C HAPTER 4

About Nouns

A NOUN, OR SUSTANTIVO, is a word that refers to a person, animal, thing, or idea. Nouns can be accompanied by articles (a, an, the) and described by adjectives. A noun may be the subject of the sentence, in which case it takes on the action of the verb, or it can serve as an object or as part of a prepositional phrase.

Divided by Gender

Only a few English nouns have a particular gender: for example, you know that “sister” is feminine and “brother” is masculine. But what about a noun like “cookie”? It doesn’t have a gender.

In Spanish, noun genders work a little differently. Hermana is feminine and hermano is masculine, so nouns representing people work similarly. However, the difference is that even nouns like “cookie” have a gender (in this case, galleta is a feminine noun). All nouns in Spanish can be divided into two groups: feminine and masculine.

This doesn’t mean that people who speak Spanish see cookies as having particularly feminine qualities. The gender of any particular noun has nothing to do with the object itself—it’s a grammatical construction that allows nouns to agree with other parts of speech. So if you see a noun in context, you can figure out whether it’s masculine or feminine by checking the ending of its article or adjective. If these clues aren’t available, you can probably make a guess based on a few rules of thumb presented here.

Check the Ending

The clue to whether a noun is masculine or feminine can be found in its ending. The first rule of thumb is that some masculine nouns end in an –o, and many feminine nouns end in an –a.

Masculine	Feminine
el caso (case)	la casa (house)
el gasto (expense)	la plata (silver)
el techo (roof)	la mosca (fly)
el niño (boy)	la niña (girl)

One important exception to this rule: Nouns that end with –ma, like el problema (problem), are masculine.

ALERT

The easiest way to keep track of which nouns are masculine and which are feminine is to memorize them along with their definite article (the). As you’ll learn in the next section, masculine nouns agree with the masculine article el and feminine nouns with the feminine article la.

If the rule of thumb doesn’t apply, check to see if the noun has one the following endings. If it does, the noun is most likely feminine.

–dad	la verdad (truth)
–ión	la contemplación (contemplation)
–tad	la libertad (liberty)
–tud	la quietud (quiet)
–ie	la especie (species)
–sis	la tesis (thesis)
–ez	la vejez (old age)
–triz	la cicatriz (scar)
–umbre	la certidumbre (certainty)

With all other endings, you can probably assume that the noun is masculine. Unless, of course, it’s one of the exceptions to the rule.

Learn the Exceptions

Every rule has its exceptions, and there are a few nouns that don’t follow the general rules of grammatical gender:

Masculine	Feminine
el día (day)	la clase (class)
el planeta (planet)	la gente (people)
el mapa (map)	la cama (bed)
el sofá (sofa)	la pluma (pen)
el avión (plane)	la mano (hand)

Representing Gender

And what about nouns referring to people, which do have gender? In Spanish, nouns that represent people do match the gender of the person referred to. In some cases, the two words are completely different:

el hombre (man)

la mujer (woman)

Other nouns simply change the ending:

el tío (uncle)	la tía (aunt)
el primo (cousin)	la prima (cousin)
el abogado (lawyer)	la abogada (lawyer)
el niño (boy)	la niña (girl)

And in some cases, both genders retain the same ending:

el dentista (dentist)	la dentista (dentist)
el pianista (pianist)	la pianista (pianist)
el estudiante (student)	la estudiante (student)

ESSENTIAL

Here’s another exception to remember: there are a few feminine nouns that take on the article el in the singular. The reason for this is simple: Feminine nouns that begin with a stressed “ah” syllable can’t take on the article la— the two “ah”s will get swallowed up into one sound—so to make the article clear, you switch to el. For example: el águila (the eagle), las águilas (the eagles).

Forming Plurals

Conveniently enough, in Spanish a noun is made plural by adding an –s or –es, just as you do in English. If a noun ends in a vowel, use the –s ending:

carta (letter)	cartas (letters)
abuelo (grandfather)	abuelos (grandfathers)
guante (glove)	guantes (gloves)

Nouns ending in a consonant take on –es to form a plural:

comedor (dining room)	comedores (dining rooms)
habilidad (ability)	habilidades (abilities)
matón (killer)	matones (killers)

Dropping the Accent Mark

As you can see from the example of matón/matones , making a noun plural may affect the use of the accent mark. Remember, words ending with a vowel, S, or N generally have a stressed second-to-last syllable, and exceptions must employ the accent mark to show where the stress falls. Because matón is pronounced “mah-TOHN,” and not “MAH-tohn,” the accent mark is employed to indicate correct pronunciation. However, by adding –es the syllable “ton” becomes second-to-last, thus making the accent mark unnecessary in the plural.

Spelling Modifications

It’s also important to remember that adding the plural ending may affect the spelling of the word. For instance, a final Z will change to C, in order to avoid combination ZE, which does not occur in Spanish: el pez (fish), los peces (fishes).

QUESTION?

If a plural noun refers to a group of both genders, which ending should be used?
Plural nouns that refer to a mixed group of both genders retain a masculine ending. For example, even if you’ve got one male cousin and twelve female cousins, you will refer to them collectively as los primos.

Other Exceptions

As you know, some English nouns don’t have a singular and a plural form. For example, the word “elk” can be either singular or plural. The only way to know is through context. A few Spanish words behave the same way. For example, a compound word where the second part of the word is plural will retain the same ending, whether the noun is singular or plural: paraguas (umbrella, literally “for water”) is el paraguas in the singular and los paraguas in the plural.

Other nouns only exist in the singular form, even though they refer to more than one person or object. The best example is “people” or gente. Although the noun refers to multiple individuals, the form both in English and in Spanish remains singular.

Definite Articles

English only has one definite article: “the.” The article is used with nouns to make them specific (or definite): the book, the job, the idea. In a sense, Spanish also has one definite article, but the article has four forms because it must agree in gender and number with the noun that it precedes:

el	masculine/singular	el libro (the book)
la	feminine/singular	la mancha (the stain)
los	masculine/plural	los libros (the books)
las	feminine/plural	las manchas (the stains)

Note that the masculine/singular form el may appear as a contraction:

a + el	al (to the)
de + el	del (from the)

The contraction is formed because the vowel at the end of the preposition merges with the vowel at the beginning of the word el. This does not occur with the other forms of the article:

a la playa (to the beach)	al cine (to the movies)
de la playa (from the beach)	del cine (from the movies)

Indefinite Articles

An indefinite article preceding a noun indicates nonspecific (indefinite) objects: A book is an unspecified book; an idea is an unspecified idea. In English, the definite article “a” (“an” before a vowel) is only used with singular nouns. If there’s more than just a book, we say “books” or give the number of books: two books, some books, a few books.

In Spanish, the indefinite article can be used with singular as well as with plural objects. Because it must agree in gender and number with the noun it precedes, the indefinite article also has four forms:

un	masculine/singular	un libro (a book)
una	feminine/singular	una mancha (a stain)
unos	masculine/plural	unos libros (some books)
unas	feminine/plural	unas manchas (some stains)

FACT

The indefinite article means nothing more than “one.” A book is really one book; an idea is just one idea. In Spanish, this is more obvious because un and una can be translated as “one.”

Choosing the Right Article

For the most part, articles in English and Spanish correspond to each other: “the” usually translates as el, la, los, or las, and “a” or “an” translate as un or una. However, there are some instances where article usage in Spanish differs.

Dropping the Indefinite Article

The indefinite article is not used as frequently as it is in English. One general rule is that when substituting “a” for “one” sounds strange, you drop it in Spanish. For example, you don’t need it when describing someone’s profession:

Ella es enfermera.

She is a nurse.

Quiero ser millonario.

I want to be a millionaire.

The indefinite article is also dropped in exclamations beginning with qué:

¡Qué alegría!

What a joy!

¡Qué chiste más gracioso!

What an amusing joke!

The indefinite article is also dropped after con (with) and sin (without):

Escribo con pluma.

I write with a pen.

Sin duda, es la mejor idea.

Without a doubt, it’s the best idea.

Body Parts

In English, you would use the possessive pronoun “my” to refer to a part of your body. In Spanish, however, parts of the body are preceded by definite articles, whether you’re talking about your own body or about someone else’s:

Me rompí la pierna.

I broke my leg.

A ella le gusta cepillarse el cabello.

She likes to brush her hair.

As you’ll see in the following sections, expressions of possession also affect article use.

QUESTION?

What are proper nouns?
Proper nouns are “name” nouns. Jill, Smith, London, and Shorty are all examples of proper nouns. To help you make a distinction, think of it this way: “city” is a noun, but “London” is the name of a city, so it’s a proper noun.

The Rules of Possession

“Possession” is a big word for a simple concept: a relationship of ownership. If you ask the question “whose?” the answer—mine, Jane’s, the high school students’—is the possessor.

In English, possession is indicated by adding an apostrophe and “s” (’s) to the noun representing the possessor:

Jane’s car (car owned by Jane)

Student’s notebooks (notebooks of the student)

As you can see, in the English construction, the possessor (Jane, student) comes before what is possessed (car, notebooks). In Spanish, this construction does not exist. Instead, people use the Spanish equivalent of the preposition “of” (de ), and say el coche de Jane (literally, “the car of Jane”). In this construction, the object possessed always comes before the possessor:

los zapatos de Enrique

Enrique’s shoes

el libro de la chica con pelo negro

the girl with black hair’s book

la amiga de la hermana de Diana

Diana’s sister’s friend

In Spanish, the object or person possessed (shoes, girl, friend) carry a definite article. Possession can also be signaled with possessive pronouns, covered in the next chapter.

Practice Makes Perfect

Indicate whether each of the following nouns is masculine or feminine:

1.	árbol							_______________________
2.	dieta							_______________________
3.	navidad							_______________________
4.	malecón							_______________________
5.	solución							_______________________
6.	tienda							_______________________
7.	problema							_______________________
8.	paraguas							_______________________
9.	ajedrez							_______________________
10. especie							_______________________

Write down the plural form:

1.	la consecuencia							_______________________
2.	el microondas							_______________________
3.	un pez							_______________________
4.	una cocina							_______________________
5.	el ratón							_______________________
6.	un matador							_______________________
7.	la merced							_______________________
8.	un café							_______________________

Insert the correct definite and indefinite article, where necessary (and don’t forget about the rules of agreement):

1. Me gusta tomar una siesta ________________________ domingos.

2. Escribí ________________________ poemas para ella.

3. Me duele ________________________ cabeza.

4. Mi papá es ________________________ abogado.

5. Tengo ________________________ regalo para ti.

6. Ya pasaron ________________________ semanas desde que te vi ________________________ por última vez.

7. ________________Sánchez me invitaron a su casa a cenar con ____________ellos.

8. ¡Qué _________________bebé más dulce!

Translate into Spanish:

1.	Maria’s house							_______________________
2.	Ricardo’s brother’s wife							_______________________
3.	the class teacher							_______________________
4.	the doctor’s patients							_______________________
5.	the children’s toys							_______________________
6.	today’s lesson							_______________________

To check your answers, refer to the answer key in Appendix D.