The Spanish language uses determiners in a similar way to English. The main differences are that Spanish determiners inflect for gender (masculine/feminine, with some instances of vestigial neuter) and always inflect for number as well.[1]
Spanish has three kinds of demonstrative, whose use typically depends on the distance (physical or metaphorical) between the speaker and the described entity, or sometimes depends on the proximity to the three grammatical persons.[2]
| Demonstratives | Proximal | Medial | Distal |
|---|---|---|---|
| Masculine singular | este | ese | aquel |
| Masculine plural | estos | esos | aquellos |
| Feminine singular | esta | esa | aquella |
| Feminine plural | estas | esas | aquellas |
Old English also used to have a three-way system: "this hill (here)", "that hill (there)" or "yon hill (yonder)" — in Spanish, "esta colina", "esa colina", "aquella colina". Standard English lost the third level, so that the "that, there" series covers the ground of "yon, yonder".
Este usually refers to something near the speaker (the first person). Ese usually refers to something nearer the listener (the second person). Aquel usually refers to something away from both the speaker and the listener.
The demonstrative determiners can also be used as pronouns, with the addition of the neutral singular forms esto, eso, aquello.
A similar three-way system of demonstratives is found in Portuguese, in Slavic languages, in Japanese and in Turkish.
The definite article in Spanish, corresponding to "the", is el. It inflects for gender and number as follows:
| Definite | ||
|---|---|---|
| Singular | Plural | |
| Masculine | el | los |
| Feminine | la | las |
| Neuter | lo | — |
Thus:
The usually-masculine form el is used instead of la before feminine nouns that begin with a stressed a (or rarely, au) sound (as well as, in principle, ai although such words are almost never found in practice):
La is used, however, when el would imply a masculine noun:
Feminine el is never used, however, before feminine adjectives that begin with a stressed a:
Azúcar is a very special case. Its a- is unstressed, but it usually takes el even when feminine. In addition, azúcar can be of both genders in Spanish (other words with double gender are sal (salt), mar (sea) and sartén (frying pan)):
Feminine el does not have the same origin as the masculine el. The latter is from the Old Castilian ele, but the former is from ela, just like la.
There is also a neuter article that is used before adjectives and makes them act like nouns:
The indefinite article in Spanish, corresponding to "a/an", is un and inflects for gender and number as follows:
| Indefinite | ||
|---|---|---|
| Singular | Plural | |
| Masculine | un | unos |
| Feminine | una | unas |
| Neuter | uno (Archaic) | — |
Thus:
Near-synonyms of unos include unos cuantos, algunos and unos pocos.
The same rules that apply to feminine el apply to una and un:
As in English, the plural indefinite article is not always required:
The use of uno/una/unos/unas before adjectives can be analyzed as a pronoun, followed by an adjective, rather than as an indefinite article, followed by a nominalized adjective:
These are often known as possessive or genitive determiners. They are used before the noun referring to what is possessed (and before the rest of the whole noun phrase, for example when an adjective precedes the noun). They inflect for number and in some cases gender as well.
| Possessor | Possessed | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Singular | Plural | ||||
| Masculine | Feminine | Masculine | Feminine | ||
| Singular | 1st-person | mi | mis | ||
| 2nd-person | tu | tus | |||
| 3rd-person | su | sus | |||
| Plural | 1st-person | nuestro | nuestra | nuestros | nuestras |
| 2nd-person | vuestro | vuestra | vuestros | vuestras | |
| 3rd-person | su | sus | |||
For example:
Given the ambiguous meaning of "su/s", this is often avoided, and replaced by other forms that clearly state who owns the thing in question. So sentences like the following can be heard:
Or even:
Note the following:
Dialectal variation:
Demonstrative pronouns can be combined with possessives as follows:
Strictly speaking, the presence of the first determiner means that the possessive must be interpreted as an adjective rather than a determiner. Note however that the long adjectival form (mío, tuyo, suyo, etc.), which is identical to the corresponding possessive pronoun, is not used in this construction, which is rather uncommon.
It is also possible to use the long adjectival form. In this case, it goes after the noun:
There are many more words that can be used as determiners in Spanish. They mostly end in -o and have the usual four forms (-o, -a, -os, -as) to agree with the noun.
