La canción de la semana #298

...is Que no se acabe la fe by a young Cuban singer Danay Suárez Fernandez. Although mostly known for her hip-hop and R&B work, here mademoiselle chante le blues: pure and simple.

La canción de la semana #297

...is Pistear, Pistear, Pistear by Chuy Lizarraga y Su Banda Tierra Sinaloense.

cardinales y ordinales

First published 13 December 2011 @ sólo algunas palabras

Last Friday, on the way back from school, Timur and I talked about difference between números cardinales (cardinal numbers) and números ordinales (ordinal numbers). I used to confuse which are which until I mentally connected ordinal with Spanish masculine noun orden (order). So, that’s it: ordinal numbers are those that refer to positions within some ordered list, and cardinal numbers are... the other ones (those which represent quantities). Unlike English, where the ordinal numerals beyond 1st, 2nd and 3rd are typically formed by simply adding -th suffix to the corresponding cardinal numerals, Spanish has rather different terminology for ordinals.

OK, to an English speaker primero, segundo, tercero etc. should not sound exactly alien. Apart from first, second, third, fourth and so on, English has another set of ordinal numbers derived from Latin: primary, secondary, tertiary, quaternary... well, that’s about as far as it gets. I’ve never encountered quinary, senary and higher in either literature or conversation. Also, if you ever learned basics of music theory in a language other than English, the names of intervals are all very similar to Spanish ordinal numbers. But this is probably a topic for next post.

It is said that ordinal numbers above ten are seldom used in Spanish. Indeed, go googling for “mil novecientos sesenta y siete” and you’ll get thousands of hits. Now try to do the same with “milésimo noningentésimo sexagésimo séptimo”. The obvious explanation is that ordinals are significantly longer than cardinals. Still, it’s good to know one when you see one, so I think the table below may come handy *.

Cardinales		Ordinales
0	cero	—	—
1	uno	1º	primero
	un	1er	primer
	una	1ª	primera
2	dos	2º	segundo
		2ª	segunda
3	tres	3º	tercero
		3er	tercer
		3ª	tercera
4	cuatro	4º	cuarto
5	cinco	5º	quinto
6	seis	6º	sexto
7	siete	7º	séptimo
8	ocho	8º	octavo
9	nueve	9º	noveno
10	diez	10º	décimo
11	once	11º	undécimo
12	doce	12º	duodécimo
13	trece	13º	decimotercero
14	catorce	14º	decimocuarto
15	quince	15º	decimoquinto
16	dieciséis	16º	decimosexto
17	diecisiete	17º	decimoséptimo
18	dieciocho	18º	decimoctavo
19	diecinueve	19º	decimonoveno
20	veinte	20º	vigésimo
21	veintiuno	21º	vigésimo primero
22	veintidós	22º	vigésimo segundo
23	veintitrés	23º	vigésimo tercero
24	veinticuatro	24º	vigésimo cuarto
25	veinticinco	25º	vigésimo quinto
26	veintiséis	26º	vigésimo sexto
27	veintisiete	27º	vigésimo séptimo
28	veintiocho	28º	vigésimo octavo
29	veintinueve	29º	vigésimo nono
30	treinta	30º	trigésimo
31	treinta y uno	31º	trigésimo primero
32	treinta y dos	32º	trigésimo segundo
33	treinta y tres	33º	trigésimo tercero
40	cuarenta	40º	cuadragésimo
50	cincuenta	50º	quincuagésimo
60	sesenta	60º	sexagésimo
70	setenta	70º	septuagésimo
80	ochenta	80º	octogésimo
90	noventa	90º	nonagésimo
100	cien	100º	centésimo
101	ciento uno	101º	centésimo primero
200	doscientos	200º	ducentésimo
300	trescientos	300º	tricentésimo
400	cuatrocientos	400º	cuadringentésimo
500	quinientos	500º	quingentésimo
600	seiscientos	600º	sexcentésimo
700	setecientos	700º	septingentésimo
800	ochocientos	800º	octingentésimo
900	novecientos	900º	noningentésimo
1000	mil	1000º	milésimo
1001	mil uno	1001º	milésimo primero
1002	mil dos	1002º	milésimo segundo
2000	dos mil	2000º	dosmilésimo
2011	dos mil once	2011º	dosmilésimo undécimo
3000	tres mil	3000º	tresmilésimo
4000	cuatro mil	4000º	cuatromilésimo
5000	cinco mil	5000º	cincomilésimo
10.000	diez mil	10.000º	diezmilésimo
100.000	cien mil	100.000º	cienmilésimo
500.000	quinientos mil	500.000º	quinientosmilésimo
1.000.000	un millón	1.000.000º	millonésimo

* In Diccionario panhispánico de dudas and Spanish Wikipedia, the symbols for ordinal numerals contain a full stop (1.º, 3.^er, 5.ª), while Collins dictionaries do not (1º, 3^er, 5ª). I used this latter style in the table. Also, starting with 4, I listed only masculine ordinals. I hope you don’t think this sexist. To get feminine forms, simply replace the terminal -o’s with -a’s and º’s with ª’s). Maybe one day Real Academia Española will admit uses like 1^@ and segund@, why not.

La canción de la semana #296

...is Río Negro by Christoph Müller and Eduardo Makaroff (of Gotan Project fame), from El Gaucho, a film by Andrés Jarach.

Falsos amigos

First published 8 November 2011 @ sólo algunas palabras

The other day, I was chatting with a friend of mine about Spanish/English false friends: the words that look or sound similar but often mean very different things. Classic examples of these are constipado vs constipated and embarazada vs embarrassed. A good list of such falsos amigos is compiled by Laura K. Lawless.

Some words are written (although not pronounced) exactly the same in English and Spanish, for instance these:

Word	English	Spanish
actual	existing in reality	current, present
agenda	a list of matters to be taken up	diary
arena	an enclosed area for the presentation of spectacular events	sand
cargo	freight	charge; position
hay	cut and dried grass	there is, there are
local n	a person who lives nearby	location, premises, site
mama	mother	breast
manga	a Japanese comic style	sleeve
mayor	the leader of a city	bigger; older
media	plural of medium; environment	sock, stocking, pantyhose; mean, average; half
once	one and only one time; as soon as	eleven
pan	flat vessel used in cooking	bread
quince	a tree, Cydonia oblonga, or its fruit	fifteen
real	existing in reality	existing in reality; royal
red	a colour	network, web
sensible	reasonable	sensitive
sin	a violation of a moral or religious law	without
taller	more tall	workshop
tan	a darkening of the skin after exposure to UV light	so, as

La canción de la semana #295

Nine minutes of beauty: Peace Pipes (Pipas de la Paz) by legendary Argentinian prog-rockers Arco Iris.