¿Subjuntivo o Indicativo?

Question

Hi my friends. I was summarizing a text in Spanish as it's the only homework that my teacher gives me. And I got stuck. There is a text named "Algo más que palabras" and it's about learning and using foreign languages, it says only knowing a lot of words or grammar rules doesn't mean knowing a language etc. I was going to construct a sentence which is:

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"Es decir, saber una lengua es enlazar todo lo que has aprendido y poder contar todo lo que necesitas comunicarte aunque tienes que hacer mención de una palabra que no conoces."

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As I'm talking about a general fact, I thought, those verbs in bold should be in the indicative form and not subjunctive. But I couldn't be sure as normally they may be in subjunctive form.

Thanks in advance and Happy Halloween..

..... the only homework that my teacher gives me ..... - patch, Oct 30, 2010

Answer 1

Hi, Culé!

Edit: you need a subjuntive in "tener".

"Es decir, saber una lengua es enlazar todo lo que has aprendido y poder contar todo lo que necesitas comunicar aunque tengas que hacer mención a una palabra que no conoces."

This is right!

If you wanted to express this sentence in subjuntive mood (this is not necessary), it would be:

"Es decir, saber una lengua es enlazar todo lo que hayas aprendido, y poder contar todo lo que necesites comunicar aunque tengas que hacer mención a una palabra que no conozcas."

So you say that the whole thing needs to be in the subjunctive form? Mmm yes, you seem to be right about para. :) But actually the thing I wanted to say was depended on this sentence: "Necesito comunicarme algo." But now I think that, it's not corect.. - culé, Oct 30, 2010

Answer 2

I think that "necesitas" has to be in the subjunctive mood, i.e., "necesites" because we are talking about the unknown needs that you may or may not have in the future.

Therefore "conocer" also should be in subjunctive, as we don't know which words we won't know, right? - culé, Oct 30, 2010

"Lo que necesitas" also can work here , it's difficult to explain. - cogumela, Oct 30, 2010

No, it should be indicative, because if you were in a situation were you had to mention that, you would be declaring that you don't know that word (but the word would be there in front of you) - lazarus1907, Oct 30, 2010

Then, the correct form is indicative..? - culé, Oct 30, 2010