Pronoun placement

hwils66 · #1 October 23, 2008, 02:49 PM

I am confused on when to place a pronoun before the verb or after it. If I wanted to say: "Give the me hole punch", would I say "me da el perforadora" or "dame el perforadora?"

Thanks

Howard

**Rusty** · #2 October 23, 2008, 03:24 PM

Give me is a command, or an imperative. In the imperative, pronouns are suffixed. Note that the originally stressed syllable of the imperative must be retained through the addition of pronouns!

Dame la perforadora. (Dar is a single-syllable verb, so suffixing the indirect object pronoun me to it doesn't change which syllable is stressed - the normal second-to-the-last syllable is stressed, and this means the only syllable of the imperative receives the stress.)
Dámela. (Give it to me. The addition of both the direct and indirect object pronouns requires an accent in the imperative to retain the original stress. Without the accent, the second-to-the-last syllable would fall on the indirect object and the command could be misunderstood.)

If you want to say, "Are you giving me the hole punch," you would be using the indicative, present tense (asking a question, of course). In that case, the object pronouns precede the verb:
¿Me da la perforadora?
¿Me la da?

hwils66 · #3 October 23, 2008, 04:21 PM

Thanks! Don't know why I treated it as masculine. I know better.

***Tomisimo*** · #4 October 23, 2008, 06:47 PM

I might add that something like "¿Me da la perforadora?" is an extremely common way to request something and commanding someone to give it to you. It is literally "Are you giving me the hole punch?" or "Do you give me the hole punch?", but it is used in the same way we would use "Can you/will you give me the hole punch?" in English.