"se van" vs "van" and "tu las llaves" vs "tus llaves"

Question

Hi guys, great site. I do have a question.

In the following 3 questions/statements

¿Dónde pusiste tu el libro? - Where did you put your book? Why is the 'el' here? Why is it not just... Donde pusiste tu libro?

Ellos se van de la fiesta. - They go to the party. Why the 'se' and why the 'de'? Why is it not just... Ellos van a la fiesta.

¿Dónde pusiste tu las llaves? - Where did you put your keys? Why the 'las'? Why not just... Donde pusiste tus llaves?

Any and all corrections/insight would be helpful. Thx in advance. HD

Good question! - BigMike, Apr 7, 2013

Answer 1

"¿Dónde pusiste (tú) el libro?".... "Tú" is emphasized to indicate not me or someone else, but you. It´s not posessive of "el libro".

"Ellos se van de la fiesta."... "Se" indicates leaving rather than in route. "De" la fiesta indicates from the party. They are leaving it.

"¿Dónde pusiste (tú) las llaves?" Same idea as the first sentence; "Tú" is for emphasis. It does not say "Where did you put your keys?" but "Where did you put the keys?"

If the tilde with tú had not been forgotten, you probably would not have been confused.

Answer 2

For the first one, although Spanish has possessive adjectives they are used much less frequently than we do in English.

When it comes to clothing and body parts they are rarely used:

Eg: Levanta la mano, instead of 'levanta tu mano'.

And when the possession is known or understood by the speaker and the listener, it's more common to use the definite article instead of the possessive adjective - this is probably the case with your example.

For the second one - 'se van' is from the pronominal form or ir, irse. Irse has a different meaning from ir - ir means to go and irse means to leave and is used with 'de' or 'desde' to supply a reference point, as in 'de la fiesta' = 'from the party'.

Your last example uses 'las' llaves for the same reason as your first example. The listener obviously knows that it's their keys that are being spoken about. The possessive adjective would only be used if really necessary to avoid ambiguity.

Answer 3

¿Donde pusiste el libro? Whether is or not yours. ¿Donde pusiste tu libro? Whether is yours.

Ellos se van de la fiesta mean (they be in the party and then they go) Ellos van a la fiesta (they go to the party)

¿Donde pusiste las llaves? .Whether is or not yours. ¿Donde pusiste tus llaves?-Whether is yours.-----

(...Tu el... tu las) is not very correct Saludos