What's The Most Difficult Thing In The Spanish Language?

[PhilipDT]

For me its nouns that have irregular gender.

Mapa
Foto
Problema

etc.

An interesting blog post on this topic for anyone who's interested
http://www.blogolengua.com/2009/10/sustantivos-masculinos-terminados-en.html?m=1

 

[AmigoArtistico]

Understanding the various uses of the word se. It's even a huge problem for Spanish speaking people. My wife is Argentine and used to teach Spanish in Argentine schools, to Argentine children. In the schools here they dedicate -- or used to, at least -- three months to teaching this little bastard, and it still gives me fits after many years now. It can indicate reflection, pseudo-passive tense, or substitute as a pronoun, in which case it can mean you, he, she, it, and they.

Pronoun ambiguity in general is a big problem for me, especially when I'm reading the paper. The pronoun le also can mean you, him, her, it, and them (which should really use the pronoun les, but it's often misused), which can be a real pain in the ass when you don't have enough context to understand which one of those it refers to. And when I ask my wife, half the time it's ambiguous to her, too (at least without reading a paragraph or two to figure out the context that it's being used in).

Those two are near the top of my 1000 most difficult things about the Spanish language.

I don't think the verbs are so bad, with the exception of certain irregular verbs (and of course, as in many languages, many of the most commonly used verbs are irregular).

I don't think Spanish grammar is "richer" than English. It's just different. Ask an educated Spanish speaking person what they think about English grammar. You'll usually get the same type of comment.

Ser/estar, por/para, wrong gender issues, etc. are a pain in the ass, but you'll usually be understood if you choose the wrong one of those.

Page8383, the Argentines speak Spanish relatively slowly. They commonly complain about the Spaniards, who they say speak too fast to understand (my wife needs subtitles when watching a Spanish movie). And anyway, there's a big difference between speaking a language well enough to communicate and really being able to speak and understand a language. I've had English language conversations with many Argentines, but if I then turn to an English speaking person and say a few things, the Argentine is usually immediately lost. Which echoes my personal experience when it happens the other way.

After struggling these past few years to learn Spanish, I'm really amazed that anyone can learn English.

 

[nlaruccia]

Spanish speakers have a difficult time understanding the difference in to do and to make since both are translated as hacer in Spanish. At least in Spanish pronunciation is easy. A word is pronounced exactly as it's written, unlike in English.

 

[stephensonle]

I don't have too much trouble with pronunciation in Spanish, but damned if federal doesn't get fall off my tongue like a drunk man getting out of a cab, every time. It ain't pretty.

 

[kellrobinson]

Being Scottish i can roll my r's quite easily.

That's what she​​ said.

 

[mmoon]

Irregular verbs (seemingly more common than regular ones) and crazy pronouns...

 

[AngelinBA]

Maintaining the gender of the object I'm talking about throughout a whole conversation (why is it so difficult for my brain to remember an el or a la for more than three sentences?) and words like "trueno" and "estruendo". Something about the "t-r-u-e" combination ties my tongue in knots. And yes, living in the city centre I use both of these words a lot with my kids - lots of thunder storms where they're scared of the truenos and lots of protests where they set off bombas de estruendo.

 

[AdrianB1983]

Use of "para" vs use of "por" - I just see it as a coinflip and am right 50% of the time

Haha. That's pretty much the same to us (or is it same for us?) with to, for; and then you have in, on, at (en in spanish).

For me its nouns that have irregular gender.

Mapa
Foto
Problema

etc.

I think there's no rule to that. I used to think it was with words that started with an "a" (el arca, el agua) but well apparently is not. Damn I don't even know my language.

Excellent videos also at the end of the video they suggest a series of videos related on Bs. As. for gringos

IMMO the key issues for anglos to master Spanish are:

1. Of course the double erre. RR
   
2. Ignoring the vowels phonetic sounds in Spanish A, E I O U not Ae I Ou Uu as in English
   
3. Also the phonetic sound of letters like De not Di as English, Pe not Pi
   
4. Etc

Check out Dustin Luke videos. The guys a yanqui who speaks porteño quite well. You can learn a lot from him and you'll get a good laugh.

Spanish speakers have a difficult time understanding the difference in to do and to make since both are translated as hacer in Spanish. At least in Spanish pronunciation is easy. A word is pronounced exactly as it's written, unlike in English.

Puede ser porque en Argentina no hacemos nada? And yes, the great thing about spanish is that every letter is always pronounced in the same way (except for the "u" in "guinda" for example).

Irregular verbs (seemingly more common than regular ones) and crazy pronouns...

I didn't know there where such things as regular or irregular verbs in spanish. I thought they were all irregular. Could you name a regular verb?

 

[bobg]

For me its nouns that have irregular gender.

Mapa
Foto
Problema

etc.

I am about as far from an expert on Spanish as one can get, but two of these are not so bad (as I have learned from the excellent "A New Reference Grammar of Modern Spanish" by Butt and Benjamin).

Foto is feminine because it is short for fotografia. Problema is certainly a bit strange but not alone, several common words which end in ma are masculine - clima and tema and many others.

Bob

 

[ajoknoblauch]

I am about as far from an expert on Spanish as one can get, but two of these are not so bad (as I have learned from the excellent "A New Reference Grammar of Modern Spanish" by Butt and Benjamin).

Foto is feminine because it is short for fotografia. Problema is certainly a bit strange but not alone, several common words which end in ma are masculine - clima and tema and many others.

Bob

Nouns that come from the Greek, such as programa, are masculine.