Learn Spanish

Why learn Spanish?

This may well be a redundant question, since practically everybody in Britain seems to be learning Spanish or to have studied a bit of Spanish at some stage.

Spanish is a very attractive language that allows us to travel confidently in Spain and most countries of Central and South America, as well as the Philippines and Equatorial Guinea.

It is also a relatively easy language to learn.

First of all, the spelling - and therefore also pronunciation - is pretty straightforward. Here is a very quick overview:

Double letters are rare.

r is sometimes doubled, which has the effect of strengthening and prolonging the roll of the r.
c is sometimes doubled, to give two different sounds. In the word acción, for example, the first c is a 'k' sound and the second a 'th' sound. We have the same phenomenon in English with words like succeed.
l is sometimes doubled but this is almost like another "letter" or character for the Spanish. If you look at a Spanish dictionary, you will find a separate section, after l, for words beginning with ll. The sound it makes is almost a 'y', as in paella.

h is always silent

c is a 'k' sound in front of a, o, u or a consonant but a 'th' sound (in Spain; a 's' sound in South America) in front of e or i. Hence, cinco (five) is pronounced thinko

g is a 'gh' sound in front of a, o, u or a consonant but a 'hh' sound in front of e or I, similar to the 'kh' sound of j though not quite as hard. Hence, guapa (beautiful) is pronounced gwapa, while gira (tour) is hhira

ch is pronounced just as it is in English, though it is considered to be a separate entity from c, in the same way as ll is from l

j is a 'kh' sound, like in the Scottish word loch

ñ is pronounced nya, as in señor and mañana

v is pronounced like b

z is a 'th' sound (in Spain; a 's' sound in South America)

Some of this may appear a bit complicated at first glance but you soon get used to it - and the great thing is that, once you've learnt the rules, you can pronounce any word.

Another useful thing to remember is that Spanish native-speakers find it difficult to pronounce s+consonant at the beginning of a word and their solution is to put an e in front. This is why the Spanish word for Spain is not Spaña but España.

In terms of vocabulary, just speaking English is a huge advantage for learning Spanish, since so many English words also come straight from Latin and the words that came into English from Greek went into Spanish in a similar way.

Look how easy the following words are:

English	Spanish

possible	posible
music	música
telephone	teléfono
hypnotism	hipnotismo
dentist	dentista
sufficient	suficiente
material	material
optimistic	optimismo
station	estación
temperature	temperatura

… and there are many more like this.

Add to these the number of words you know already (often from South America via North America):
amigo, hombre, adiós, por favor, gracias, de nada, buenos días,
tapas, vino, chorizo, etc, etc …

… and you see that you could learn Spanish quite quickly!

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