Norma Gabriela Cuevas Quintero

September 2023
The Similarities and Differences Between English and Spanish

In English, morphology defines morphemes as the smallest units of meaning in the language.
In Spanish, the concept is “monemas” and they are divided into “morfemas” and ”lexemas”, in
English lexemes and morphemes. These concepts are the same in both languages. Lexemes
are lexically meaningful units of language from which other lexemes can be created through
derivation (e.g. the verb play becomes the noun player by adding -er) and inflection creates
other forms of the same lexeme (e.g. verb conjugation: play, plays, played, playing). In
Spanish, lexemes are said to carry “referential meaning”, so the lexeme gives us the center
idea or concept to grasp the meaning of the word. For example if you see the word “sung” you
can identify that it is an inflection from the original verb “sing”. Morphemes are the smallest
units of meaning that a word can be broken down into. For example the word “trees” can be
broken down into “tree” and “-s”. The first carries the meaning of a tall plant that has a wooden
trunk and branches, and the latter carries the meaning of pluralization. In Spanish, it is said
that lexemes carry the lexical meaning and they are the roots or bases of the words, and
morphemes are the ones with grammatical meaning that modify lexemes.
In English, morphemes are classified into free and bound morphemes, which are called
“morfemas independientes y dependientes” in Spanish. Free morphemes are those that can
stand alone as words. These are divided into content words (Main verbs, Nouns, Adverbs,
Adjectives) and function words (Pronouns, Auxiliary Verbs, Conjunctions, Articles,
Prepositions) also called the parts of speech. On the other hand, bound morphemes carry
meaning but cannot stand alone as a word. For example they can be inflectional, meaning
that they do not change the word class of the base word (pluralizing -s, possessive -’s, 3rd
person singular -s, regular past tense -ed, regular past participle -ed, present participle -ing,
comparative -er, and superlative -est), or they can be derivational, and in this case the base is
modified with prefixes (before the base) and suffixes (after the base), for example prehistoric,
unusual, engagement, cordially.
One important thing to mention is that infixes, or the insertion of affixes in the roots are not
common in English, so the only examples that we can find are those of expletives, which are
expressions of anger or
excitement, and sometimes even pain. They are extremely informal and might be considered
rude, for example fanf*ckingtastic, halleflippinlujah, absofreakinlutely, etc. but there are no
examples found in the Spanish language. However, there are interfixes or “interfijos” just like
in English.
The main parts of speech in both languages are 9:
1. Nouns, or “sustantivos” in Spanish, are the names that identify objects, feelings and
concepts. They can be abstract, concrete, countable and uncountable. Just like in English,
the endings of some words can help us identify that they are nouns in Spanish, for
example “-ión, -ción, -idad, -ez”.
2. Pronouns, or “pronombres” in Spanish, are the words that substitute the noun. In Spanish,
there are two versions of “You”: formal (usted) and informal (tú). This distinction is
important because although both mean the same in English, there is a different verb
conjugation for each, since it is important to address people respectfully according to age
or the amount of trust. Also, while in English the word “we” is enough to refer to a group
including ourselves, in Spanish we can say “nosotros” and “nosotras” depending on the
gender of the people in the group (nosotros= men, or mixed men and women / nosotras=
women only), and the same goes for “they”: “ellos” or “ellas”.
3. Adjectives, or “adjetivos” in Spanish, help us describe nouns (people, places, things, etc.)
It is important to mention that while in English the adjective goes before the noun that they
describe (beautiful dress), in Spanish the adjetive goes after the noun (vestido hermoso).
4. Verbs, or “verbos” in Spanish, are actions or a state of being. Spanish verbs in infinitive
form end in -ar, -er, or -ir. It is believed that Spanish is one of the languages that require
more conjugation than others.
5. Adverbs, or “adverbios” in Spanish, add a description to the verbs. Just like “-ly” is a
distinctive adverb ending, “-mente” is the most common ending for adverbs in Spanish.
6. Prepositions, or “preposiciones” in Spanish, explain the relationship between nouns, often
referring to a location.
7. Conjunctions, or “conjunciones” in Spanish, are the words that connect nouns, verbs,
phrases and sentences. These can be simple or complex.
8. Articles, or “artículos” in Spanish, draw attention to the noun that goes after them. They
can be definite or indefinite. In English “the” is the only definite article, but in Spanish there
are four: los, las, el, and la, and they change depending on whether the noun that they
precede is masculine or feminine, and singular or plural. I have noticed that this is
something non-native speakers of Spanish struggle with, due to the fact that sometimes
nouns can seem feminine because they end in “a”, for example “el agua” “el alma” “el
águila”, but for us Spanish speakers it is easy to use “the” in English, with no gender
distinction for most nouns.
9. Interjections, or “interjecciones” in Spanish, are abrupt remarks that help express different
emotions.

From my point of view, Spanish is much more complex in terms of gender distinction because
it is needed for verb conjugation, and also the way we distinguish pronouns in Spanish is a
topic that has gained popularity in the last 5 years because of inclusion and the changes in
gender expression of people. In English, it is easier to address people who identify as non-
binary due to the fact that in the English language the pronoun “they” exists, but in Spanish
we do not have a neutral pronoun and verb ending that enables the speaker to conjugate the
verbs accordingly; although “elle” and “-e” has been proposed, most of the population finds it
very unusual and not easy to get used to, but I believe that gender-neutral pronouns would be
a good addition to the language. Even though people find it strange, languages are ever-
changing and evolving according to the needs from writhing the native speakers and the
influences from people who use a language as their lingua franca.