Demonstrative Adjectives

Los Adjetivos Demostrativos

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Introduction

Introducción

Demonstrative adjectives are words used to indicate specific objects in relation to the speaker and listener. In English these are words like “this”, “these”, “that” and “those”.

In Spanish they are nearly identical to the demonstrative pronouns. Both must match the gender and plurality of the objects they describe, like most other adjectives in Spanish.

They also have two different words equivalent to “that” in English. Ese used for nearby objects, and aquel used for distant objects, far away from both the speaker and listener.

The major differences are that the demonstrative adjectives do not use the diacritical marks above the first vowel like the pronouns do (though according to Real Academia Español it is technically only required for pronouns when settling ambiguity), and demonstrative adjectives do not have a neuter form like esto.
MasculineFeminine
Near speaker Singular
este
this
esta
this
Plural
estos
these
estas
these
Near listener,
far from speaker
Singular
ese
that
esa
that
Plural
esos
those
esas
those
Far Singular
aquel
that
aquella
that
Plural
aquellos
those
aquellas
those

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