This document summarizes various uses of tenses and grammatical structures in Spanish, including: 1) A review of tenses learned so far such as the preterite, imperfect, present of ser/estar, and passive voice. 2) An explanation of the present tense in Spanish and how it varies based on verb conjugation endings. 3) A discussion of the "expletive" structure in Spanish using "hay" and how it translates to "there is/are". 4) A brief overview of the differences between "por" and "para" and how they are used in phrases.

1. The Present Tense and The Expletive
Some Uses of Por and Para
E. Siler

2. Review of Tenses
• Look at how much you’ve already learned:
• The past tense (the preterite)
• Ustedesaprendieron el pretérito.
• The imperfect past tense (the imperfect)
• Aprendían el imperfecto.
• The present tense of ser/estar
• Ustedes son muybuenosestudiantes.
• The passive (present or past) formed with “ser” and a past-
participle. Muchascosasfueronaprendidaspor los estudiantes.
• The present perfect and past perfect with a form of “haber” and
the past-participle. Los estudianteshabíanaprendido mucho.
• THAT’S A LOT IN THREE WEEKS!

3. Present Tense
• The present tense is one of the most useful
tenses to know for academic Spanish.

4. The English Present Tense
• This is so easy, it’s embarrassing:
• Drop the “to” of the infinitive.
• Use the simple form of the verb except in the
third person singular (he/she/it), when we add
–s to the simple form.
• There are a few minor spelling changes, but
very few true irregularities in this super easy
present tense.

5. Examples
• To study
PERSON SINGULAR PLURAL
First I study We study
Second You study You (all) study
Third He/she/it studies They study

6. Uses
• The present tense is used for the following
purposes:
• Repeated actions (usual, repeated, habitual, also
ability or inability or choice not to do).
• My husband is an artist. He does ceramics. He
doesn’t do anything in computer-generated art.
He often throws as many as four pots a week. He
starts by choosing the clay. Then he kneads it,
throws it, and puts it in the kiln.

7. Uses 2
• Facts, generalizations, descriptions.
• Cats are natural-born hunters. They hunt
whatever they find handy. Most cats like the
thrill of the hunt as much as the prey itself.
My cat has black fur. He acts more like a dog
than a cat. He is very friendly but he also likes
hunting.

8. Uses 3
• Scheduled events in the future.
• My plane leaves tomorrow at 9.

9. Uses 4
• To express actions happening RIGHT now but
with a certain subset of verbs (the statives)
that are rarely if ever used in the –ing form:
• I know what that look on my husband’s face
means. (NOT: I am knowing what that look on
my husband’s face is meaning).
• I need some help right now. (NOT: I am
needing some help right now)

10. The Present Tense in Spanish
• The present tense in Spanish depends on the
form of the infinitive.
• Each person has a different ending.
• Again, we’re looking at a total of about 18
endings to memorize to form the present
tense in Spanish.

11. -AR Verbs
• Drop the AR and add these endings:
• Hablar
Person Singular Plural
First Yohablo Nosotros/as
hablamos
Second Túhablas/Ustedhab Ustedeshablan
la
Third Él/ellahabla Ellos/ellashablan

12. -ER Verbs
• Drop the ER and add these endings:
• Comer
PERSON Singular Plural
First Yocomo Nosotros/as
comemos
Second Tú comes/ usted Ustedescomen
come
Third Él/ella come Ellos/ellascomen

13. -IR Verbs
• Drop the IR and add these endings:
• Vivir
PERSON Singular Plural
First Yo vivo Nosotros/as
vivimos
Second Túvives/usted vive Ustedesviven
Third Él/ella vive Ellos/ellasviven

14. Irregularities
• Spanish has many sub-categories of verbs in all
three infinitive groups.
• These sub-categories often undergo changes in
the stem of the verb in the present tense.
• It is outside the bounds of a lecture to present all
of these, but for more information on the present
tense, as well as the many irregular “stem
changers” see pp. 36-55 in the grammar.
• HOWEVER, you should know the irregular present
tense forms of the following verbs cold: poder,
poner, ir, ser, estar, hacer, dar, tener and haber.

15. The Expletive (Undeleted)
• English and Spanish (and indeed almost all Indo-
European languages) have a structure called the
“expletive.”
• In English this is formed with THERE and a form of
BE. The tense of BE changes accordingly.
• There are two dogs in the garden.
• There is a cat in the house.
• There were many cats in my house over the
years.
• There was one dog I really loved.

16. The Expletive in Spanish
• The present tense expletive in Spanish is formed with a
highly irregular form of the verb haber: hay.
• This word is translated as “there is” or “there are”
depending on what comes after it.
• Hay dos muchachos en la clase. There are two guys in the
class.
• Hay unamujer el la clase. There is a woman in the class.
• The imperfect form of haber (había) is routinely used to
express either “there was” or “there were” --- again
according to context.
• Había dos perros en el jardín (there were two dogs in the
garden). Había un gato en la casa (there was a cat in the
house).

17. Por/Para
• These two words have so many different
translations in Spanish that it is impossible to
consider them all here.
• There is a chapter in the grammar on this
subject. It’s okay, but as we go through the
course, I will present some ideas on this.

18. Por
• Por is almost always the choice when there is
a passive involved.
• The “by phrase” of an English passive is
translated with “por” in Spanish.
• Nicole fuematadapor OJ. (Nicole was killed by
OJ).

19. Phrases with Por/Para
• Por ser/ Para ser.
• Por ser ROUGHLY means “because of” and Para ser means
“in spite of.”
• Figure out the nuance in these sentences:
• Por ser estudiante, ellasabe mucho.
• Para ser estudiante, ellasabe mucho.
• The first (por ser) is a positive thing to say! Because of
being a student (because she is a student), she knows a lot.
• The second is very negative! Obviously spoken by
someone who doesn’t think much of education!
• In spite of being a student, she knows a lot.