Special characters or accents

Question

That may sound straight forward for some people who's native language use similar accents, but for the rest of us (well me at least) getting the idea is probably the toughest at the moment.

Are there any easy to follow rules to understand where does accents usually go in words? For example "él" and "ella"- though it's easy to learn, I can't understand why one has accent, while other doesn't- as far as I can hear they both are pronounced similar.

Answer 1

if the word ends in n, s, or a vowel, the stress is on the second to last syllable by default, otherwise, it defaults to the last syallable. (see here) Accents are used to override these rules.

"ella" ends in a vowel, so the stress is on the second to last syllable.

some one syllable words (él, sí) just use accents to differentiate themselves from other words that are spelled the same. There aren't many of these, so memorizing them won't take long.

Answer 2

Hola Chris

Quiza te sirva esta información.............Los acentos ortográficos

Thanks for the link ;) - ChrisMc99, MAR 11, 2010

Answer 3

delete-too slow typing

Answer 4

Now this makes sense. Thanks!