Learn Spanish (Latin America): Mi abrigo es para ti, y el de mi hermano es para él. - My coat is for you, and my brother's is for him.

Mi abrigo es para ti, y el de mi hermano es para él.

My coat is for you, and my brother's is for him.

Breakdown of Mi abrigo es para ti, y el de mi hermano es para él.

Questions & Answers about Mi abrigo es para ti, y el de mi hermano es para él.

Why do we say el de instead of just translating 'my brother's'?

In English, you can add an apostrophe-S to show possession, like 'my brother's'. Spanish doesn't have an apostrophe-S. Instead, you have to say 'the one of my brother'. Because we are talking about an abrigo (coat), which is masculine and singular, we use el (the) plus de (of) to get el de mi hermano.

Could I say el abrigo de mi hermano instead of el de mi hermano?

Yes, you absolutely could! Saying el abrigo de mi hermano is grammatically correct. However, using el de is a very common shortcut that native speakers use so they don't have to repeat the word abrigo in the same sentence.

Why is it para ti but para él? Shouldn't it be para tú?

After prepositions like para (for) or de (of), Spanish uses special pronouns. For the informal 'you', the word tú changes to ti. But for 'him', the pronoun doesn't change at all: it stays él.

Why does él have an accent mark at the end of the sentence, but el doesn't in the middle?

The accent mark changes the word's meaning. El without an accent means 'the' (like in el de mi hermano). Él with an accent means 'he' or 'him' (like in para él). They are pronounced exactly the same, so the written accent is the only way to tell them apart in writing.