Word of the Day: el ramo

Question

¿En qué ramo de la medicina te vas a especializar? Hoping someone can tell me why this is "te vas" instead of just "vas a especializar" as I would have translated the latter as "are you going to specialize in."

Gracias. - RolloMartins, Nov 19, 2015

Answer 1

After looking through the dictionary, I agree with bosquederoble.

"Especializar" is a transitive verb. Transitive verbs require object. For example "to hit" is transitive in English. You can't just say "I want to hit" or "I hit", you have to add an object. So you'd say "I hit the ball".

In Spanish, if you want to use a transitive verb but you don't know the object, you can usually make it into a pronominal verb (reflexive verb). So if you don't have a specific object to specialize in, you can't use "especializar". You'd have to use "especializarse".

Other verbs in Spanish have this structure as well. "Hundir" for example, means "to sink", but it's transitive. So you can't say "El barco hundió", you'd have to say "El submarino hundió el barco". If you want to say "The boat sunk" you'd turn it pronominal and say "El barco se hundió". (Or, more naturally, "Se hundió el barco")

The confusion often happens because most verbs in English are both transitive and intransitive. You can say "The bottle broke" (instransitive) and "I broke the bottle" (transitive). But in spanish "romper" is transitive (except in certain special cases). So you'd say "Se rompió la botella" (pronominal) and "Rompí la botella" (transitive)

Very good explanation of the differences in the languages. The English language does not have the pronomial (I think it could almost be called grammatically a Mood) sense of verb understanding, hence the constant difficulty with English speakers. - Jubilado, Nov 18, 2015

Answer 2

http://www.spanishdict.com/translate/especializar

From our dictionary two examples

Con más de 30 años de experiencia en el sector del automóvil, ya es hora de especializar nuestras operaciones para concentrarnos en el mercado de lujo.With over 30 years' experience in the automobile sector, it's time to specialize our operations and focus on the luxury market.

Fernando se va a especializar en psiquiatría.Fernando is going to specialize in psychiatry

.

My take as an intermediate level learner: I think it is more natural to use the verb especializar with an object (transitively), and if the object is the same as the subject, it is used in the reflexive/pronominal form most naturally.

Note in the first sentence- we are going to specialize our operations- in the second, essentially Fernando is going to specialize himself. In English we do not normally use it that way, but I believe in Spanish you normally do.

Gracias. Creo que entiendo. - RolloMartins, Nov 19, 2015

De nada. :) - bosquederoble, Nov 19, 2015