Me da miedo a las osos - Correct ?
This is what some latino child said on a TV show when asked what her greatest fear was. Actually she wrote it under a picture of a bear she had drawn. First I thought it means "Bears give me fear" and I went with that.
On closer inspection I realized that this can't be true cuz then it'd have to be :
Los osos me dan miedo
if anything. That's when the pain began. I tried to break it down but ran into trouble,
subj - There isn't one (maybe "it" from "it gives me fear" but I think Spanish doesn't have such a subject.
verb : dar
direct object : miedo
indirect object : me (iop)
Where does that leave the bears then ? Is the "a" here prepositional or is she considering bears to be people and the "a" is personal ? I don't think so but I also don't see why bears would be another indirect object...but what else can they be ? They don't look like they can be subjects.
It gives me fear of/to/from the bears ?
Who gives her fear if not the bears themselves ? Maybe "Seeing bears it gives me fear?"
I'd just say "Les tengo miedo a los osos". Is that better ?
Is she just totally wrong or can anyone break this down correctly for me ? After all she was just a little child.
Thx
10 Answers
Los osos me dan miedo. Subject: los osos.
Indirect object: me. Direct object: miedo. Verb: dan.
How old was the child? The sentence is grammatically incorrect, but kids have been known to do that. I'd go with your original interpretation.
Me dan miedo los osos = I'm afraid of bears.
I'd go with: I'm afraid of bears. 
As you have probably found many sentences just won't work when you scrutinize them word by word in an effort at translation.
Maybe it's 'the thought of' bears or some such unstated idea?
Spanish has a more flexible word order than English, so you can say me dan miedo los osos, or los osos me dan miedo. The darle miedo construction is like gustar, no? In other words the subject and object switch. You don't generally say that you fear it, rather you say that it gives you fear, as you don't say that you forgot something, you say that it was forgotten unto you. Se me olvidó Is my thinking correct here?
Bob
I fully agree with you that los osos must be a subject then and that the sentence is wrong. I just wanted someone to confirm since I'm not advanced enough to make such a determination myself yet.
Jack
if you were right then los osos would have to be a direct object and I don't see that at all. What is the action being done to them ?
So she's not only mixed up "dan" and "da" but also added an "a" to a subject which can neither be prepositional nor personal.
I'm not blaming the child for that - it's not about the child. It's about my understanding of Spanish - that's all.
No, she's not "just totally wrong". She may have missed a bit by using "da" instead of "dan", but crikey, she's a child. Her sentence structure is just as it should be, in my opinion. I'm believing that she put the 'a' in the 'a los ojos' as the personal pronoun 'a', since we do that with our beloved animals anyway. It may not be right, but it may be from a 6 year olds perspective. That's just my two cents :~)
Stucky, The sentence is wrong because the subject and the verb don't agree. The subject is los osos so the verb has to be dan and you can't put an "a" in front of the subject of the sentence. I can't cite a grammatical rule for that because I'm not into grammar (I don't own a grammar book), but I read alot and I know usually what looks right. Perhaps a native speaker should weigh in.
Bob
Wouldn't it then be
Se me da miedo ?
I'm not sure you can compare the 2. Also just to make sure you realize she didn't use "dan" but "da" which is my issue. Again, if its wrong then no problem here but so far I have not heard something definitive about the grammatical correctness of this sentence except from Kevin.
Kiwi
Yes I'm sure its supposed to mean "I'm afraid of bears" but I'm always interested in grammatically understanding the spanish sentence and since this was a 6 or 7 year old I wanted to know if her construction was grammatically correct or not. If not I don't have to worry about it but if it is I'd like to understand it and I don't.
Bob
You broke down my sentence not the one the child wrote.
BTW I had a typo - it's "los osos" - the kid definitely got that right !
