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- Topic: Spanish >
- "Me gustaron esas mujeres."
156 Comments
the conjugation of gustar, which means "to be pleasing," refers to the thing doing the pleasing, not the person being pleased. In this sentence, esas mujeres is a plural they, so gustar is conjugated appropriately to refer to "those women." Another way of looking at this sentence is that it says "Those women (esas mujeres) were pleasing (gustaron) to me (me)."
"those women pleased me." That should be the translation. After reading much of the material below, I still stand with that. I will change it to get through duo but it's a shame to lose the real meaning. I think we ought to be translating this word for word since the concept is more interesting than just liking someone. I think the flavor of a culture should be in the translation. That's my theory so that missing the flavor and uniqueness of a person and their words and culture and thoughts is not watered down. keep the flavor. In French, people say that someone is missing from them, in a way, instead of missing. So it is like this in construction. it's a very touching way to describe the feeling of loss that English is not at all up to. But French is. So why lose it or water it down.
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Thank you for this insightful explanation! You have added a new dimension to my learning Spanish. Muchisimas gracias! (sorry, I don't know how to type accents.)
Just like CGiattino said, the LITERAL translation of this sentence is not "I liked those women," but rather "Those women were pleasing to me." The verb is conjugated for "women," because they are the subject of the sentence. They are the ones performing the action, therefore the verb is conjugated in third-person plural for "ellas."
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No. Neither English nor Spanish have deponent verbs, i.e. verbs with active meaning taking their form from another voice, usually the passive one. Like and gustar just change subject to object and vice versa. The same is valid for like and please. Therefore, when translating gustar, one can use please as a working hypothesis and change it to like in the final version.
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The subject is mujeres. The form "gustaron" tells that the Spanish subject is a third person plural: mujeres
Just like CGiattino said, the LITERAL translation of this sentence is not "I liked those women," but rather "Those women were pleasing to me." The verb is conjugated for "women," because they are the subject of the sentence - the ones performing the action - therefore the verb is conjugated in third-person plural for "ellas." The first person pronoun "me" is an object pronoun, and is receiving the action (the first person subject pronoun, "yo," is not used here.)
Because "gustar" is a common word in Spanish, and the closest and most natural approximation in English is "like." In English it sounds weird to say "Playing the guitar is pleasing to me" or "Camels are pleasing to me." The most common way to convey that we enjoy something is to say that we like it.
Ya and duolingo loves using gustarle about people, it supposed to be caerle. duolingo is really good for getting practice in hearing and improving vocab but you have to be careful this could get you in some hot water. por ejemplo i once asked my mexican friend (a guy) te gusta pitbull (the rapper)? he was quick too point out me gusta la musica de pitbull pero no él.
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I learnt that the hard way. In a Spanglish moment, I accidentally said "Quieres coger esta noche para un lección?" They asked for more details. Jejejeje
When I was in Mexico City many years ago, I was treated so well and kindly, and warmly. People were not after the buck but sharing real help. One guy asked if he might pay my bus ticket not as a flirt but to appreciate how he was treated in America. That's how people are...people seemed to go out of their way to help...men and women...and not willing to take a tip. That was the rule, tho of course there are exceptions. Truly caring.
Hmmm, so maybe we could get the "by" out ot "attracted" and say "Those women attracted me." so then we could still satisfy the English constructon of "Those women"-Subject, "attracted"-Verb, "me*"-Direct Object ? I know this would convey a difference in meaning a lttle bit, but would it really? Just my two cents...
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I was told the same thing in Costa Rica. The teacher said to use me cae bien for a specific female. It is not the same thing referring to a class or a group of women as this would nor be considered sexual. Una mujer sí. For example I was staying at a Shirley's home. I would say " a Shirley, me cae bien. Totally innocent expression.
Not an "alternate!" You picked up on a myth and take it as truth. Most commonly the "mouse over" shows translations of a word which are used in different contexts and do not apply to the current situation They are shown for our education so that we can understand how the word has other usages beyond the present. However, sometimes, though rarely, all the shown words can apply to the current usage. This is just another situation in line with Duolingo's inconsistencies.
Thank yiu, Marie. Once one understands how it works it can be extremely helpful.
One other thing. All new words will have the top word as the current translation.
One other thing further. And I mean for this to be a cool learning trick. Whenever I need to do a peek so I can provide an accurate translations, I deliberately spoil it by adding a couple of Xes on the end of the line to intentionally error out. I do this so that I will be given the problem again.
I copy paste the new ones to a list for review but they made them harder to copy without going to the comments page. Seeing a word in various sizes of print seems to help but adverbs, connectors, and some verbs just take reps. I wish the comments section were divided with the tips and tricks for memory and roots of words to help remember at the top. ;)
The literal translation would be: The women were pleasing to me. In English we would say: I liked those women. The sentence construction is completely changed in Spanish. The women (subj) were pleasing (verb) to me (direct object). In English: I (subj) liked (verb) those women (direct object) .
Since subj / verb must agree, gustaron is used so it agrees (in number) with the plural subject, women.
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or me gusto esas mujeres. i liked those women. I don't get why it's it's gustaron. why is not not those women like me since gustaron agrees with the subject?
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Because it is in the past those women were pleasing to me. It is using the 3d person plural preterite conjugation.
I find it somewhat funny to notice, that with 'gusta' the subject and the object make a total 'looping'. Me gustaron = I like ... BUT there it is;'I (singular)' cannot be the subject in this Spanish sentence, 'cause 'gustaron' is plural. Therefore this sentence should be translated sort of reversed: 'Those women please me.'
Likewise "No nos gusta el pollo." There nosotros (nos) is plural - but gusta is singular! So the subject is not 'nos', but 'el pollo'. So it should be translated accordingly: The chicken does not please us."
Am I right or am I right?
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ekihoo Yes you are right. Futhermore in me gustaron me is the objectform of yo and cannot be the subject, likewise in no nos gusta nos is the objectform of nosotros/ as and cannot be the subject.
In spanish an object cannot 'like' another, instead an object is 'pleased' by another. So literally this sentence would be translated as "those women were pleasing/pleased to/by me". "Esas mujeres me gustan" - "I like these women" "El gato me gusta" - "I like the cat". It's simply an idiom you have to memorize.
Because "gustar" technically means "to please" not "to like." You are the object in the sentence, and whatever it is your like is the subject. What you are literally saying is "They please me." German uses similar construction. Du gefehlst mir, you are pleasing to me, is a very direct way of telling someone you like them, as in you want to date them. Spanish uses subject object verb word when using pronouns that are added onto the conjugation (nos vamos= let us go; vamanos= let us go).
English never derivates from subject-verb-object order.
I'm just reading this thread 3 years after it started. Thanks to all of the users who gave terrific information and helped me understand the issue. I had no idea that gustar was such a land-mine.
My friend's son is now living in Uruguay, and reports that the Spanish language spoken in S. America is fraught with sexual innuendos and idioms that one must really be careful about, and it differs from one country to another.
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A is used before an OBJECT if it is a person. Esas mujeres is the Spanish SUBJECT and me is the Spanish object. Gustar is a little bit tricky, it switches the Spanish subject/ object and English object/subject
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It would be "a esas mujeres les gustaba (yo)", or "... les gusté", depending on the meaning/context (imperfect would be more likely here).
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Tell me if I'm wrong, but shouldn't the translation of "esas" be these and not those? and a another thing the translation of "Gustaron " actually means "They liked".
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Esas - those. Estas - these. "ESTAS" EN INGLÉS Resultados: 1-21 de 9205 estas {adjetivo} estas {adj.} (también: estos) these {adj.} Estas dos decisiones son fundamentales y espero que el Parlamento las ratifique. These two choices are fundamental and I hope that Parliament will ratify these.
No. The verb "gustarse" is kind of a tricky one. For example, if you were to say "I like apples" you would say in Spanish "me gustan manzanas". It actually means essentially "apples bring pleasure to me" which is why the conjugation of "gustar" is the plural (to match with the plural apples) and "se" is conjugated to "me" (to say you are the one they bring pleasure to). Or if you were to say "I like you" you'd translate it to "me gustas". Make sense? I hope that helps.
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Isaiah otherwise OK only that GUSTAR IS NOT REFLEXIVE BUT HAS DATIVE OBJECT: me, te, LE, nos, os, LES
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"they liked" if you use "gustar" is conjugated according to what they liked. not according to they.This "what" is the Spanish subject
they liked me/ LES GUSTÉ yo
they liked you/ LES GUSTASTE tú
they liked the cat/ LES GUSTÓ el gato
they liked us/ LES GUSTAMOS nosotros
they liked you (in Spain and pl.) / LES GUSTASTEIS vosotros
they liked the dogs / LES GUSTARON los perros
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I wish Duolingo would change the meaning for the drop down suggestions because I always forget. Lolbs.
I imagine them as women that he/she met once, perhaps on vacation or at a salsa class or at a concert, and have not seen since. It's assumed that you can't really continue liking someone you met once long ago, but you still wouldn't use the phrase "used to" because that implies that you liked them for a while, then stopped.
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Pretérito means past. Gustaron, Pretérito Perfecto Simple, is for an action which took place and was perfected (ended) in the past. An action with indefinite ending or beginning is imperfect in the past and Spanish uses Pretérito Imperfecto for this gustaban. Duo and others recommend us to use used to do for Spanish Imperfect, maybe to stress that it is used for habitual actions.
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autopsybllue! That is exaxtly what I say: perfect "gustaron" for something starting and ending in the past.
So big comments get likes and lingots. Well.
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This will get tons of dislikes
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preterite 3:rd pers: pl, me gustaron esas mujeres/ sing, me gustó esa mujera
imperfect 3:rd pers: pl, me gustaban esas mujeres/ sing, me gustaba esa mujera
both = I liked those women/ that woman, pret. just liked/ imperf. a prolonged action
I used ladies instead of women. Duolingo shows ladies as a definition in their pull down, but I got it wrong. My culture in America taught me that you show more respect when you refer to "ladies ", as in "ladies and gentlemen ", so as a habit I prefer to use the respectful language. Is this not a respectable way to speak of women in the Spanish cultures? Or is it just an oversight by Duolingo? Maybe it has something to do with "gustar"? I'm really curious.