SE - what does the Spanish mind visualize when using this word?
Hi All,
In his post about verbs of position (an excellent post, by the way), Lazarus says the following regarding SE...
The "se" indicates that you are not doing it to other people, but simply doing it (intransitive).
This brought to mind a question that has been bugging me for a while now, and I don't know that I can even articulate it very well or that it even has an answer. But, I wonder what the Spanish mind visualizes when it uses SE for forming so-called "passive" tenses and for "de-transitivizing" verbs.I ask this because these are (apparently) not reflexive pronouns in such cases.
Examples:
Se venden las autos aqui. (Cars are sold here).
Se sentó en el sillón. (He sat in the chair)
Even though SE is not being used reflexively in the above sentences, in MY mind SE is still visualized as "themselves" in the first sentence and as "himself" in the second sentence. However, I wonder what the Spanish mind visualizes for the word in such cases.
I am wondering if it acts almost like a particle in Japanese, which are words that have no meaning at all but merely help to show the grammatical relationship of other words (usually the preceding word). For example...
Watashi wa
Watashi means I or me, and wa has no meaning at all but rather is merely a grammatical device to indicate that watashi will be the subject of all sentences spoken or written in the text or conversation until some other word is followed by wa.
I have no problem with the idea of particles (that's not to say that I can speak Japanese... as the preceding few sentences pretty much sum up my total knowledge of the language), but is SE just a meaningless particle in the Spanish mind when it is used to make verbs passive or intransitive? Or, does it feel like it has some kind of meaning? And, if so, what? (I'll totally understand if it feels like it has a meaning of some sort but cannot be expressed).
4 Answers
Perhaps I over-complicated it with the Japanese "wa" thing. I'm not looking for a grammatical treatise on the subject. I am looking for the "mental image."
I'll give a different example. Let's consider the word "matter." When I say, "What's the matter?" the word "matter" conjures up a mental image of "distressing issue." However, if I say, "The matter is not open for discussion," the word "matter" here conjures up an image of "a just-mentioned topic." If I say, "Matter occupies space," the mental image is "a physical substance of some sort."
So, when I say, "Se venden las autos aquí" my mind (on a gut-level, not a grammatical level) visualizes "The cars sell themselves here." My mind visualizes that because, to my mind, SE is a pronoun that means you, you all, her, him, it, yourself, yourselves, himself, herself, itself, and themselves (whew!). The best my mind can do is associate SE with las autos and consider it to mean "the cars themselves."
But, another part of my mind understands that SE affects grammar and doesn't just sit there being something. SE can change the meaning of a verb (slightly or wildly), make the verb passive, make the verb intransitive, and perhaps other things.
So, I'm asking, what mental image does the Spanish mind form for SE in these special cases--like in "se dice..." Here's what happens in my mind when I encounter "se dice..." (A conversation between two parts of my mind follows):
- Mind Part 1: That says, "it says itself..."
- Mind Part 2: Um, Here SE is making the verb passive...so it doesn't mean "itself."
- Mind Part 1: Well, what the heck does SE mean, then? What feeling, image, or idea am I supposed to associate with SE in these cases? Tell me and I'll quit thinking it says, "it says itself..." Otherwise, shut up.
- Mind Part 2: Yeah, I don't know what it means in such cases. I just know it's not reflexive there so "itself" probably ain't right. Sorry to have bothered you, Mr. Sensitive.
So, when the Spanish mind uses SE to mean "yourselves" I'm certain it is thinking "the group of people I'm addressing right now and who are acting on themselves" When it uses SE as a disguise for LE (meaning "to her," for this example), I'm certain the Spanish mind is visualizing the girl/woman being spoken about and receiving the action of the verb in some way...that is to say, the Spanish mind visualizes SE in this case like my English mind visualizes "to her." But, I can't for the life of me imagine what the Spanish mind conceives for SE when it uses it in sentences like "Se venden las autos aquí." (unless it does in fact visualize the cars, as does my mind).
It might help to pretend you're 5 or 7 years old...before someone explained what SE meant in these special cases...or an illiterate person who never had it explained in a technical way but still uses it quite correctly. I'm looking for that gut-feeling image.
So, in "Se venden las autos..." is the image for SE...
- a passive-marker (rather like wa in Japanese)
- the cars
- no image at all
- something else that my English mind has yet to conceive?
Perhaps it's not explainable?
Well... I happen to know a little bit about Japanese, and I don't think this knowledge is going to help you at all. If you are interested about this sort of language comparisons, Lithuanian and Indo-European roots are the best for a comparative study.
Anyway, Latin was not exactly a perfect language, but it had many resources to convey specific meanings. Modern languages have lost many of these mechanisms, but instead they have developed alternative tools to express similar things. Here is where using SE becomes meaningful.
The dreadful "SE" is "de-transitivising" in many cases, but it has other uses. Summarising the whole thing in a few words is like explaining Einstein's law of Relativity using 5 words.
I would suggest that you read the above article. When you get down to the part about using passive se (and other methods) to avoid the classic passive voice (ser+pp por..) take note of this important part:
However, there are several alternatives to la voz pasiva (besides la voz activa) when you want to focus on an action without identifying the performer:
Se venden las auto aquí.
If you translate it as "They sell cars here" or "The cars sell themselves here" rather than "Cars are sold here" you are missing the point about suppressing the identity of the performer.
Well I'll give you my 2 cents. I would say "Aquí se venden coches" and read it as "They sell cars here". (with no los). I never think of it as "cars are sold here" though some people do. Se habla español = Spanish is spoken here. I think of it that this way though. I guess it depends on situation. As for "se sentó" the verb is sentarse so that is different, if you just say "sentó en el sillón" without "se" then it's just wrong, as far as I know. He sat in the chair, he sat himself in the chair. I think "he sat in the chair". Maybe lots of people like Lazarus and Gekkosan will answer hopefully since they have Spanish minds.
PS wa is a pointer that points to watashi. Watashi wa Jeezzle desu. It indicates that the topic is watashi, I.
