Ser vs Estar et le présent progressif

¡Hola, bienvenidos! Welcome back to Spanish for Beginners with Lingua, and welcome to your last lesson. Hurrah! You did it. I'm so proud of all of you. You've done an incredible job. You've learned so much over these 20 lessons, four hours. It's really, really, really wonderful. I'm so happy you've stayed this whole time.

There will be more Spanish for Beginners classes after this, so make sure you keep an eye out for those. As always, I'm your teacher, Isabella. Let's get started on our last lesson.

Today, I'm going to be teaching you something I promised I would teach you : the difference between SER and ESTAR. This is very easy and very difficult. It's something that will haunt you throughout your entire Spanish journey, and I'm sorry I have to be the one to introduce it to you, but it's incredibly important and incredibly useful.

You already have a bit of an idea of what the differences are based on what we've learned previously. But the differences can sometimes get a little convoluted. Don't worry. Today we're not going to get into what makes the differences convoluted. We're just going to go with the basic differences so you can have a good base. In future courses, we will build on the differences of SER vs ESTAR.

So both of these words mean "to be", but they're used in completely different scenarios.

SER is used when talking about : time, dates, days, origins, religion, politics, material, relationships, physical characteristics, and who people are. Basically, SER is used for things that don't really change, things that stay the same, things that are absolute. I know time is not absolute, but like I said, sometimes these rules get a little convoluted. But things like your religion, where you are from, what you look like, those are things that are considered more permanent. So when you are discussing them, you use SER.

Let's look at some examples.

TIME (we learned this in the previous lesson) : "es la una" (it's one o'clock), "son las dos", "son las tres".

DATES : "es el 10 de octubre" (it's October 10th), "es el 7 de junio", "es el 21 de abril". For dates, we always use SER because for that whole day it won't change.

DAYS : "es lunes" (it's Monday), "es jueves", "es domingo".

ORIGIN : "soy de Francia" (I'm from France), "soy de Estados Unidos", "soy de Canadá", "es de España". If you want to ask somebody where they're from, you say "¿de dónde eres?". "¿De dónde es?" = where is he / she from? "Ella es de…", "Él es de…", "Somos de…". You should remember how to conjugate ser. So all of these should make perfect sense. Where you are from is always going to use SER.

RELIGION : "él es judío" (he's Jewish), "es cristiano" (you are Christian), "soy musulmán" (I am Muslim), "ella es atea" (she is atheist). Remember that when it comes to these sorts of words, you need to match the ending to the gender. So if we say "es cristiano", the O indicates the person is a man. But if it were a woman, it would change to "es cristiana". Same down here : "es atea" if it's a woman. Remember that very important little side grammar lesson.

POLITICS : something no one ever wants to talk about, but if you are talking about it, use SER. "España es un país democrático", "el presidente es republicano".

All right, let's move away from politics. MATERIAL THINGS : whenever you're discussing what material something is made of, you're also going to use SER. So "la camisa es de algodón" means "the shirt is cotton" (made from cotton). Literally, this means "the shirt is of cotton".

RELATIONSHIPS : not just romantic ones, mostly we use this for familial relationships. "Ella es mi madre" (she is my mother), "él es el amigo de mi hermano" (he is the friend of my brother). Both are correct. Relationships : SER, super important.

PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS : things about you that don't really change. "Ella es alta" (remember we saw "alto" : it also means tall). "Somos cortos" (we are short). "Soy rubia" (I'm blonde). These are things that won't change about us. Well, they can, but they are more concrete. Physical characteristics : always use SER.

WHO PEOPLE ARE (personality) : "soy tímido" (I'm shy), "el chico es extrovertido" (the boy is outgoing). Who you are, what makes you who you are, is always going to use SER.

Now, let's look at ESTAR. ESTAR doesn't have as many specific rules as SER. So when you are confused, your best bet is to use SER. But remember, you do need to learn these differences because they are very important.

ESTAR is used to give location, to talk about the condition of something (emotions, temperatures, things that can change quickly), and it's also used in the progressive tense. I know I said we would only do present tense in this course, but progressive tense is ridiculously easy and we're only going to look at it for three minutes. So I'm not that much of a liar.

LOCATION : "Barcelona está en España". You might think, well, that's not going to change, so shouldn't it be SER? No. The rules get a little convoluted, but if you know that ESTAR is always used with location, it doesn't really matter what the rules technically say. "Estoy en la tienda" (I am at the store). "Mi madre está en casa" (my mother is at home). Location is always ESTAR.

CONDITIONS : "estoy contento" (I'm happy : I feel happy right now). "Ella está triste" (she's sad right now). It's not only for emotions, it's also for temperature. "La comida está fría" (the food is cold) : doesn't have to stay that way, you can throw it in the microwave. But right now, "la comida está fría".

PROGRESSIVE TENSE : very easy. To make something progressive in English would be adding -ing to a word. In Spanish, all you do is : -ando if it's an -AR verb, or -iendo if it's an -ER or -IR verb. So "estoy caminando" (I am walking), "están saltando" (they are jumping), "mi padre está corriendo" (my father is running).

Let's practice. First, in English : when you are talking about CONDITION, you use which one? PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS? DATES? LOCATION?

Did you get them right? Condition is ESTAR. Physical characteristics is SER. Dates is SER. Location is ESTAR. Good.

Now, a slightly more difficult practice. I would like you to pause the video, look at these sentences and fill out the correct form of SER and ESTAR. It's not enough to just write SER or ESTAR in infinitive : you must also conjugate them.

How did you do? Let's check it out. "¿De dónde eres?" or "¿De dónde es?" (Where are you / he from?) "Mi padre está corriendo" (My father is running). "Barcelona está en España" (Barcelona is in Spain). "Es el 7 de junio" (It's June 7th). "Son las dos" (It's two o'clock). "Ella está triste" (She is sad).

¡Felicidades! Everyone, you did it. You made it through four hours of a Spanish course. That is incredible. I'm so proud of each and every one of you.

If you feel like this wasn't enough, you have so many more questions : I totally understand. One beginner Spanish course is not enough. You don't speak the language now. You have so much more to learn, which is why we're making three more Spanish for Beginners courses. So if they are already available, go ahead and buy them. If you can't or if they're not available yet, it doesn't mean you can't still go back and watch this course again. You can also study materials online, start watching videos and films in Spanish, listen to Spanish music. There's so much you can do.

But for right now, I just want to thank you. Muchas gracias for your patience, for your attention. And I hope you're interested enough to continue to learn Spanish in the future.

Hasta luego.