Hace cuanto tiempo

Question

...que ha estiando espanol? Is this how you would ask "how long have you been studying spanish?" I'm especially wondering about the use of "hace..." here which would translate as "(It makes) how much time that you have been sudying spanish?" Do you need "hace" in this kind of construction?

Answer 1

Just as an update following ruisñor's helpful comment on my post it seems that although llevar and hacer are more common constructions in this type of question some native speakers say that 'ha estado' works too.

All those that I asked kind of hedged around whether they would actually say it that way but they say it's fine and would be understood - so I just thought I'd pass that on. I'll keep investigating

thanks "kiwigirl". I stumbled across this as I ws looking up something else in "the ultimate spanish review & practice" (considered a premier reference): Hace + expression of time" + que + verb for the type of construction I was asking about originally - t8805jg, Jul 6, 2012

It's on page 4 of this 400 + page reference by the way. So slightly different word order than what I was asking about but essentially the same thing. - t8805jg, Jul 6, 2012

Answer 2

¿Cuánto tiempo ha estado estudiando español? You don't need the hace on this construction.

then why do 2 fluent (including one native) speakers say I do?? - t8805jg, Jul 4, 2012

Answer 3

Yes as far as I understand hacer or llevar are more commonly used for this type of constuction instead of 'ha estado' as us English speakers might expect. So to ask someone how long they've been doing something you can use expressions such as:

¿Cuánto tiempo hace que .....

or

¿Cuánto tiempo lleva estudiando español? etc

No sé si lo que dices es correcto o no. Vi una frase "Por cuánto tiempo ha estado consciente de tener sed excesiva"... pero sí, tenés razón en la mayor parte. - ruiseñor, Jul 4, 2012

hmmm me pregunto si es regional quizas, gracias por tus comentarios :) - Kiwi-Girl, Jul 4, 2012

I'll check o it out a bit but apparently in Argentina it's the case, according to this post at least - http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=1813513 - Kiwi-Girl, Jul 4, 2012

Ambas son correctas: "¿Cuánto (tiempo) hace que estudias español?" o "¿Cuánto tiempo llevas estudiando español?". Otra opción más: "¿Desde cuando estudias español?" :) - Cordobesa, Jul 5, 2012

Gracias Cordo, y ¿qué hay de '¿Cuánto tiempo ha estado ...? - Kiwi-Girl, Jul 5, 2012