Pronominal verbs...

[laepelba]

I receive a couple of different "word of the day" e-mails to increase my Spanish vocabulary. The most recent one used the word "burlarse", and said that it is a "pronomial verb", meaning that it takes a reflexive pronoun, right? The definition of the word (in English) is given as "to mock, to flout, to ridicule". They also give a couple of example sentences:
- Mi hermano burlarse de las leyes.
- Muchos niños se burlan de los niños diferentes.

My questions:
1) In the first example, why is the verb not conjugated? Why isn't it: Mi hermano se burla de las leyes.
2) What is the pronoun supposed to be representing? It would seem to me that with this particular verb, the pronoun should represent the object of the joking. Or does it HAVE to agree with the subject? It's not apparent in either example, which both use third person. For example:

Which is correct?
- Tú se burlas de los niños diferentes.
OR
- Tú te burlas de los niños diferentes.


Which is correct?
- Yo se burlo de las leyes.
OR
- Yo me burlo de las leyes.

[Rusty]

Good job. You caught the mistake made in the first sentence, and correctly translated it.
The verb burlarse is categorized as pronominal, which just means it has a pronoun. How it is used wasn't mentioned. Pronominal verbs fall into three categories: reflexive, reciprocal, and idiomatic pronominal

Burlarse is reflexive. That means the person and pronoun agree: (Yo) me burlo, (Tú) te burlas

[laepelba]

Originally Posted by Rusty

Good job. You caught the mistake made in the first sentence, and correctly translated it.
The verb burlarse is categorized as pronominal, which just means it has a pronoun. How it is used wasn't mentioned. Pronominal verbs fall into three categories: reflexive, reciprocal, and idiomatic pronominal

Burlarse is reflexive. That means the person and pronoun agree: (Yo) me burlo, (Tú) te burlas

YAY! I love it when I catch mistakes. It means that I am actually LEARNING SOMETHING! w00t!!

Okay - so that makes sense to me in the mechanics of the sentence structure. But it doesn't make sense to me in the meaning. If it is "Yo me burlo..." or "Tú te burlas..." does it mean that "I, myself, am teasing...." and "You, yourself, are teasing..."??

THANKS, Rusty!!

[bobjenkins]

Originally Posted by laepelba

YAY! I love it when I catch mistakes. It means that I am actually LEARNING SOMETHING! w00t!!

Okay - so that makes sense to me in the mechanics of the sentence structure. But it doesn't make sense to me in the meaning. If it is "Yo me burlo..." or "Tú te burlas..." does it mean that "I, myself, am teasing...." and "You, yourself, are teasing..."??

THANKS, Rusty!!

Entiendo así ,
You made fun of my cat because he is fat, and now he is sad
Te burlaste de mi gato..

pero sé el porqué de tu confusión
Nunca he visto un verbo reflexivo parecido al burlarse

¿Por qué "se" necesita estar en acuerdo con el sujeto ?
Me burlas , you tease me

Me amas , you love me



¿Puedo no escribes así, con LE?

A mi gato te le burlas

[irmamar]

Sorry, 'burlarse' is not reflexive, just pronominal.

Yo me burlo a mí misma.

You can use 'burlar' as a pronominal verb or not:

El gato burló al perro y se subió a un árbol (transitivo = el gato esquivó al perro).
Tu te burlas de mi gato (pronominal -Bob, that's for you ).

[bobjenkins]

Originally Posted by Rusty

Good job. You caught the mistake made in the first sentence, and correctly translated it.
The verb burlarse is categorized as pronominal, which just means it has a pronoun. How it is used wasn't mentioned. Pronominal verbs fall into three categories: reflexive, reciprocal, and idiomatic pronominal

Burlarse is reflexive. That means the person and pronoun agree: (Yo) me burlo, (Tú) te burlas

Originally Posted by irmamar

Sorry, 'burlarse' is not reflexive, just pronominal.

Yo me burlo a mí misma.

You can use 'burlar' as a pronominal verb or not:

El gato burló al perro y se subió a un árbol (transitivo = el gato esquivó al perro).
Tu te burlas de mi gato (pronominal -Bob, that's for you ).

Pienso que me beneficiaría si aprendo los tipos de que Rusty habla.

Significa pronominal cuando el verbo tiene SE
Pronominal Burlarse
No pronominal Burlar


1. Sé que reflexivo es así
Me lavo

2. Verbo recíproco
Nos ayudamos
Ellos se hablamos

3. Verbos idiomáticos pronominales
LOs verbos que cambian cuando están pronominales o no.

abonar - to pay abonarse - to subscribe abrir - to open abrirse - to open up, confide in acabar - to finish acabarse - to run out of acordar - to agree, decide acordarse - to remember acusar - to accuse acusarse - to confess alegrar - to cheer up alegrarse - to be happy arreglar - to repair, fix arreglarse - to get ready burlar - to deceive, thwart burlarse - to joke caer - to fall caerse - to drop colocar - to put, place colocarse - to stand or sit conducir - to drive conducirse - to behave dormir - to sleep dormirse - to fall asleep enojar - to anger enojarse - to get angry hacer - to do, make hacerse - to become ir - to go irse - to leave, go away lastimar - to hurt lastimarse - to complain levantar - to lift, raise levantarse - to get up llamar - to call llamarse - to be called/named llevar - to carry llevarse - to take away negar - to deny negarse - to refuse poner - to put ponerse - to put on, wear probar - to test, prove probarse - to try on quitar - to take off/away quitarse - to go away salir - to leave salirse - to escape, leak sorprender - to surprise sorprenderse - to be surprised volver - to (re)turn volverse - to turn around, to become

Así es difícil para escribir

[laepelba]

Originally Posted by irmamar

Sorry, 'burlarse' is not reflexive, just pronominal.

Yo me burlo a mí misma.

You can use 'burlar' as a pronominal verb or not:

El gato burló al perro y se subió a un árbol (transitivo = el gato esquivó al perro).

I know. I didn't say that it was a reflexive verb. I said it was pronomial.

What is wrong with the sentence "Yo me burlo a mí misma"?? Doesn't that mean "I tease myself"?? From what Rusty said, I thought that the pronoun was supposed to agree with the subject, "yo" and "me" in that sentence DO agree. What's wrong with it?

Also, I'm not asking about the "burlar" non-pronomial verb, but "burlarse", the pronomial verb....

Which brings me back to my question (see my second post above): it doesn't make sense to me in the meaning. If it is "Yo me burlo..." or "Tú te burlas..." does it mean that "I, myself, am teasing...." and "You, yourself, are teasing..."?? What is the point of the pronoun?

[chileno]

Originally Posted by laepelba

I know. I didn't say that it was a reflexive verb. I said it was pronomial.

What is wrong with the sentence "Yo me burlo a mí misma"?? Doesn't that mean "I tease myself"?? From what Rusty said, I thought that the pronoun was supposed to agree with the subject, "yo" and "me" in that sentence DO agree. What's wrong with it?

Also, I'm not asking about the "burlar" non-pronomial verb, but "burlarse", the pronomial verb....

Which brings me back to my question (see my second post above): it doesn't make sense to me in the meaning. If it is "Yo me burlo..." or "Tú te burlas..." does it mean that "I, myself, am teasing...." and "You, yourself, are teasing..."?? What is the point of the pronoun?

I don understand why irma says that "me burlé a mí misma/o" is incorrect. It means "I teased/fooled myself"

Consider this:

Yo me burlo. Could mean that I tease.fool myself.

Yo me burlo de ti. I am making fun of you, I am teasing/fooling you.

Now:

Tú te burlas. You make fun of... You are teasing/fooling...


That's it. Do your part!

[laepelba]

Originally Posted by chileno

I don understand why irma says that "me burlé a mí misma/o" is incorrect. It means "I teased/fooled myself"

Consider this:

Yo me burlo. Could mean that I tease.fool myself.

Yo me burlo de ti. I am making fun of you, I am teasing/fooling you.

Now:

Tú te burlas. You make fun of... You are teasing/fooling...


That's it. Do your part!

I am doing my part. I have tried to find the answers to my questions, and am asking here.

What I do not understand is what the "me" signifies in the following sentence:
"Yo me burlo de ti." = "I am making fun of you."
What purpose does "me" serve?

[chileno]

Originally Posted by laepelba

I am doing my part. I have tried to find the answers to my questions, and am asking here.

What I do not understand is what the "me" signifies in the following sentence:
"Yo me burlo de ti." = "I am making fun of you."
What purpose does "me" serve?

Grammatically? I do not know.

But consider this instead:

Me burlo de ti.

You cannot just say "burlo de ti"


Does it make sense?

[laepelba]

Originally Posted by chileno

Grammatically? I do not know.

But consider this instead:

Me burlo de ti.

You cannot just say "burlo de ti"


Does it make sense?

It makes sense that you cannot say "burlo de ti".

Why the pronoun has to match the subject and not the object does not make sense to me. (As I stated in my original question.)

[chileno]

Originally Posted by laepelba

It makes sense that you cannot say "burlo de ti".

Why the pronoun has to match the subject and not the object does not make sense to me. (As I stated in my original question.)

The way I see it.

The action is coming from me to you. I am teasing you.

Me burlo de ti

What do you think of this?

Me burlo de la gente.

[Ambarina]

Like Irmamar said "burlar" can be pronominal or not.
El gato burló al perro - the cat outwit the dog.
El gato se burló del perro - the cat made fun of the dog.
Using the pronoun changes the meaning.

Ocupas mucho sitio - You take up a lot of space.
Te ocupas de tu hogar. - You take care of your house.

Los ingleses conducen por la izquierda - The English drive on the left
(Ellos) se conducen de manera impropia cuando han bebido demasiado - They behave badly when they've drunk too much.

[rvbigcat]

Hi everyone,

I teach Spanish in public school and I have always wondered about the mechanics of Burlarse De, and I have not come across a satisfactory explanation. But I have deviced an explanation myself.

I think that the verb comes from the same word as "Burlesque" which can be defined as a kind of crude or grotesque entertainment. Thus, I think the Spanish verb connotes one entertaining oneself at the expense of another person. Many are right to point out that the SE is not a ReFlexive Pronoun but an Indirect Object Pronoun, the one entertained by such humoristic action on another person.

What do you think of such reasoning?

[Ivy2937]

Originally Posted by laepelba

I receive a couple of different "word of the day" e-mails to increase my Spanish vocabulary. The most recent one used the word "burlarse", and said that it is a "pronomial verb", meaning that it takes a reflexive pronoun, right? The definition of the word (in English) is given as "to mock, to flout, to ridicule". They also give a couple of example sentences:
- Mi hermano burlarse de las leyes.
- Muchos niños se burlan de los niños diferentes.

My questions:
1) In the first example, why is the verb not conjugated? Why isn't it: Mi hermano se burla de las leyes.
2) What is the pronoun supposed to be representing? It would seem to me that with this particular verb, the pronoun should represent the object of the joking. Or does it HAVE to agree with the subject? It's not apparent in either example, which both use third person. For example:

Which is correct?
- Tú se burlas de los niños diferentes.
OR
- Tú te burlas de los niños diferentes.


Which is correct?
- Yo se burlo de las leyes.
OR
- Yo me burlo de las leyes.

Los verbos pronominales tienen por característica usar los pronombres átonos (me,te,se, nos, os) como morfema (marca, indice) sin función nominal pertenecen a la estructura morfológica de los verbos pronminales, burlarse, asustarse, dormirse, arrepentirse, marearase, cansarse, este 'se' pronombre átono no tiene ninguna función nominal de complemento directo, indirecto. No puedes decir yo arrepiento sino yo me arrepiento, los m'se' reflexivos y recíprocos el 'SE' tiene función nominal de CD and CI.
Los verbos átonos concuerdan con los pronombre sujetos así :

yo ......me
tú........te
él, ella, ello......se
nosotros .........nos

Uds and they......SE plural, ellos se burlan del bobito de la escuela, uds. (ustedes) América latina en vez de 'vos' uds. se burlan de ellos.