Why are there so many words for the same thing in Spanish
Just when I think I've learned a word for something I found out that there is another word for the same thing. Why does this happen so much in Spanish?
5 Answers
This occurs, generally, for 2 reasons. One, the words do not usually mean exactly the same thing. Think of words for colors. Red could cover scarlet, crimson, burgundy and many more. They all fall under the heading red, but our language and actually our thought would be limited without access to the variety. Two, every language, with the possible exception of Icelandic incorporates words from other languages which overlap, often, existing words.
With that in mind, Spanish is rich, full, nuanced Language but English has more words for basically the same things than does Spanish because English has been prolific in adopting words from all other languages.
Dude! I know what you're saying! That is the one thing about Spanish that really makes me angry, affronted, annoyed, antagonized, bitter, chafed, choleric, convulsed, cross, displeased, enraged, exacerbated, exasperated, ferocious, fierce, fiery, fuming, furious, galled, hateful, heated, hot, huffy, ill-tempered, impassioned, incensed, indignant, inflamed, infuriated, irascible, irate, ireful, irritable, irritated, maddened, nettled, offended, outraged, piqued, provoked, raging, resentful, riled, sore, splenetic, storming, sulky, sullen, tumultous/tumultuous, turbulent, uptight, vexed, wrathful. 
Just like in English, there are multiple words for the same thing.
grocery cart is called a buggy in the Southeastern United States. In the UK, they say life for elevator and things like that.
So, they are usually regional things. Coche vs. carro depending on where you are in the Spanish world.
do you mean like como and cómo ? becuase those are deifferent arent they, como means as and cómo means how right....? i think i got those translations correct...
One major issue is location. People in different countries have different words for the same things simply because they have grown up in different surroundings or situations, in some cases, different dialects. Indian influence is heavy in Peru, Chile, Mexico, etc... They all have different words because of they're different language make-ups. Some words, from the mapundung indians, for example, are integrated into Chilean spanish, so much so that some words are completely different from near- by Argentina and Peru, eventhough they all speak Southern Cone (South American) Spanish. The same goes for Mexico and the Aztecs... and so on.
