usar/utilisar?
I have always seen 'utilisar' as being 'to make use of'. The past participle 'utilisado' as meaninh 'made use of' - 'used'. 'Usado' has always had the nuance of 'second-hand', 'used', or 'worn-out', verging on 'gastado'. I teach conversational Spanish to beginners, and have told them this is how the words have been used in my experience... this was mostly in South America. Am I wrong??
2 Answers
You are right, however utilizar is spelled with a z
http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=74476
Summery, they're almost the same, but as you said utilizar has "to make use of" or "utilize" in it's meaning.
In English when you take advantage of a person you "use" them, but in Spanish you use "utlizar una persona" for that. Another person said that you can use both utilizar and usar in this sense. There's really no consensus on that, I would say that they are completely interchangeable.
You can search the forum for other times this question has been asked.
Here's another thread on the same topic:
