Week #17 - Final Grammar Exploration (Pejoratives & The Neuter "Lo")

It says volumes about the breadth (and, yes, even depth) to which we have covered the Spanish language that I actually had to dig quite deep to come up with a couple of worthwhile final "exploratory" concepts to investigate to finish the year. In the end, I have found 2 that were worth our time looking at: pejoratives (a relative of  diminutives and augmentatives) and the neuter "lo" subject pronoun. 

WHAT! --- yeah, I know... but it will explain a lot of things that you might see and/or hear that have confused you.

First, though, there is the pejorative. For this, just watch the video below that briefly explains the concept. Like diminutives and augmentatives, there is not a lot of structure to these, but are handy to for recognition of what is being said or reading. These aren't typically used until one is an advanced speaker, even then they should be approached cautiously as these are used to cast things in a negative light (not always bad, but can have the tendency to be used in mean/unkind ways -- though, especially when used on inanimate objects, not necessarily wrong to use.

Next, and much more common in the everyday usage of Spanish is the neuter "lo" subject pronoun. This concept really takes the "not-word-for-word" translation to the next level and one really has to go for what the understanding is, as the Spanish will use a lot less words than the English. Also, with these, there are quite often (though not always) other ways that these sentences could be said, but they are usually longer and less succinct. This really is a cool, efficient addition to one's repertoire and is used quite a bit. Please watch the video below, which gives a good explanation of this topic. To wrap up this concept, I would like for you to take a look at this grammar guide on spanishdict.com. At the end of the guide, which gives more in-depth details about the concept, I would like you to take the quiz. There is a link at the end of the guide for that quiz. If you are unable to locate it, here is the direct link just to the quiz (no guide, which you should read prior to attempting the quiz).
Once you have finished the quiz, make sure to write down your score and answer the Google Classroom Question that this exploration was part of with what your score on the quiz was...no worries, your grade is not going to be based on that score. Your grade will be on completion. I'm just curious about how well you did :) I thought about taking this Spanishdict quiz and turning it into a Kahoot (which I've done in the past), but one thing that I really like about the Spanishdict.com concept quizzes is that it gives you feedback as to why an answer is the way that it is. This is great for helping to learn and get a handle of a new concept.