- How to put spanish accents in word document full#
- How to put spanish accents in word document windows#
If you don't know what that means, let me quickly explain: What Is Word Stress? Generally, an acute accent is used to denote word stress. It can appear above all five vowels: á, é, í, ó, ú. The acute accent (é) is by far the most common diacritic in the Spanish language.
With that out of the way, it’s time to tackle the biggest and baddest of Spanish accent marks: The Acute Accent in Spanish If it didn't have the diacritic on the “u”, it would be pronounced “peen-GHEEN-oh”. So pingüino is pronounced like “peen-G WEEN-oh”. It’s not just there to provide moral support to the “g” – it’s a fully articulated vowel. In a word like pingüino, the diaeresis tells you that the “u” should be pronounced out loud like a regular “u”. If it was spelled gitarra it would be pronounced “ hee-TAH-ra”.īut hold on: what if you don’t want the “u” to be silent? That’s where the diaeresis steps in. That extra “u” is silent – it’s just there to tell you that the “g” should be pronounced like a regular “g”, not like a “j”. Spanish does this by sticking a “u” in the middle, as in as in words like guitarra (guitar) and manguera (hose). So gemelo, for example, is pronounced as if it was written jemelo.īut wait – what if you have an “e” or “i”, and you want to preserve the regular “g” sound without turning it into a “j”? This is the same sound that's normally written in Spanish as a letter “j”. But when it’s followed by an “e” or “i” – as in words like gemelo (twin) or girar (to spin) – it becomes a raspy, “h”-like sound from the back of your throat. Normally, a “g” in Spanish is pronounced like an English “g”. To understand what’s going on here, we need to consider how the “gue” and “gui” letter combinations are pronounced when they don’t have diaeresis. More tellingly, that “ü” always comes immediately after a “g”, and immediately before an “e” or “i”. Here are the ones you’re more likely to encounter:ĭid you spot the pattern? In all of these words, the diaeresis appears above a “u”. Truth be told, there aren’t many words in Spanish that use a diaeresis. Suffice to say that Spanish has no umlauts, only diaereses, as seen in words like pingüino or vergüenza. Sometimes people call it an umlaut, but technically, an umlaut and a diaeresis aren't the same thing, despite looking identical. This symbol – two dots above a letter – is called a diaeresis (pronounced “die heiresses”). What English speakers call a “tilde”, Spanish speakers call la virgulilla or la tilde de la eñe. They even have separate keys on a typical Spanish keyboard.Ĭonfusingly, while the English word “tilde” exclusively refers to this “~” symbol, the Spanish cognate tilde is used to refer to diacritics in general, including the other ones you'll see in this article like the accent on “é”. “ eñe“, and are listed separately in the dictionary – so for example leñador comes later than lengua and lento. In Spanish, “n” and “ñ” are considered to be two completely separate letters. While a tilde-less “n” is pronounced like the English letter “n”, an “ñ” is pronounced roughly like an English “ny”. This accent mark is only ever found above an “n”. Let's start with the simplest diacritic of Spanish’s three: You'll never see a grave accent (è) or a circumflex (ê) in Spanish. Spanish uses three such diacritics: the diaeresis (ü), the acute accent (é), and the tilde (ñ). By the end, you'll never be unsure again about whether to write como or cómo.Ī quick note before we get started: Technically these “accent marks” are called diacritics – an extra symbol added to an existing letter.
How to put spanish accents in word document windows#
We'll cover what the accents in Spanish are, how and when they're used, how they affect pronunciation, and how you can type them on Windows or a Mac. In this article, I'll tell you everything you need to know about Spanish accent marks. The good news is that accent marks in Spanish – like everything else about Spanish spelling – follow very consistent rules. More often than not, an accent (or lack of it) completely changes the meaning of a word.įor example, you definitely don't want to confuse año (year) with ano (anus).Ī proper understanding of Spanish accent rules is therefore essential if you want to read and write Spanish effectively. What about the written accent marks that go above Spanish letters? Spanish accents can be confusing – and I'm not just talking about the way they pronounce things in Chile.
How to put spanish accents in word document full#
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