Grappling with Spanish Adverbs of Place

Adverbs in Spanish

When teaching Spanish, we often work with students who have a particularly challenging time learning how to explain where things are.

I’m talking about the use of the adverbs aquí, ahí and allí, and of course their variants acá and allá.

Beginning level students have a tendency to translate word for word the grammatical structures of their native languages into Spanish, which is something we just have to handle with patience and resignation until they understand that not all languages share the same structures and lexical parallels. A simple example can illustrate that point: how do you translate the word cozy into Spanish? There are countless possibilities depending on the context, it could be cómodo, confortable, agradable, ameno… Then there’s the German Word gemütlich, which according to all knowing Google, can be translated as cómodo, confortable, agradable, acogedor, íntimo, campechano, familiar, ameno o apacible… And that’s just the beginning.

It’s understandable that a grammatical pattern made up of three references to location (aquí, ahí, allí) may cause confusion among Spanish learners, as most languages only have two different words for this pattern.

One thing you can do is the following: first mention the fact that Spanish, English, and German for example, all have an equivalent two-word system, in which speakers use their word for AQUÍ to refer to nearby places and ALLÍ for places farther away… Here you’ll also have to toss into the mix the pronouns and adjectives associated with these adverbs: este/a/o (and their plural forms) and aquel/aquella/o (and their plural forms). 

Then you can take it one step further.

It seems that we Spaniards always love to push things just a little bit further, staying faithful to the motto “si podemos complicarlo… ¿por qué hacerlo fácil?” This is when you get all philosophical on your students by casually asking:

“What is verbal communication?”

(A class full of stone-faced students…) Communication, I begin to explain like a bishop speaking from a pulpit of wisdom, is the transmission of verbal information from one person (the speaker) to another (the listener), and in which three levels of participation can be defined:

1. The person speaking, defined as YO.
2. The person listening, who would be TÚ.
3. The person not participating in the conversation, ÉL.

So, in Spanish, you can refer to the space occupied by each one of these components. AQUÍ for the space of the speaker, AHÍ  for the listener (notice that physical distance is not relevant with this distinction) and ALLÍ for the person being talked about, or who’s not present while communication is taking place.

This explanation may solve a few questions. It’s clearer, at least in my opinion, than other explanations out there that I’ve seen in learning manuals.

Think about and decide if it’ll work in your class.

¡Hasta otra!