Gracias por recomendarme a

[Tyrn]

Hi,

Gracias pro recomendarme a una niñera means thanks for recommending a babysitter to me.

What do I have to do to invert the meaning? Gracias por recomendarle ...

[aleCcowaN]

Do you mean gracias por recomendarle una niñera a NN?
Thanks for recommending a babysitter to Mrs. Doe.

[wrholt]

Hmm: your sentence "gracias por recomendarme a una niñera" seems to suggest:

You: subject
me: indirect object, the person that receives the recommendation
a babysitter: direct object, the person that you are recommending

You asked aboiut inverting the meaning, which suggests:

You: still the subject
a babysitter: indirect object,
me: direct object, the person that you are recommending

Perhaps "gracias por recomendármele a una niñera"?

But maybe that's not enough, or is not a natural way to do that in Spanish.

The challenge is that the grammatical marking of direct and indirect objects in Spanish when they both refer to known people does not always disambiguate them, and one must rely on context to do that.

Sometimes the only solution is to use more words, so that you establish a context that distinguishes them more explicitly.

[Tyrn]

Very interesting!

Yes, by inverting I meant recommend me to a babysitter.

You say gracias por recomendármele a una niñera, and also say that it could be either un-Spanish, or still ambiguous, or both. I'm mystified :thinking: .

[aleCcowaN]

Gracias por recomendarme (a) la niñera = thanks for recommending the babysitter to me

Gracias por recomendarme a la niñera = thanks for recommending me to the babysitter.

A third of Spanish speakers would rather use the pair

Gracias por recomendarme a la niñera / Gracias por recomendarme con la niñera

[AngelicaDeAlquezar]

Yes, by inverting I meant recommend me to a babysitter.

In Mexico we would say: "Gracias por recomendarme _con_ la niñera". :)