Adjective Declension

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ich
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Adjective Declension

Postby ich » 2017-09-01, 14:40

I was wondering if someone could answer a few questions about adjective declension for me.

I was wondering what the plural and feminine forms are of the adjectives:
iraquí
café

and is "austriaco" the correct translation for "Austrian"?

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linguoboy
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Re: Adjective Declension

Postby linguoboy » 2017-09-01, 14:58

ich wrote:I was wondering what the plural and feminine forms are of the adjectives:
iraquí
café

The plural forms are:
iraquíes
cafés

They are invariable for gender, just like adjectives ending in -e.

ich wrote:and is "austriaco" the correct translation for "Austrian"?

It is.
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Re: Adjective Declension

Postby Bubulus » 2017-09-01, 16:14

ich wrote:I was wondering if someone could answer a few questions about adjective declension for me.

I was wondering what the plural and feminine forms are of the adjectives:
iraquí
café

The standard form of the first one, in regular usage, ends in -es: iraquíes. The RAE agrees. But you will hear native speakers saying iraquís as well, even when they'll tell you "it's wrong" if you ask them about it.

The standard plural form of café, in regular usage, can take -s or not: los zapatos café, los zapatos cafés. I can't find what the RAE thinks about this, but the DRAE at least only mentions the invariable plural without -s: tonos café, so perhaps they prefer that. Some speakers though do insist the invariable form without -s is the only correct form, along with naranja, turquesa, púrpura, violeta: las bolsas naranja, los contenedores turquesa.

It might interest you to read the following from the RAE's DPD. It's from the article entitled "Plural", section 1.c.
DPD wrote:c) Sustantivos y adjetivos terminados en -i o en -u tónicas. Admiten generalmente dos formas de plural, una con -es y otra con -s, aunque en la lengua culta suele preferirse la primera: bisturíes o bisturís, carmesíes o carmesís, tisúes o tisús, tabúes o tabús. En los gentilicios, aunque no se consideran incorrectos los plurales en -s, se utilizan casi exclusivamente en la lengua culta los plurales en -es: israelíes, marroquíes, hindúes, bantúes. Por otra parte, hay voces, generalmente las procedentes de otras lenguas o las que pertenecen a registros coloquiales o populares, que solo forman el plural con -s: gachís, pirulís, popurrís, champús, menús, tutús, vermús. El plural del adverbio sí, cuando funciona como sustantivo, es síes, a diferencia de lo que ocurre con la nota musical si, cuyo plural es sis (→ l). Son vulgares los plurales terminados en -ses, como *gachises.


and is "austriaco" the correct translation for "Austrian"?

Yes. Note it can also be pronounced and spelled differently: austríaco. Both forms are common. As an example, the Spanish Wikipedia article on Beethoven uses the accented í form twice and the non-accented i form once. That's right, in the same article.

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Re: Adjective Declension

Postby langmon » 2018-11-16, 8:52

Ser wrote:
and is "austriaco" the correct translation for "Austrian"?
Yes. Note it can also be pronounced and spelled differently: austríaco. Both forms are common. As an example, the Spanish Wikipedia article on Beethoven uses the accented í form twice and the non-accented i form once. That's right, in the same article.


Is there an underlying Spanish Noun Pattern that can be used to make a difference between these two types of nouns?

- Those who can be pronounced by stressing (Spoken Syllable Emphasis) them in two different ways

- Those who cannot be pronounced in more than one way
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Re: Adjective Declension

Postby Bubulus » 2018-11-16, 15:17

SomehowGeekyPolyglot wrote:Is there an underlying Spanish Noun Pattern that can be used to make a difference between these two types of nouns?

- Those who can be pronounced by stressing (Spoken Syllable Emphasis) them in two different ways

- Those who cannot be pronounced in more than one way

No. They tend to be quite idiosyncratic: período vs. periodo, chófer vs. chofer, meran vs. bumerán, biósfera vs. biosfera...

The only thing they all have in common is that they tend to be found among recent borrowings from other languages. But of course, most native speakers have no way of knowing that, as it's not a synchronic fact. For us there's just competing pronunciations that get reflected in spelling.

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Re: Adjective Declension

Postby langmon » 2018-11-16, 15:35

Ser wrote:The only thing they all have in common is that they tend to be found among recent borrowings from other languages. But of course, most native speakers have no way of knowing that, as it's not a synchronic fact. For us there's just competing pronunciations that get reflected in spelling.


But still, even if we only got that particular Language Puzzle Piece which is about knowing that they tend to be found in recent borrowings, then this is much more than not having any of these Pieces at all. Reminding oneself of a Piece like this can aid the ability of Written Spanish Accent Recall.
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