Spanish For Dummies- How To Learn Spanish Quick
Spanish For Dummies is one of the books in the successful “For Dummies…” series. It obviously focuses on the Spanish language and aims to help you learn Spanish quick in an easy and entertaining manner.
Spanish For Dummies is written by people who know the language best at the Berlitz language school. The book features specific expressions and phrases that you may find helpful while you are on holiday, and tries to get you up and running with the language.
The Spanish For Dummies book describes itself as being, “…the ultimate guide for speaking Spanish quick and easy.” The book is comes with a CD-ROM, allowing you to hear the language spoken by native speakers.
In a way, you could describe any starter Spanish learning course as being Spanish for dummies generally. The concept is that it can take a person with no idea about Spanish, from knowing absolutely nothing to at least speaking a couple of commonly used expressions of Spanish.
There are a fair number of courses like that you’ll be pleased to hear. These days, language courses have started concentrating on the fun element of language learning, downplaying the need for grammar, syntax and cultural nuance, and replacing it with shortcuts, tricks and tips to actually speaking the language with other native speakers.
Grammar certainly has its place. Spanish grammar is quite different from English grammar. That’s why they will describe a new car as “un coche nuevo,” literally, “a car new.” There is not much you can do about that other than simply learning it.
Translating directly from English to Spanish is a not a good idea. That would come out as, in our example, “un nuevo coche,” and would sound every bit as wrong to a Spanish person as “a car new” sounds to you! As a general rule of thumb, put the adjective, the describing word, after the noun, the thing being described. This is the opposite of the normal rules in English.
The Spanish for dummies type of courses tend rather to concentrate on the easier aspects of things. There are a large number of Spanish terms, for instance, that are very similar to their English counterparts. Most of the time, they change only with the suffixs. Words in English ending in “ant” often become words ending in “ante” in Spanish. Por ejemple (that’s Spanish and I’m sure you are able to guess what it means), “important” becomes “importante.”
But that’s not all…
A fair number of the “ent” ending English words become “ente” in Spanish, such as “evidente.” A fair number of the “ible” and “able” ending words stay the same in both languages: comparable, combustible. A number of Spanish words merely drop English endings, such as the “ate” ending words where “participate” becomes “participa” and “terminate” becomes “termina.”
How many English words can you think of that end in “ary”? There are dozens and you’ve just learned as whole lot more Spanish words, because you can adapt the English to Spanish by changing the “ary” ending to an “ario” ending.
Spanish for dummies can be the title of a best selling language book, or it can simply be a way of describing a good Spanish course designed to help Spanish learners learn Spanish fast without the hassle of learning complex Spanish grammar.
Related Articles
