The indirect object indicates the person or thing receiving the action of the verb. They can be replaced by the indirect object pronouns below. [ view full lesson ]
me
to/for me
te
to/for you (familiar)
le
to/for you, to him, to her (formal)
nos
to/for us
os
tofor you guys
les
to/for you all, to them
The indirect object pronoun answers the question “to whom?” or “for whom?”.
Mi novia me compró un reloj.
My girlfriend bought me a watch.
indirect object pronoun - me
Unlike English, Spanish also requires the indirect object pronoun when the indirect object is still present in the sentence.
Yo le di el dinero a Juan ayer.
I gave the money to Juan yesterday.
indirect object - Juan
indirect object pronoun - le (to him)
The Spanish direct object pronouns are used to substitute for direct objects. [ view full lesson ]
me
me
te
you
lo
him, you, it
la
her, you, it
nos
us
os
you all (familiar)
los
them, you all
las
them, you all
Nosotros lavamos el carro. Nosotros lo lavamos.
We wash the car. We wash it.
(direct object - el carro)
(direct object pronoun - lo)
Ellos trajeron las mochilas. Ellos las trajeron.
They brought the backpacks. They brought them.
(direct object - el carro)
(direct object pronoun - lo)
Use Indirect Object Pronouns
Use Direct Object Pronouns
Dialogues - Indirect Object Pronouns
Dialogues - Direct and Indirect Object Pronouns
What is a pronoun? When you make a sentence with a direct and/or indirect object, you can state the object fully, of you can reduce it to a pronoun. For example, in English, one can say,
I drink the coffee.
or one can say,
I drink it.
In the first sentence, "the coffee" is the direct object. In the second sentence, "the coffee" is still the direct object, but the speaker assumes that the listener knows that he's talking about "the coffee". You replace the "the coffee" with a pronoun to shorten the sentence. In Spanish, one can say,
Yo bebo el café.
or one can say,
Yo lo bebo.
Notice that in the case of the fully stated direct object, the word order is identical to English. However, in the case of the pronoun, they put the pronoun in front of the conjugated verb. The placement of the pronoun is one of the greatest sources of confusion for native English speakers.
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