Desabastecimiento

Desabastecimiento
 

This is a discussion thread for the Daily Spanish Word for February 3, 2009

desabastecimiento - masculine noun (el) - shortage, scarcity. Look up desabastecimiento in the dictionary

100,000 personas sufrieron desabastecimiento de agua en el mes de julio.
100,000 people were affected by a water shortage in the month of July.

How do you pronounce a word with so many syllables? Normally, in a shorter word that ends in a vowel, the emphasis would go on the penultimate syllable. Right? But there must be a secondary emphasis earlier in the word for something like this. Right?

Pronounce every syllable crystal clear, giving stress to the penultimate one.
The root of this word is abasto (supply; abastecer - to supply), so you'll hear secondary stress given to the appropriate syllable in the root.:
desabastecimiento

Thank you, Rusty - that helps. I couldn't make myself say the word without that little "boost". :)

I'm sorry, you have said (boost), I'm not sure, but (boost) mean empujon?

boost = un empuje, un aumento
Empujón is more like a shove (stronger than a push).

Boost. Hmmm.... Let me see how to explain it. Imagine a little kid who can't quite reach the sink to wash his hands. So the father pushes him up just a little bit. The father gave him a "boost". I was close to being able to say that big long word, but it wasn't quite working for me. That little bit of extra help was all I needed. I'm not sure if the Spanish word would be "empujar" ... maybe one of those who is fluent in both Spanish and English could make that translation.

Interestingly - I forget about little words like that which would be confusing to English-second-language-learners. I was talking with my friends from Peru the other day about movies, and I said something about a "sappy" movie. They're both highly educated people (she has a PhD from an American university - he's finishing his second masters in the US). Neither one of them knew "sappy", and there was no real way I could explain it to them......... :)

Yes there is .Try empalagoso for sappy. You are doing your Peruvian friends a great service by exposing them to words like sappy.

Poli - they live in Rockland County - I think that maybe New Yorkers in general are confusing. ;) I grew up in Buffalo, NY - so I think they lump me in with all the rest of you. :D

Anyway - I tried and tried to explain it to them, and I couldn't come up with a good enough explanation (by my own judgment). Thanks for that word - I will definitely pass it along. We frequently stumble across words that I have difficulty explaining to them. It's kind of fun! :)

My experience is that sometimes Peruvians are confusing, but well educated Peruvians speak slowly and clearly with nearly perfect steccato Spanish.

A mutual acquaintance of ours described my Peruvian friend's speech as sounding like an AK47. ;)

A synonym for desabastecimiento is desabasto.