Spanish Word of the Day

"este trabajo exige mucha concentración"

I am not sure how you would use the imperative, "exija". The verb seems inherently imperative. I found this example on the web:

Salvo los casos que la ley exija mayorias superiores, los acuerdos de las Juntas de Accionistas deberan ser adoptados por la mayoria absoluta de las acciones presentes o representadas, con derecho a voto.

Quote: Nareed

Remember the G in Spanish sounds like a J in Spanish when used in front of an E or I. Therefore in present tense the conjugations are "exiJo, exiGes, exiGe."

Rule g > j: Verbs whose infinitive form ends in -gir change the g to j before an a or an o.

dirigir (direct) dirijo, diriges, dirige, dirigimos, dirigís, dirigen
corregir (correct), fingir (pretend), and surgir (arise).


These verbs are not really considered irregular. They have an orthographic changes in order to maintain the same pronunciation of the final stem consonant:

Fecha: 10-11-12
Palabra: Retar

Thanks, as always, for the help yesterday. However, it is a new day.

Today's SWD means to challenge/impugn.

The assignment for the advanced readers is to compare and contrast retar, impugnar, y desafiar.

Ejemplo time.

Mis profesionalidad como un matemático fueron retados por Sally de Potro Mesteño= My professionalism as a mathematician was impugned by Mustang Sally.

Quote: Wizard

The assignment for the advanced readers is to compare and contrast retar, impugnar, y desafiar.

Google translates all three words as "challenge", but their second order meaning seems to be:

retar = challenge in the sense of defiance
impugnar = challenge in the sense of contest (war of words)
desafiar = challenge in the sense of provocation

The word impugn in English seems to have evolved from the idea of a simple fight. It is related to pugilism or another word for boxing, or pugnacious which means "belligerent". They are all related to the Latin word for "fist". But the word impugn in English now means "to verbally assault, especially to argue against an opinion" and does not refer to physical assault.


I do not Challenge Diego ... {the implication is defiance}


I am going to challenge ...
Obrador is going to contest the results of the election. I think this became one of his catchphrases.
Remember that "voy a infinitive" is a shorthand Spanish future tense, since it doesn't use future tense conjugations.


You dare challenge the power of Thor!
The sense is one of provocation

Quote: Wizard

Mis profesionalidad como un matemático fueron retados por Sally de Potro Mesteño= My professionalism as a mathematician was impugned by Mustang Sally.

Oy vey!

"My professionalities as a one mathematician [using the wrong gender] were defied by....."

Second, the rule about not translating names applies to nicknames as well, with rare exceptions. In this case, most Spanish spekaers know Mustang is a Ford, true, but calling it what you did is much less enlightening.

Third, the word "challenge" doesn't really exist in Spanish. "Retar" means something more like a dare. The closest word for your meaning would be "desafiar," but it carries the undertone of a dare in some cases.

Quote: Nareed

Third, the word "challenge" doesn't really exist in Spanish.

The original Latin word was calumnia which means "trickery".
The was adopted into Old/Middle French into two words calomnie and chalonge, and on to English as calumny and challenge. The word "calumny" is used by Shakespeare, but it is now pretty rare.

Although the idea of slandering/trickery and a call to fight are obviously closely connected, in English the accusatory connotations died out in the 1600's. So a project could be "challenging" without necessarily involving any slander.

As we have seen several times, the Spanish development still follows the Latin and did not go through the same metamorphosis. The Latin calumnia is intact in Spanish as calumnia , and it is a noun that refers to a slander.

So, as Nareed pointed out, there are other verbs in Spansih that have similar meanings, but don't have the precise equivalent to the English word "challenge".

Interesting, thanks for the above. Just goes to show how culture and language are intertwined.

On another topic, I came across this expression, which must be a figure of speech, "Esto se está poniendo color de hormiga." My best translation is "This is becoming the color of an ant," but given the context of the book, that makes no sense. I tend to think the actual meaning is something like "This is getting bad."

Quote: Wizard

"Esto se está poniendo color de hormiga." My best translation is "This is becoming the color of an ant," but given the context of the book, that makes no sense. I tend to think the actual meaning is something like "This is getting bad."

Yes, the literal translation is meaningless. Yes, it is meaningless literally in Spanish (ants are not all of a single color, after all). Yes, it means what you think it does. No, I've no idea why that's so or where the expression comes from. Yes, I've heard it before.

Fecha: 11-11-12
Palabra: Arrasar

Today's SWD means to destroy. Be careful not to confuse it with arrastrar, which means to drag.

The assignment for the advanced readers is to compare and contrast arrasar y destruir. I tend to think that destruir is the more general word for destroy, and arrasar conveys overdoing the destruction, as if it was done out of too much excitement.

Ejemplo time.

¿Gilligan, por qué arrases nuestra oportunidad de ser rescatados todos los tiempos? = Gilligan, why do you destroy our chance to be rescued every time?

Quote: Wizard

Today's SWD means to destroy.

Actually it means to level or to raze. When used to mean "to destroy," it refers to actions like "to demolish." So you'd say something like "Pittsburgh arrasó a los Cuervos en playoffs."

Quote:

The assignment for the advanced readers is to compare and contrast arrasar y destruir.

See above.

Quote:

¿Gilligan, por qué arrases nuestra oportunidad de ser rescatados todos los tiempos? = Gilligan, why do you destroy our chance to be rescued every time?

Aside from the choice of "arrasar," it should be "arrasAs" and "todo EL tiempo."

Quote: Wizard

Interesting, thanks for the above. Just goes to show how culture and language are intertwined.

On another topic, I came across this expression, which must be a figure of speech, "Esto se está poniendo color de hormiga." My best translation is "This is becoming the color of an ant," but given the context of the book, that makes no sense. I tend to think the actual meaning is something like "This is getting bad."

A blogger tells one story about how he studies Spanish. A Peruvian friend of his posted some Spanish on his Facebook, ""Happy no more. Things are looking color de hormiga"" Faced with this idiom he does two things.

(1) He searches for the phrase on WordReference.com where he learns that ponerse las cosas color de hormiga means "that things suddenly take a turn for the worse, get ugly, go awry."

(2) His technique for determining if a phrase is tired and old (a dictionary word) is to look at tweets to first of all see how often it is used. Secondly he also tries to see variations in context (different pronouns, with different words etc.)

• Esto se esta poniendo color de hormiga!
• Esto se me esta poniendo color de hormiga - Lamentablemente a mi, solo a mi.
• Ya van a ser las doceeeee pero esto esta color de hormiga se acaba de empatar a dos Carreras en la novena entrada, Mexicali y Hermosillo
• Todo es color de rosa hasta que una hijue puta lo vuelve colorhormiga.
• Cuando la cosa se ponía color de hormiga ...
  
  (3) Leaving aside the fact that people are notorious about using bad grammer and poor spelling on twitter, he makes four conclusions about the phrase
  
  - It is common to say that something "se está poniendo color de hormiga."
  - It can take an indirect object (me/te/le/nos/les) to show that it affects someone.
  - Things can become (volver) color de hormiga, and you can leave out the "de"
  
  However, he had no insight into the origin of the idiom