Don't drop them

What for the inhabitants of Spain is a

that, raised from the ground, reduces speed on the highway, is called in Venezuela, Nicaragua or Colombia "lying police", a graphic image of how these devices determine driving. That tool that in the Spanish of Spain we have not known how to denominate in a uniform way (USB, pincho, memory stick ...) is called

in Costa Rica and

(what a lovely word) in other Hispanic areas. It is logical to be surprised when discovering the words with which other speakers of the same language name something that we call different.

When the difference is not in the vocabulary but in the plot with which the grammar is woven, the astonishment is greater, because it implies renegotiating our way of structuring the language, of organizing it, of conferring properties to the words.

It happens, for example, to verbs such as

or

: usually we use them to express an action that occurs fortuitously, without doing anything: a stain

, after a blow there

a pain ... and it seems that nothing expressly involves us in action.

Something similar happens when we use to

: a leaf falls, a plan falls ...;

if we want to get involved in the fall we have to change the way we use the verb and say that we

.

But there is a group of Hispanic dialects where this is not exactly the case, where objects do

or someone

them but someone

; where things do not remain or remain, but someone else

. It is typical especially of the central and western area of ​​the Peninsula (Valladolid, Zamora, Extremadura ...): kitchens that say that they make fried tomato and

like the one in the supermarket, a grandfather who scolds his grandchildren because they

the glass of water, people who ask the other for trust by saying "I

that on my account" or someone who regrets his mistake because

bag at home. It is a use that in grammars is called causative, because it makes it clear what the cause is, it points to an express agent that causes something to stay or fall. It is the same difference that occurs between what dies (alone) versus what we kill (ourselves): the verb to

is the causative factor for

.

Although perhaps we lack historical perspective to warn it, at this time of pandemic our actions, no matter how minor, give off a greater significance than ever. Now we have the opportunity and the obligation to be more causative than before, because there are things that do not fall or remain alone, we let them fall or, said in the way of a part of Spanish speakers,

them. Wind or storms are born and die alone, but our action and our collective inaction cause many other things to be born or die: bookstores, language schools, food houses or theaters that do not stay where they are because heaven bless them. but by our causative intervention as consumers. That is why my exhortation is that we propose this year to

the things that matter to us and not

, because there is a moment when it is too late to conjugate grammar in another way, and we will say of that adorable place that it has closed, without noticing that we were the ones who were causing the fall to fall. blind.

More information

Business before the precipice: "I prefer to close before drowning"

Sign in to continue reading

Just by having an account you can read this article, it's free

Sign upLogin

Thanks for reading EL PAÍS