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Grammar Summary

Spanish-1 Unidad 5 Etapa 1

Describing Actions That Involve Oneself:  Reflexive Verbs

To describe people doing things for or to themselves, use reflexive verbs.  Examples of reflexive verbs are brushing one's teeth or combing one's hair.  Reflexive verbs are used with a reflexive pronoun to indicate that the subject of the sentence receives the action of the verb.  When a reflexive verb is conjugated, the reflexive pronouns go before the verb.   For example, with the verb lavarse - to wash oneself

Notice that the people say they wash themselves "the face" and not "my face" or "your face," etc.  This is because reflexive pronouns already include the concept of possession.

When you use the infinitive form of a reflexive verb after a conjugated verb, there are two options for where to place the reflexive pronoun.  It can go either before the conjugated verb or after (and attached to) the infinitive:

Some verbs have different meanings when used reflexively:

Irregular Affirmative Tú Commands

Remember how to form regular affirmative tú commands?  You use the present indicative tense tú form, but drop off the "s":  ¡Habla!   ¡Come!  ¡Abre!  Some verbs have irregular affirmative tú command forms:

Remember that when you use a pronoun with an affirmative tú command, you attach the pronoun to the end of the command:  ¡Hazlo ahora!

Negative Tú Commands

When you tell someone what not to do, use a negative command.  Negative commands are formed by starting with the yo form of the present tense, dropping the o and adding the appropriate ending:

Notice that the vowel in the ending changes to the "opposite" of that of the infinitive.  An -AR verb's vowel changes from "a" to "e" and -ER/IR verbs change from "e" or "i" to "a."

There are a few irregular negative tú command verbs:

With negative tú commands, pronouns are always placed before the verb: