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- "Parents need to love their c…
"Parents need to love their children."
Translation:Los padres necesitan amar a sus hijos.
32 Comments
'Ninos' implies any children and 'hijos' is specifically their children. Though I would have thought the 'sus' would qualify it. That's my best guess anyway.
Ditto, especially since up to this point "ninos" has been used as "children"
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Some idiosyncrasy of the language they teach us here in this way I suppose. Hijos antes de ninos... vive y aprende.
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Literally children means "niños" but we don't use to say niños to refer to our own kids, though we understand it.
Please elucidate---I know the rule but do not understand it---for if indeed we are talking about parents in general then "parents/padres" is far more accurate than "the parents/los padres." However in Spanish the rule requires the definite articles even though it ususally, as here, changes or at least clouds the meaning. Sort of like "tiene que (any infinitive)" is not "have to to (infinitive)". One says the word, caminar e.g., when one does not mean "to walk" but only walk, 'tiene que caminar' is not "have to to walk" similarly as in this example "los padres/the parents" does not mean parents in specific but in general. As far as I can tell these rules make NO SENSE like the rules for matching gender or number. So rather than understanding I just memorize and move on. However, if you could help me understand that would be great.
I sympathize Tom. The SpanishDict site does a pretty good job of explaining. It states is that if you are talking about something in general terms you use the article. This is just how Spanish works and you can't apply English logic to it.
As for the other stuff you simply have to remember that you are dealing with two separate and independently developed languages. It is unreasonable to think that both languages would do things the exact same way. I often think we are a little unfortunate in that English is often the odd man out with many of these languages. What I mean is that most other languages use the gender/number matching you mentioned. So the differences tend to be less between say Spanish and French than they are with English. Even German has more in common with them as they have three genders (they add neuter).
Sorry that this was more pep talk and less informative. The important thing to remember is that you need to forget your English rules as they will often get in the way of learning. Also 'word for word' translations simply do not often work. Instead you need to translate the intent of the sentence. For example: If I say 'Tango miedo' it translates (word for word) to 'I have fear'. We don't say that in English though so the correct translation would really be 'I am afraid' or 'I'm scared'.
The last few sentences in this exercise did NOT use "a" after "amar". Why doesn't this one follow the same rule?
agree... I'm having a LOT of trouble with the word "a". I even googled lessons on the personal "a"... Does anyone know any tricks or mnemonics at all to remember WHEN to use "a"?
A little confused. I had thought anytime you were discussing poeple the sentence needed to include "a" (a ninos, a amigos, etc) and this lesson did. However, the lesson just before it, "quiero ver la tele con mis amigos" did not. Why wasn't it "quiero ver la tele con a mis amigos"?
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I don't disagree with the underlying meaning of your translation, but in a literal sense, necesitar is "to need" and tener que is "have to." So there is the very slightest difference in nuance. What I am saying is that necesitar is better for a language course like this where you are given a sentence out of context, but if you were translating a paragraph it might be a fine translation depending on context and voice.
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I was marked wrong using encantar, so can anyone help, what is the difference between amar and encantar ?
DrHarvs, I think in this case it is a difference of contextual meanings. In this case we are talking about a 'family' love which 'amar' can be used for. Used with people, 'encantar' is closer to the 'enchanted' or 'romantic' side of love so inappropriate in this case. I'm not a native speaker though so it would be good to get a second opinion on this.
Every DL excercise I have done until now has accepted "niños" as a synonym for "children"
So, you can also say "Los padres tienen que amar a sus niños" right? because I don't know why the Que is wrong all of a sudden
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Spanish is a very sexist language. I am wondering, if the parents are a same sex female couple, how would you refer to them?
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Yes, I'm pretty sure that's the way. Here is what I think:
The primary meaning of "padre" is "father", but in the plural, it can also mean parents of both sexes as long as one of them is male. If they are all female, it must be "madres" - mothers.
Why is it amar and not amor? Both nouns are masculine. Los padres and Los hijos
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Cause "amar" is a verb, "amor" is a noun. http://www.spanishdict.com/translate/amar http://www.spanishdict.com/translate/amor
I still don't understand why the "a" precedes "mi" and other pronouns.
