Word
Mi prima estudia biología y siempre habla de animales interesantes.
Meaning
My cousin studies biology and always talks about interesting animals.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Lesson
Breakdown of Mi prima estudia biología y siempre habla de animales interesantes.
mi
my
y
and
hablar
to talk
interesante
interesting
Questions & Answers about Mi prima estudia biología y siempre habla de animales interesantes.
Why is it prima and not primo for “cousin”?
Spanish makes a gender distinction for cousin that English doesn’t:
- mi prima = my female cousin
- mi primo = my male cousin
The word prima is feminine (ends in -a), and primo is masculine (ends in -o).
The possessive mi doesn’t change for gender (it’s the same for masculine and feminine singular nouns), so the only thing that shows the cousin is female is the -a in prima.
Why is it estudia and not something like está estudiando? In English we say “is studying.”
Spanish uses the simple present much more than English does.
- Mi prima estudia biología can mean:
- My cousin studies biology (general fact / field of study),
- and also often covers is studying biology (what she is doing with her life right now).
You would use está estudiando biología when you really want to stress the action as something happening right now or during this period, e.g.:
But for her major or what she does in general, estudia biología is the normal, natural choice.
Why is there no article before biología? Why not “la biología”?