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Day 9 of 90

Describing things

Adjectives, and making them agree. About 10 minutes. Grammar: adjective agreement and position.

You have been agreeing adjectives since day one without being told the rule. Today it becomes a rule, which means you can apply it to words you have never seen.

The four endings

Most adjectives have four forms, and you already know how to pick one.

el libro rojothe red bookMasculine singular. The base form, and the one in the dictionary.
la mesa rojathe red tableFeminine singular. The o becomes an a.
los libros rojosthe red booksAdd s for plural, on both the noun and the adjective.
las mesas rojasthe red tablesEverything agrees, all the way along the phrase.
Why it works this way

Agreement runs through the whole phrase, not just the noun. las mesas rojas has the plural marked four times, on the article, on the noun and on the adjective. English marks it once. That redundancy is why a Spanish speaker can follow a sentence in a noisy bar when half of it is lost.

The ones that do not change for gender

A large group has only two forms, not four.

grande, inteligente, interesantebig, intelligent, interestingEnding in e, so they are the same for masculine and feminine.
un hombre grande, una casa grandea big man, a big houseOnly the plural changes: grandes.
fácil, difícil, joveneasy, difficult, youngEnding in a consonant, same for both genders.
un examen difícil, una pregunta difícila hard exam, a hard questionPlural adds es: difíciles.
Why it works this way

Only adjectives ending in o have a separate feminine form. Everything else takes one shape for both, which cuts the memory load roughly in half. So the question to ask about a new adjective is not what gender is it, it is does it end in o, and if not you have nothing to decide.

Adjectives you will use daily

Twelve words that carry most ordinary description.

bueno, malogood, badShorten to buen and mal in front of a masculine noun: un buen día.
grande, pequeñobig, smallchico is small across much of Latin America.
caro, baratoexpensive, cheapFrom day 5.
bonito, feopretty, uglylindo is the common word for pretty in most of Latin America.
Why it works this way

bueno and malo lose their last letter in front of a masculine noun, so it is un buen hombre and not un bueno hombre. A small group does this, always in front and always masculine singular. It is worth knowing because these are common words and the shortened form is what you will actually hear.

Adjectives usually come second

The default order is noun then adjective, the opposite of English. A small group can move in front, and when they do the meaning shifts from a plain description to a judgement: una casa grande is a big house, una gran casa is a great one. un viejo amigo is a friend of many years, un amigo viejo is an elderly one. Same two words, different claim.

Carry these forward

Four lines from today that later days assume you know.

la mesa rojathe red table
muy carovery expensive
un buen díaa good day
es difícilit is difficult

Check yourself

Eight questions. Finishing them marks the day done.

Question 1 of 8

The red tables is

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