Language Bites, Volume I: Spanish ✔

Possessives 101

Now that we've learned about subject pronouns, we'll get to possessives. In English, a possessive pronoun is the "my", "your", "our", "their", and so forth.

Yo: Mi, Mis (My)

Tú: Tu, Tus (Your)

Él, ella, ud.: Su, Sus (His, her, its, your - formal)

Nosotros: nuestro/nuestra, nuestros/nuestras (ours)

Vosotros (Spain): vuestro/vuestra, vuestros/vuestras (your - plural, Spain)

Ellos/Ellas, Uds.: Su, sus (Their, your - plural)

You'll notice that there are two sets of pronouns. This is because they change depending on the number of objects. If there is one pronoun, you say the first set. If there is more than one, you would say the second. For example:

Yo como mi zanahoria. (I eat my carrot - singular)

Yo como mis zanahorias. (I eat my carrots - plural)

You will also notice that for nosotros and vosotros, there are masculine and feminine pronouns. This depends on whether the group is masculine or feminine. Remember, if a group has both girls and boys, the plural masculine is used:

Nosotras gustan nuestras pasteles. (We like our cakes - plural feminine)

There are also pronouns in Spanish to refer to extended possessives such as "mine", "yours", etc. They follow the rules of nuestro and vuestro in regard to gender and number:

Yo: mío/mía, míos/mías (mine)

Tú: tuyo/tuya, tuyos/tuyas (yours)

Él, ella, ud.: suyo/suya, suyos/suyas (his, hers, its, yours - formal)

Nosotros: Pronouns are same as above

Vosotros: Pronouns are same as above

Ellos/ellas, uds.: suyo/suya, suyos/suyas (theirs, yours - plural)

Examples for all:

Los gatos son míos. (The cats are mine)

Los perros son tuyos. (The dogs are yours)

Tienes el pantalón que son mío. (You have the pants that are mine)

Lastly, as I said in my punctuation chapter, the possessive in Spanish is different since there are no apostrophes. Instead we say, "The [noun] of [name]. For example:

El libro de Joye. (Joye's book / Literally, "The book of Joye")

All possessives are like this.