Los acentos

Los Acentos

The natural accent of most words follows these rules:

If the word ends in a vowel, n or s, the natural accent falls on the second to last syllable of the word.

Come (CO-me)

Libro (LI-bro)

Inmediatamente (in-me-diat-a-MEN-te)

· If the word ends in a consonant (not n or s), the natural accent falls on the last syllable of the word.

Ciudad (ciu-DAD)

Escultor (es-cul-TOR)

If a word breaks the rule, you must write the accent mark in.

Jabón (ja-BON)

Matemáticas (ma-te-MA-ti-cas)

Járabe (JA-ra-be)

Some accents are used to distinguish one word from another:

Si (if) Sí (yes)

Papa (potato) Papá (dad)

Some accents are used to create a syllable. Typically, two vowels written together in Spanish create their own unique sound (a diphthong). To break the diphthong, you need to give the weaker vowel an accent mark. This is not your decision, these accents need to be memorized with new vocabulary.

La televisión (te-le-vi-si-ON)

El tío (TI-o)

Los acentos y los pronombres

When you use pronouns (reflexive, direct, indirect) in Spanish, you may attach them to infinitive verbs, commands, and progressive tenses. You must know if you need to give your verb an accent because you are adding syllables to the original word.

· Using a direct object pronoun:

Voy a cantar la canción. (la canción is Direct Object, substitute with pronoun)

La voy a cantar. (note: can-TAR)

OR Voy a cantarla. (No accent needed because your new word ends in a vowel. The natural accent is on the second to last syllable, where it should be.)

· Using direct and indirect object pronouns:

Voy a cantar la canción a mi amiga. (direct and indirect object pronouns)

Se la voy a cantar.

OR Voy a cantársela. (Now you need to write the accent because you want to maintain the accent on the TAR syllable.)

The progressive tenses:

· Using direct object pronoun:

Estoy cantando la canción. (can-TAN-do)

La estoy cantando.

OR Estoy cantándola. (accent on second to last syllable before you add pronouns)

· Using direct and indirect object pronouns

Estoy cantando la canción a mi amiga.

Se la estoy cantando.

OR Estoy cantándosela. (accent on second to last syllable before you add pronouns)