Gustar and Similar Verbs (Gustar y verbos parecidos) ¿Te gusta mi coche? Sí, me gusta mucho.

Gustar is a completely regular -ar verb in its conjugation. Gustar = to be pleasing Gustar is used to express preferences, likes, and dislikes; however, gustar means “to be pleasing,” and is constructed very differently from the English “to like.” Gustar is a completely regular -ar verb in its conjugation. gusto gustas gusta gustamos gustáis gustan

I like it. It’s pleasing to me. Gustar = to be pleasing In Spanish, the thing or things that we like are expressed as being “pleasing to us.” . . . where “it” is the direct object. In English, we say . . . I like it. In Spanish, “it” becomes the subject of the sentence and we say instead . . . It’s pleasing to me. “I” is then expressed as the indirect object phrase “to me.”

Let’s start by talking about something we all like. I like Spanish. Following the format on the previous slide, we would say . . . Spanish is pleasing to me. In Spanish, this would literally be . . . me gusta. El español gusta me. But, of course, in Spanish, pronouns must be placed before conjugated verbs. Now, it so happens that, by convention, the subject (in this case El español) is generally placed at the end of the sentence with this type of construction.

I like Spanish. Spanish is pleasing to me. Me gusta me gusta. el español. El español It turns out, then, that the sentence in Spanish is exactly the reverse of that in English, in its sense, and also in its word order.

Nos Les Me Os Te Le gusta el español. You all They You We He I To express that others like Spanish, only the object pronoun needs to change, since Spanish remains the subject in all the sentences. Nos Les Me Os Te Le gusta el español. You all They You We He I likes Spanish. like Spanish.

Since most of the things or people that please us are expressed in third person, the two forms of gustar that are used most commonly are gusta and gustan gusto gustas gusta gustamos gustáis gustan Me gusta el verano. I like summer. No me gustan las tardes aburridas. I don’t like boring afternoons.

When gustar is used with one or more infinitives, only the third person singular is used. Me gusta leer. Me gusta leer, jugar fútbol, y viajar.

The verb gustar is used exclusively with indirect object pronouns me nos te os le les

Gustar is used with indirect object pronouns Me gusta este apartamento. I like this apartment. ¿Te gusta el tiempo hoy? Do you like the weather today? Le gustan mucho las fotografías. He/She likes the photgraphs a lot. No nos gusta el yogur. We don’t like yogurt. Les gusta cenar en casa. They/You (plural) like to eat dinner at home.

Many other verbs function like gustar These, too, are used with indirect object pronouns. aburrir to bore; to tire encantar to delight; to be extremely pleasing faltar to be lacking or needed fascinar to be fascinating interesar to be interesting molestar to be a bother or to annoy parecer to seem quedar to be left; to remain

Many other verbs function like gustar Me aburre comer solo. Eating alone bores me. Les encanta la primavera. They love the spring(time). ¿Les faltan los teléfonos celulares? Do you all need cell phones? Nos fascina la pizza de Domino. Domino’s pizza fascinates us.

Many other verbs function like gustar Nos interesan los pingüinos. We’re interested in penguins. Me molestan algunos clientes. Some customers annoy me. Nos parece caro este vino. This wine seems expensive to us. ¿Te queda suficiente dinero para pagar la cuenta? Do you have enough money left to pay the bill?

I like to eat a lot of food. When we like something a lot (mucho) or more (más) than something else, mucho and más immediately follow the verb gustar: Me gusta mucho comer. I really like to eat. A different word order would convey a different meaning: Me gusta comer mucho. I like to eat a lot of food.

Do you like winter or spring best? When we like something a lot (mucho) or more (más) than something else, mucho and más immediately follow the verb gustar: ¿Te gusta más el invierno o la primavera? Do you like winter or spring best? Me gusta más la primavera. I like spring best.

(for clarification or emphasis) Again, the verbs gustar, encantar, etc. are used exclusively with indirect object pronouns These are mandatory me te le nos os les (a mí) (a ti) (a usted) (a él) (a ella) (a nosotros) (a vosotros) (a ustedes) (a ellos) (a ellas) The prepositional forms are optional (for clarification or emphasis)

All the prepositional forms can be used to emphasize the object pronoun form. Juan doesn’t like beans, but I do. A Juan no le gustan los frijoles, pero sí me gustan. a mí Notice that because Juan and I were stressed in the above sentence in English, we added the prepositional forms a Juan and a mí in Spanish to reflect that stress.

Les encantan las bananas. Since the third-person pronouns le and les can be ambiguous, they sometimes require prepositional forms for clarification. Les encantan las bananas. Since les can represent a number of different people, we may need to add a prepositional form to avoid confusion. A ellos les encantan las bananas. A ellas les encantan las bananas. A Luis y a Marta les encantan las bananas. A Uds. les encantan las bananas.

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