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Possessive adjectives and pronouns

Possession in Spanish is often expressed by using a prepositional phrase such as Los cangrejos son de la abuela. Possessive adjectives and pronouns, however, also have shortened forms.

Possessive adjectives

Short form

Possessive adjectives are words such as my, your, our, their, etc., and the more commonly used Spanish forms are:

These possessive adjectives precede the nouns they modify. They all agree in number, and in the first and second person plural they also agree in gender.

It is important to remember that even though mi, tu, and su have a singular reference, they can have plural forms, since they reflect the number of the word they modify, not the identity of the person to whom they refer. Conversely, su may be plural, referring to "their" or "your" (plural), but it will be written su or sus depending on whether the noun it modifies is singular or plural.

In addition, one should also remember that when referring to parts of the body or clothing, among other items, the definite article usually replaces the possessive adjective.

Emphatic form

There is a longer form of the possessive adjective that is used primarily to draw special attention to the possessor, such as in the case of exclamations or in other situations in which the speaker wishes to be emphatic. These adjectives always follow the noun they modify, and they always reflect the number and gender of that noun. Following are just the masculine singular forms.

Examples:

* Notice how ambiguous the word suya is. It could mean his, her, your (sing.), your (pl.), their, etc. To eliminate confusion one may also substitute this form with a prepositional phrase such as de él, de ella, de usted, de ellas, etc. to remove ambiguity.
**Both the emphatic form of the possessive adjective and the possessive pronoun can be used with the verb ser. The former use indicates simple possession, while the latter is used in situations where selection from various possibilities is implied. Compare, for instance Son nuestros and Estos son los nuestros.

Relative possessives

The relative possessive "whose," or cuyo, cuya, cuyos, cuyas, should not be confused with the interrogative ¿quién?

Possessive pronouns

Possessive pronouns are similar in form to possessive adjectives, and, similar to them, these words reflect the number and gender of the word to which they refer. They are different only in that the definite article precedes the word. Following are just the masculine singular forms.

Examples:

See also

Possessive adjectives.