Temporal is not Temporary: A Contrastive Examination of Spanish Copula Selection

Abstract

Spanish has a variety of forms which are translatable as the English verb "be": ser (soy profesor "I am a teacher"). estar (Ella está en clase "She is in class"), haber (Ustedes han de estudiar "You are to study"), tener (tenemos mucho frío "We are very cold"), quedar (La casa queda en la Avenida 33 "The hous is on 33rd Ave"), etc. Different pedagogical grammars, however, have traditionally narrowed down the focus to a two-way contrast: ser and estar.

Keywords

• grammar
• Spanish
• English
• copula selection