Hola todos and bienvenidos
- I'm Andrew Barr and welcome back to Real Fast Spanish.
In this video, you're gonna learn
about the differences between the Spanish verbs,
ir vs irse.
Specifically you're gonna learn about the subtle changes
that occur both in meaning
and in how we should use these two verbs
in a Spanish sentence.
You're also gonna learn about a few common errors we see
Spanish students making with these two verbs.
So if you wanna learn about the subtle differences
between ir vs irse
and how to use them in your next Spanish conversation,
then keep watching.
¡Vamos!
(upbeat music)
In Spanish, whenever you see a verb with se on the end,
this means that it is a reflexive verb.
And almost all verbs in Spanish,
with very few exceptions, have both a reflexive
and non-reflexive version of the verb.
For example:
the verbs dar, comer, and ir
Can become
darse, comerse, and irse.
Of course in this video we are going to look at in depth
at the verbs ir versus irse.
But you should also take note that
Irse is the most commonly
occurring Spanish reflexive verb.
Which means it's a verb you need to know really well.
So let's start by having a look at the differences
between ir and irse
in terms of their meaning.
So if we are going to translate
ir back to English,
This means To go.
Now whenever we add se to the end of a verb,
this can mean himself, herself, or oneself.
So a possible translation of
irse is to go oneself.
Now, of course, it doesn't make sense to say
to go oneself in English,
And while this does work with other Spanish reflexive verbs
like vestirse, to dress yourself,
or lavarse, to wash yourself,
we need to find a different translation for
irse,
because to go oneself really doesn't sound right.
A better translation of
irse is to leave.
Now that we know the verbs ir and irse
mean to go and to leave.
we can now notice that these two verbs
behave in a very similar way to the English verbs.
So for example, in English, going and leaving,
in some situations are completely interchangeable,
and in some situations they are not.
Specifically, the verb
ir is focused on a destination,
I'm going to the beach,
I'm going to the doctors.
Whereas irse
is not necessarily focused on a destination,
but on the process of leaving.
So when are you leaving?
I'm leaving as soon as I finish this project.
Where are you going?
It doesn't matter, I'll be leaving then.
Now ir
is a very irregular verb in Spanish.
So before we look at some examples,
lets have a look at the conjugations of this verb.
So the conjugations of ir are
Voy I go
Vas You go
Va He or She goes
Vamos We go
and van They go
Now to form the conjugations of a reflexive verb,
we simply take the conjugations of the normal,
non reflexive form,
and then we add the reflexive pronouns.
So we have me voy I leave
Te vas You leave
Se va He or She leaves
Nos vamos We leave
Se van They leave
Okay, now we can have a look at a few examples of ir.
Imagine you want to say to someone
"Today I'm going to the beach".
This in Spanish is
(speaking in foreign language)
Another example,
"We are going to the park this morning".
(speaking in foreign language)
Let's have a look at a few examples for
irse.
Imagine you want to ask someone
"When are you leaving"?
This in Spanish would be
(speaking in foreign language)
Now another example, imagine you are asking
a mutual friend about two friends
that are leaving on a trip soon.
So you could ask them when are they leaving,
and the answer could be they are leaving on Thursday.
They are leaving on Thursday, this in Spanish is
(speaking in foreign language)
Now I mentioned earlier that we don't need a destination
with the verb irse
in Spanish,
but just like English,
we can add a destination to a sentence with
irse if we want to.
In English, we can say something like
"I'm leaving for Spain on Tuesday".
This in Spanish is
(speaking in foreign language)
Now a question that often comes up with Spanish students,
specifically in regards to this sentence is
what is the difference between
(speaking in foreign language)
and (speaking in foreign language)
Well if I was to translate both of these two sentences
to English, we would get
I'm leaving for Spain on Tuesday
and I'm going to Spain on Tuesday.
And so I would put this question to you.
What is the difference between
I'm leaving for Spain on Tuesday
and I'm going to Spain on Tuesday?
In reality there is not a big difference,
both sentences express the idea
that on Tuesday next week, I'm going to be on a plane,
I'm not going to be here anymore,
because I'm going to be in Spain.
Now the only real difference is sort of grammar around
I'm leaving for and I'm going to,
which in Spanish is simply me voy a or voy a
Now another way to use ir and irse
instead of talking about a destination that we're going to,
we can also use this construction to talk about an action
we're about to do.
So for example, imagine you are out with friends
having lunch, and at the end of the meal,
you want to say, I'm going to work.
Right, to imply that you have to go back to work.
This in Spanish is
(speaking in foreign language)
Now you could also say
(speaking in foreign language)
And again, similar to traveling to Spain,
going back to work, talking about leaving the situation
you are currently in,
to go and do some action,
there's not a lot of difference between these two sentences.
But, there are situations in Spanish
where we can't use ir and irse
interchangeably.
Going back to the situation
where you are out having lunch with friends,
instead of saying I'm going to work
or I'm going back to work,
you simply want to say, I'm going.
Now the temptation might be to think that you can say
voy to mean I'm going,
or me voy to say I'm leaving,
because in English we really can say
I'm going, I'm leaving, and there is not a big difference.
But in actual fact, in Spanish, there is a difference.
And my recommendation is that you think of
Voy as a sentence on its own,
as a one word as to mean I'm going to.
So in English, when you get to the end of the meal,
and you stand up and you say "I'm going to",
everybody is going to look at you and say
you going to what?
What are you going to do?
Where are you going?
Same thing in Spanish,
if you stand up at the end of the meal and say
¡Voy!
Then everybody is going to say
¿Adónde vas?, ¿Qué vas a hacer?
What are you going to do, where are you going?
So it's really important to think of
Voy as meaning I'm going to
as opposed to I'm going.
So if you simply want to say I'm going,
or I'm leaving in Spanish, then you need to say
(speaking in foreign language)
Now another option, instead of saying
I'm going or I'm leaving,
you might want to say I have to go.
Now this phrase, in particular,
we see a lot of Spanish students making mistakes.
So, if you wanna say, I have to go,
then you need to start with the phrase I have to,
which in Spanish is
Tengo que...
and then you need to add irse
to the end.
But it's really important, you can't just add
irse.
This is tempting because its the infinitive verb.
But you need to match the reflexive pronoun
se
with the subject of the sentence.
So I have to go is
(speaking in foreign language)
Which in English is kinda like saying
I have to go myself,
which is I have to leave.
Now other conjugations would look like this,
You have to go tienes que irte
He or she has to go tiene que irse
We have to go tenemos que irnos
They have to go tienen que irse
And we also have another option with these sentences.
We can also move the position of the pronoun
from the end to the start.
And therefore, the sentences become,
I have to leave me tengo que ir
You have to leave te tienes que ir
He or she has to leave se tiene que ir
We have to leave nos tenemos que ir
They have to leave se tienen que ir
Now for the last part of this lesson,
we are going to look at voy
as a sentence on its own.
Because we can use voy
as a sentence, without anything else around it,
but we just need some context in order to do it.
So going back to the scenario
we are out with friends having lunch,
and one of your friend stands up and says
"I'm going to go and order a red wine".
This in Spanish is
(speaking in foreign language)
Now while your friend gets up to order a red wine,
you might want to ask them to order a soft drink for you.
This in Spanish would be
(speaking in foreign language)
Now your friend can respond to this request
sort of like we could in English.
We could say yeah I'm going to, yes I will.
This in Spanish is
Sí, voy.
So as you can see, in this sentence,
Sí, voy means
yes I'm going to or yes I will in English.
And so you can say this in isolation,
just out of nowhere sí voy or voy
Everybody is going to be like what are you going to do?
But it's really obvious,
when you ask someone to do something for you,
and they say yep, I'm going to, yes I will
Sí voy.
Now another example,
imagine you are living with someone
and you want to ask them
if they are going to take out the rubbish.
This in Spanish is
(speaking in foreign language)
To respond to this question,
you could simply say
(speaking in foreign language)
And this in English is kinda like saying
yes, I'm going to already, like leave me alone,
or yes I'm going to now.
So as you can see,
if you have a question,
if you have some prior context before
asking you to do something,
you can simply say yes I will, yes I'm going to
Sí, voy.
Are you going to go hiking this weekend?
Sí, voy.
Are you going to finish your food?
Sí, voy.
Are you coming to the meeting this afternoon?
Sí, voy.
Alright, that ends this lesson on
ir vs irse.
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So on that note, thank you so much for watching.
Gracias por ver
And I'll speak with you soon.
Hasta pronto
(upbeat music)