Cómo se dice "to mean"

Question

¡Hola! Mi pregunta, primero en español y después en inglés:

En la escuela aprendíamos que debía usar el verbo "significar" como esto:

"Tengo dos conejos. La palabra 'conejo' significa 'rabbit'."

Pero, también lo he oído usado como esto:

"Tengo dos conejos. La palabra 'conejo' quiere decir 'rabbit'."

¿Cuál es más correcto?

Gracias,

Mitchell

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In school we learned that you should use the verb "significar" like this:

"Tengo dos conejos. La palabra 'conejo' significa 'rabbit'."

But, I've also heard it used like this:

"Tengo dos conejos. La palabra 'conejo' quiere decir 'rabbit'."

Which is more correct?

Thank you,

Mitchell

Answer 1

I agree with Q that they are both correct.

I personally would use significa here because you are defining the meaning of a word eg:"Tengo dos conejos. La palabra 'conejo' significa 'rabbit'."

Significar is used to show what a word or phrase means

If I were to use the expression querer decir I would use it in this way:

''¿Qué quieres decir?'' = ''What do you mean?''

I believe that querer decir is used to ask what a person is meaning, as in the question above or to state what you are referring to . in the context of a conversation

''Quiero decir .......'''= ''I mean to say..........'' etc.....

I hope this helps

Corregid mi español, por favor

Answer 2

They are both correct and both used commonly. Let's wait and see if there are any regional preferences.