns must be located before the main verb)
Let's review other example: Juan loves Maria | Juan ama a María
do=a Maria, Maria refears to a person in third person singular (she, Maria), therefore you must use 'la' in the sentence:
Juan la ama
Exercises: Replace the direct object in the following senteces with the appropiate pronoun:
> ¿Did you find your mother's ring? | ¿Has encontrado el anillo de tu madre?
> Roberto paid a lot of money for his new car | Roberto pagó mucho dinero por su nuevo carro
> A friend will translate the book | Un amigo traducirá el libro
The same technique can be used to replace indirect objects, Example:
Lucas buys a watermelon for Sandra / Lucas compra una sandía para Sandra
od=a watermelon = una sandía
id=for Sandra=para Sandra
Sandra refears to a third person in singular (she, Sandra), and it can be replaced with 'le' because it's an indirect object and not a direct object (in that case it would be replaced with 'la')
Lucas le compra una sandía
Exercises: Replace the indirect object in the following senteces with the appropiate pronoun:
> Tomorrow I'll give the money to Eduardo | Mañana entregaré el dinero a Eduardo
> I bought a gift for you | Compré un regalo para ti
> The donations this year will be given back to the contributers | Los donativos de este año serán devueltos a los contribuyentes
You can replace both, the direct and the indirect objects with pronouns however an additional rule must be learn, whenever you want to put together a 'lo' and 'le', you must replace the second one (indirect object) with 'se'. Example: Lucas buys a watermelon for Sandra | Lucas compra una sandía para Sandra
od=a watermelon = una sandía
id=para Sandra=for Sandra
Lucas la compra para Sandra (replacing the direct object)
Lucas le compra una sandía (replacing the indirect object)
Lucas se la compra (replacing both, the direct and indirect objects, pay attention to the 'se' which replaces 'le' for the indirect object)
keywords, palabras clave: leismo, laismo, loismo, objeto directo, objeto indirecto
If you've questions or want to practice Spanish, let me know =)
Comandante: I think it's considerably more difficult than English, I've already written my reasons, I'm a native Spanish speaker so it's actually easier for me but if you take in consideration the grammar structures you can conclude that it's actually harder because it has more tenses, it diference between gender and uses non commons structures for English speakers (subjuntive).
Tania: I think you can start with this page:
http://www.studyspanish.com/pronunciation/alphabet.htm
And then start reading as much as posibily, you could also look for karaoke songs, and sing while reading the lyric
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BNLl4l889HI
When you finish practicing the alphabet you could head to the bbc, it has good tutorial, one which is really good is 'Mi vida loca' (my crazy life)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/languages/spanish/mividaloca/ep01.shtml
Have fun
thanks alot .one of my chinese friend help me so much and shown me a site for learning chinese ,it is really great but my biggest problem is their wrting ! DO you know a site that i learn letters with thier sound? now i want to improve my english by learning anew languge.
I feel that Spanish is easier than English, I am not sure though. I am still begginer. What do you think?
Learning*
Learn a new language (any) is difficult and requires commitment, Spanish is no exception, if you're interested in learning Spanish you'll require to dedicate a fair amount of hours a week for at least 6 months or so (for getting basic skills) it then the rest of your life to master it, it's an endless process =)
If you know nothing about it I would suggest you to start with the alphabet, luckely both, English and Spanish use the same latin alphabet, so you'll only require to learn the new letters and the sounds. After doing it, you'll be able to start reading everything you find (even if you don't understand). Then you could try to memorize basic vocabulary and basic expresions (how to say, hi, goodbye, your name, your age, etc). You would need to learn some basic verbs, try to start with the more common and regular (left the irregular verbs for later). Understand and learn how to conjugate in present, past and future and take a look at subjuntive (you'll need to master subjuntive if you're not kidding about learning Spanish). Try to find native people and other Spanish enthusiastic to practice. Take every free moment to practice, start a Spanish blog, read news in Spanish, listen music, watch movies get an Spanish boyfriend =P and enjoy each and every thing you do in Spanish, enjoy using Spanish, if you don't do it, probably you won't go to far.
Bests
