Looking for the one official, true "direct object pronoun" matrix
Gurus
Up until today I thought that "le", eventhough accepted by the Academy in some cases as a dop, is not officially a dop. No dop matrix I'd ever seen included this pronoun until today.
My Spanish teacher uses an old Book called "Spanish - Third Edition" by Laurel H. Turk and Aurelio M. Espinosa, Jr. from 1974 and in there I found the bomb today that totally ruined my morning and ripped apart everything I thought I knew. Check out their dop matrix :
- me - me
- te - you (fam.)
- le - him; you (formal m.)
- la - her; it (f.); you (formal f.)
- lo - it (m. and neuter)
- nos - us
- os - you (fam)
- los - them (m.), you (m)
- las - them (f.), you (f)
- los them (m)
First shock - they actually mention "le" as an official dop. But to top it off here the real shocker. At the bottom is a note saying :
"Many Spanish-speaking people, particularly in Spanish America, prefer to use lo instead of le for him,you (formal), but only the le form is used in this text."
This totally reverses everything I thought I had understood. So now "leísmo" is not an accepted form anymore but rather mandatory. According to this book not using "le" as a dop in certain cases is actually wrong but widely accepted. Is is so hard to find a official, true, authorative copy of this dop matrix that is the ultimate source of truth ? All I want to know is what is the grammatically correct form and what is the also accepted variation of it ? Has anyone ever seen a dop matrix such as the above ? I certainly never have. What are kids in Spain taught in school these days ? Also, one of the 2 "los" must be a typo right ? One of them would have to be a "les" correct ?
The search for the holy grail continues...
6 Answers
I have a ridiculous amount of grammars at my disposal, and the above matrix -as you call it- can be found in any decent academic grammar, and it is, of course, in the latest Asociación de Academias de la lengua española grammar as a standard.
The Academies add the following remarks about the use of "le" as a DOP:
- When it is used instead of "lo", due to the amount of writers and well educated people who use it, it is accepted only in singular and for males.
- When it is used to refer to "usted", it is called "leísmo de cortesía", and its use is justified and acceptable.
N.B There is no longer one Academy and one voice. Now there are 22.
BTW. it seems this site isn't exactly following a standard either. Just look at the word of the day a few days ago : atreverse.
- ¿Cómo te atreves a pegarle? - How dare you hit her?
We should use "la" here assuming this is used transitively, correct ? Marianne, this goes together with your question.
No, it is perfect, because the direct object is implicit in that sentence:
Pegarle (un puñetazo/una torta/un golpe...)
The method of delivery (punch, kick,...) is the direct object, and the person who receives it is the indirect object. "Pegarla" would be interpreted as "glue her".
Now, going back to your question, "lo" and "la" are the correct pronouns for direct objects, and they are the ones that the RAE recommends as a default, so I guess most books simply follow their advice. But in practice, since "le" is also used in many countries as well, even among educated people, you cannot simply dismiss the way so many millions of people speak, including among them several authors with a Nobel prize of Spanish literature. There are some types "leísmo" that are regarded as perfectly acceptable, and many others that are condemned as unacceptable. While beginners maybe should start learning the standard way, at some point they need to learn how the language is actually spoken in practice, especially when using "le" is not incorrect.
These extracts have been taken from the book "A New Reference Grammar of Modern Spanish":
PAG 161: The use of le/les as direct object pronouns has always been a source of controversy. Beginners may follow the scheme given in 12.2, but they will soon come across at least some of the variants described hereafter. Some of these are dialectal and not to be imitated by foreigners. But some are basic features of certain varieties Spanish and fluent foreigners will need to use them.
PAG 162: Even when all the regional and dialectal factors are taken into account, le is still used as a direct object pronoun in the best styles in Spain where la/las would be expected, and in Latin America where either lo/los or la/las would be predicted. [...]
12.6.1 Le to denote respect: In certain areas some speakers use le for human direct objects as a mark of respect. Spaniards who say lo v i for '1 saw him' may prefer le vi for the usted form '1 saw you'. Argentine informants were convinced that they would say no quería molestarle ' I didn't mean to bother you' when speaking to their boss...
Just another amendmend. The reason why I very much dislike the "le" if its single male is that I don't like where it leaves the ladies. It seems to say males are people so "lo" doesn't work but females are not people so "la" is fine. If we're distinguishing between people and things then we should do it across both sexes. If I use "la" it still could be a thing so how is that not the same problem as "lo" ? I don't see the logic in the argument I guess.
Lazarus
Thanks for the quotes. I strongly believe every book should have a whole page dedicated to this before they even start. Then they should clearly state what they follow. Maybe they think it'd confuse newbies even more ? In my case the opposite was true. I needed to do so much digging to find something like the notes you just posted.
About pegar we might wanna translate is as "deliver a punch to her" ? Translating it this way I do understand it. In this case its a true indirect object "le" correct ?
Lazarus said:
...it is accepted only in singular and for males.
Am I to understand that the following is incorrect because it uses "le" to replace a female direct object?
In Spain in when the direct object is a person people use as direct object pronouns le / les. Example: ¿(Tú) Ves a Claudia? Sí, le veo (“le” is the direct object pronoun used to replace the noun “Claudia”).
Thank you for your explanations. 
Guys
Can anyone actually point me to an online copy of this matrix ? Lazrus, what you're saying makes every book I've bought in the US wrong then. So is every spanish learning site on the net like this one :
http://www.studyspanish.com/lessons/dopro1.htm
Clearly, they don't teach this there. Now I know there are these differences and apparently they subscribe to the "Latin way" but am I now to understand that they are not officially correct, eventhough widely accepted ? This site seems to be legit and serious just like your site so I wouldn't wanna dismiss what they're teaching there - or should I ? I guess that's my problem. Which source to follow and which source to "accept" also but know that it's not 100% correct.
BTW. it seems this site isn't exactly following a standard either. Just look at the word of the day a few days ago : atreverse.
- ¿Cómo te atreves a pegarle? - How dare you hit her?
We should use "la" here assuming this is used transitively, correct ? Marianne, this goes together with your question.
