Spanish Prepositional Pronouns

The easy part about learning the grammar of pronouns in Spanish is that they follow a structure similar to the pronouns of English, serving as subjects as well as objects of verbs and prepositions. The tricky part, at least for people whose first language is English, is remembering which pronouns to use. While English uses the same pronouns as objects of prepositions and for direct and indirect objects of verbs, Spanish has a different set of pronouns for each usage, and those sets overlap. The subject pronouns and prepositional pronouns are identical except in the first-person singular and familiar second-person singular forms. How To Use Prepositional Pronouns As you can probably guess, prepositional pronouns are those that come after prepositions. In a sentence such as Tengo una sorpresa para ella (I have a surprise for her), para (for) is the preposition and ella (her) is the prepositional pronoun. Here are the prepositional pronouns of Spanish along with examples of their usage: mà ­ (first-person singular, equivalent of me): El regalo es para mà ­. (The gift is for me.)ti (informal second-person singular, equivalent of you; note that there is no written accent on this pronoun): El regalo es para ti. (The gift is for you.)usted (formal second-person singular, equivalent of you): El regalo es para usted. (The gift is for you.)à ©l (third-person masculine singular, equivalent of him or it): El regalo es para à ©l. (The gift is for him.)  Miro debajo à ©l.  (I am looking under it.)ella (third-person feminine singular, equivalent of her or it): El regalo es para ella. (The gift is for her.)  Miro debajo ella.  (I am looking under it.)nosotros, nosotras (first-person plural, equivalent of us): El regalo es para nosotros. (The gift is for us.)vosotros, vosotras (second-person informal plural, equivalent of you): El regalo es para vosotros. (The gift is for you.)ustedes (second-person formal plural, equivalent of you): El regalo es para ustedes.  (Th e gift is for you.)ellos, ellas (third-person plural, equivalent of them): El regalo es para ellos. (The gift is for them.) Sà ­ as a Pronoun There is also another prepositional object that is occasionally used. Sà ­ is used to mean himself, herself, the formal yourself, the formal yourselves, or themselves as the object of a preposition. For example, à ©l compra el regalo para sà ­, he is buying the gift for himself. One reason you dont see this usage often is since the meaning is usually expressed using the reflexive form of the verb: Se compra un regalo, he is buying himself a gift. Pronouns for It Either à ©l or ella can mean it as the object of a preposition, although as a subject there is no Spanish word used for it. The word used depends on the gender of the noun it replaces, with à ©l being used for masculine nouns and ella being used for feminine nouns.  ¿Dà ³nde està ¡ la mesa? Necesito mirar debajo ella. (Where is the table? I need to look under it.) ¿Dà ³nde està ¡ el carro? Necesito mirar debajo à ©l.  (Where is the car? I need to look under it.) Similarly, ellos and ellas, when used as a preposition pronoun meaning them, can be used to represent things as well as people. Use ellos when referring to nouns that are masculine, ellas for feminine nouns. Ellos also is used when referring to a group that includes both masculine and feminine nouhs. Contigo and Conmigo Instead of saying con mà ­ and con ti, use conmigo and contigo. Él va conmigo.  (He is going with me.)  Ella va contigo.  (She is going with you.) You also should use consigo instead of con sà ­, although this word isnt very common. Él habla consigo. (He  talks with himself.) Exceptions: Prepositions Followed by Subject Pronouns Finally, note that yo and tà º are used with the following six prepositions instead of with mà ­ and ti, respectively: entre (between)excepto (usually translated as except)incluso (including or even)menos (except)salvo (except)segà ºn (according to) Also, hasta is used with the subject pronouns when it is used in the same way as incluso. Examples: Es la diferencia entre tà º y yo. (Its the difference between you and me.)Muchas personas incluso/hasta yo creen en las hadas. (Many people including me believe in fairies.)Todos excepto/menos/salvo tà º creen en las hadas. (Everybody except you believes in fairies.)Es la verdad segà ºn yo. (Its the truth according to me.)