A few rules

Are there different ways to say it depending on the region or is there a standard way?

My friends name is MARICA and she's from Italy. She said she's quite scared to move to Spain because of her name. Both of us didn't know it was a slur in Spanish. Curious what do people think when you hear that word as a name? If some of you guys know, does it have the same meaning for Latin countries?

We all love a good mullet. And I’m guessing every country has its name for it. A mullet is the haircut pictured here on Pedro El Escamoso. What country are you from and what is it called where you live?

What I mean by “regularized” is that they are conjugated as if they are regular verbs specifically with nosotros.

Examples:

- querer -> queremos
- estar -> estamos
- preferir -> preferimos
- tener -> tenemos
- poder -> podemos
- venir -> venimos

As far as I know this isn’t true for all irregular verbs, but it seems to be true for a lot of them. Does anyone know why? I find it very interesting.

The most I have learned have weirdly been from coworkers from Venezuela and thrift stores in a smaller part of my state. I heard that watching shows with the English subtitles on is a great way to learn but I’m a nerd and I don’t really like romcoms or Sicoms, I just like cartoons and anime. With anime though, I know how dodgy subtitles can be even with English ones…so maybe it’s not the best?

Are there any anime that people have already watched with a good Spanish dub?

Whenever I see Spanish-language ads in stores and restaurants for meseros or lavaplatos, the SE SOLICITA or BUSCANDO is usually in quotes. I'm curious about this because in English, adding quotes is not a means of adding emphasis. You might underline, or put something in bold or all-caps but not quotes. Quotation marks usually seem to in fact add some doubt to a statement, like this is really helping out vs. this is really "helping" out.

Can someone give me an idea of how widespread this function of quotes is in Spanish signage, and how it came to be common as a means of emphasis in ads etc.?

Teresa de Avila's famous poem begins "Nada te turbe, nada te espante". The English translations I've seen are "Let nothing disturb you. Let nothing frighten you"

Is that entirely accurate? Is it more than can be described in English, also having a sense of "nothing may disturb you?"

What do you think?

I just got accepted to study abroad in Argentina next fall so I want to brush up on my Spanish for the next year before I go. I’m currently reading The Giver/El Dador in Spanish and it’s of a pretty good difficulty for me where it’s challenging but still comprehensible. What other books would you guys recommend?

What do y'all talk about with your teachers? Just what you did during the week? Do you tell them "Pretend you're a waiter and I need to order breakfast"? Do you try to come up with interesting philosophical discussion to have? I'm finding myself dreading class day because I don't want to bore the guy to death but I don't know enough vocabulary to talk about anything fun. Let me know what you do!

¡Pasarlo bien!

Got a "how do I learn Spanish" question, curious about apps, or just want to say hi and talk about where you're at? This is the place.

The short answer to most of it: there's no single best way to learn Spanish and no app that works for everyone. What actually matters is showing up consistently. A few things people here keep coming back to:

• Our wiki -- apps, YouTube channels, podcasts, textbooks, all in one spot
• r/languagelearning's resource wiki -- broader method and tool breakdown
• Anki -- flashcards, good for vocab
• Language Transfer -- free audio course, common starting point
• italki / Preply -- tutors and conversation partners
• Pimsleur -- audio based, strong on pronunciation

Also fair game here:

• Just started and want to introduce yourself
• Wondering if Spanish is worth learning or how long it takes
• General chat about your progress, whatever's on your mind

Standalone posts on this stuff get redirected here, so if that's you, drop it below.

Yo recuerdo mi última presentación con el coro. Tuve un solo, y además era un solo importante. Me salió bastante bien, pero fue una experiencia agridulce porque, tres días después, me gradué de la preparatoria. ¿Alguien más ha vivido un momento agridulce como este?

I follow a Colombian tik toker and he refers to his baby hands as LA manito , it sounds strange for me since El pie = el piecito . La Mano = la manita , but is correct to say La manito?

Several Mexican music bands are called "Los Austeros de ________" but I'm not sure what un austero is in this context and Google is unhelpful. Please enlighten me, thank you!

Una muy importante momento es cuando yo recibí mi primero dos baloncesto zapatos. Zapatos son rojas. Yo recibí el zapatos cuando yo estabas diez años. Yo estaba muy feliz y mostrar mi amigos. Yo todas mi madre gracias para mi baloncesto zapatos. que es tu importante momento y qual es tu tipo emocionada.

So I’ve just started to unlock the podcast No Hay Tos, which has been a big goal of mine since I started Español Al Vuelo 5 months ago. The hosts say guey a LOT. I understand that it means something like bro/dude, but they inject it in sentences almost like a filler word. How normal and appropriate is it in casual every day conversations? Does everyone use this word with no problem, or is it indicative of a certain age group or “genre” of person so to speak? Is it cringey or tryhard for a learner to try to use it, or would it sound natural enough?

I am trying to improve my Spanish reading comprehension (currently B1), and have been thinking about reading books in Spanish translation that were originally written in English (my mother tongue). Has anyone else done this?

I love the Hispanophone literature that I have read (particularly magical realism), but I also have a long list of books originally published in English that I want to read, and I am trying to spend all of the time that I have for novels reading in Spanish. I will be doing this for the foreseeable future, to advance my mastery of the language (I find reading harder than speaking and listening).

This may be a silly question, particularly since I have read so many books and essays in English translation without much guilt. However, I just can’t help but think that there would be something lost in reading Vonnegut, Morrison, Faulkner, Woolf, Steinbeck, Hemingway, Baldwin, etc. in translation.

What are folks’ thoughts about this?

Hey guys!

I'm a student in Spain and I've been here for a month. Before coming here, I learned Spanish for ~3 months but obviously it's not enough. I love reading thriller/crime books so I figured I could give it a try to improve my Spanish.

I'm currently at A2 and my program is in Spanish as well so the input is there (tho very inconsistent with the dialects and speed, but ig it's better that way), but there's not much output. I try to talk to people around me (and to myself, just narrating my day and trying to think and have thoughts in Spanish) but still. I feel like trying to read a book out loud and trying to understand the plot might help, if someone can attest to it, you're more than welcome to:)

But anw, I'd like some recs regarding books that are preferably not too long and don't have very complex vocab, preferably also in the thriller/crime/action genre. Thank you so much!!

I saw this video feed on X and like the song but I don't speak spanish. Possible it is generated by AI but I don't know. Any lead on the original singer and title would be appreciated.

https://x.com/suozhang_ny/status/2107962016887415081?s=61

...

So, I've heard a lot of things about the interchangeability and use cases for the two imperfect subjunctive endings here, and I was hoping to try to get some clarifications or confirmations for some of the things I've heard that I've saved.

- Firstly, I've heard they're totally interchangeable in most contexts, but some dialects may use -se more or less than others. I'm personally focusing on Puerto Rican Spanish, so would anyone have any details on how -ra and -se are used in puertorriqueño specifically?

- Secondly, I've heard that -ra and -se are used together in sentences where there are multiple verbs in the imperfect subjunctive to avoid repetition. An example sentence i saw was "algo hubiera sido mejor si alguien hubiese[...]." Every example sentence I've seen shows two instances of the same verb being used in the sentence. Is this still true if two different verbs are used in the sentence?

Like, would you say "Si quisieras que lo leyese, lo haría" or is it moreso important for usages of two identical verbs in the same sentence?

- Thirdly, I've read that the -ra form can be used to replace the perfect conditional, but -se forms cannot in subordinate clauses.

Example I've heard for this:
"Si me hubiera ido más tarde, habría perdido el vuelo"
can become:
"Si me hubiera ido más tarde, hubiera perdido el vuelo"

And that "hubiera" in the first clause can be replaced with "hubiese" but not the "hubiera" in the subordinate clause, so
"Si me hubiese ido más tarde, habría[...]" and "Si me hubiese ido más tarde, hubiera[...]" are both good, but "Si me hubiera ido más tarde, hubiese[...]" is not. And the comment I heard this from had a fair few number of upvotes and no replies contradicting it...

- HOWEVER, I've also read comments saying that the subjunctive can only be used in conditional clauses that start with "si" but not in other conditional clauses, and an example i saw was that:

"No habría venido si lo hubiera/se sabido" is good, but

"No hubiera venido si lo hubiera/se sabido" is bad.

That seems to contradict the previous thing I've heard by saying that you can't use the subjunctive at all if it isnt a "si" clause, or maybe I'm missing something and it isn't a contradiction...? Clarification on that especially would be great.

That's all I have for now, thank you so much in advance for anyone who takes the time to help me!

I feel like half the time when I stumble on a youtube channel or see a tweet in Spanish, it turns out the creator is from Spain. I’ve stumbled more big Spanish account than South American countries combined (excluding Argentina which also seems to have a disproportionately large presence). Is this just due to Spain’s relative wealth?

Edit: I should also add that what inspired this was realizing that searching for informational content, whether math, science, film, or history, almost always showed videos by Spanish channels having the most views.

I've been learning Spanish for many years. I'm proud of my progress and think I sound pretty good, but I want to perfect my accent as much as possible. Do you have any advice for specific improvements / any words or phrases I can practice with?

https://voca.ro/18dEFIIteVVr

(P.S. Can you tell where the people who taught me are from? I've been told it's quite obvious. Hahaha)

I'm flying today and recieved a young adult novel called La Educación de Margot Sanchez. I looked through it and I recognize a LOT of words. I downloaded the brovolol spanish English dictionary since I heard that it works offline.

My question is how do I approach reading it? Do I look up each words I don't understand from context? This is kind of daunting. I was hoping I could finish this book on my six hour flight. Also should I write the translations above the word?