Talk:embarazado

Removed grammar lesson

I removed the following because it doesn't belong in this standard past particile entry nor is it accurate:

=== Usage notes ===

Not used as an adjective, since the feminine form would be embarazada

Contrary to that claim, all Spanish past participles, including this one, can be used as adjectives. For example, this one can be attributive or predicative, agreeing with the modified noun in both cases:

Mis tías embarazadas fueron...

Mis tías están embarazadas.

Rod (A. Smith) 09:01, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

The point is that this was previously a redirect to embarazada with the description: Should end as "-a" to make it feminine, as it describes prengancy. I recreated it to make the point that the specific form embarazado (with an -o) is used in the perfect tenses (with haber), but would not be used as an adjective to agree with a woman because it is the masculine form. Your examples about las tías are perfectly good examples -- of the adjective in feminine and plural form. There is already an adjective article about embarazada, when writing this I intended it for the verb form only. –Andyluciano 19:31, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

I also find your edit title of remove incorrect grammar lesson to be a bit overdone, and I take it as a personal insult and patronizing. What do you think I am, stupid that I don't realize this things? Of course you can say las tías están embarazadas! What you cannot say is la tía está embarazado nor ella ha embarazada a alguien, and that was what I was trying to illustrate. Call it poorly articulated, but don't call a "incorrect grammar lesson", please. –Andyluciano 19:50, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

My apologies if my "incorrect grammar lesson" note offended you. I should have chosen my words more carefully. What I meant is that entries for past participles should not each say "Not used as an adjective, since the feminine form would be ...". Grammar lessons about classes of words, like past participles, do not belong in dictionary entries of for words of those classes. For consistency, I suggest the following:

• The entry for "embarazada" should be treated like every other feminine inflected form of Spanish past participles. It should be only a minimal definition, pointing to the main entry for the past participle, embarazado.
• The entry for embarazado should be treated like every other Spanish past participle entry. It should only be a minimal definition, pointing to the main entry for the verb embarazar.

I called the previous version "incorrect" because it said this:

Not used as an adjective, since the feminine form would be embarazada

All past participles in Spanish can be used as attributively. The only reason you don't tend to see embarazado used that way is because, as you well know, most Spanish nouns for females are grammatically feminine. However, note the following grammatically correct sentence where embarazado is used attributively:

Un miembro de cada familia está embarazado.

Note that miembro is grammatically masculine so its modifying adjective is properly inflected in the masculine. Rod (A. Smith) 21:35, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

I'd just like to note two things: firstly, that there is a distinction between a past participle and an adjective, despite the fact that the one often turns into the other. It is quite right (IMO) for there to be an adjective entry at embarazada (not just a soft redirect), since that is by far the most common form of the word. Also remember that embarazada is also used as a noun meaning ‘pregnant woman’. Widsith 21:48, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

I agree about adding "===Noun===" to embarazada, but I don't think I agree that inflections of past participle entries should be split into "===Verb form===" and "===Adjective===". Indo-European languages consistently allow participles to function as verbal adjectives. In fact, that's a common definition of a participle. From w:Verb:

In the Indo-European languages, verbal adjectives are generally called participles.

So there seems to be no benefit into splitting out participle entries into both "===Adjective===" and "===Verb form===". Rod (A. Smith) 22:05, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Well, it's the same with English, and we happily do it there, although I admit that I'm not always happy with the result. However, while there are probably borderline cases, embarazada doesn't seem like one of them...it is clearly used largely as an adjective and not just as a participle (ie it can qualify a noun directly and doesn't require auxiliary verbs etc). I get why you made the changes, but in a way this is a special case, being applied almost exclusively as a feminine form. Widsith 22:10, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

OK. Maybe some example sentences on embarazado and embarazada would help show people how to use the terms. I'd recommend keeping one that uses embarazado attributively, though. Rod (A. Smith) 22:21, 23 May 2006 (UTC)