Provided by the Academic Center for Excellence 1 A Quick Guide to Spanish Syntax
June 2018
A Quick Guide to Spanish Syntax
Syntax is the order of words and phrases that create a sentence. This quick guide will discuss
the word pattern for basic Spanish sentences. This order, however, is flexible, which will be
demonstrated later in this handout. Because sentences have many elements, such as pronouns,
subjects, and verbs, please refer to the following key as you progress through this guide:
V = verb
n = negation
A = auxillary
I = infinitive form of the verb
p = preposition
PP = present progressive
d = direct object pronoun
i = indirect object pronoun
You can navigate to specific sections of this handout by clicking the links below.
Syntax and One-Verb Sentence Constructions: pg. 1
Two-Verb Constructions: pg. 2
Interrogatives: pg. 4
Direct and Indirect Object Pronouns: pg. 5
Commands: pg. 7
Verbs like Gustar: pg. 8
Syntax and One-Verb Sentence Constructions
Spanish word order follows a Subject-Verb-Object (SVO) pattern. Spanish word order is very
similar to English word order, as English also follows SVO pattern. The sentence’s subject is the
“doer” of the action; the verb is the action, and the object is the person or thing affected by the
action. In addition, when a negation (n) is necessary, the negative is placed before the verb.
While English typically adds an auxiliary verb (A), such as a conjugation of to be or to do, to a
negation, Spanish does not.