Admin
A few years ago, I had a Japanese student of mine who complained that in Spanish (and English) we always change the words over and over on an article to avoid repetition. He told me that for him, it seems very disorganized and that he thinks that when you chose one word, you should always be consistent and stick to the same word. He said that’s the way he writes in Japanese.
Maybe he is right, reporters like to avoid repetition and always use words that have a similar meaning within an article, thus making the reading less boring but more complex.
So, like I told my Japanese student, if you are reading a newspaper article that reports someone’s speech, you’ll probably run into some of these verbs in the preterit tense. If you are studying the article, don’t stop at each word to look it up in the dictionary, for now just assume they all mean “he said” (or “she said”.)
dijo, he said. This is usually the first verb used, followed by
afirmó, he said
señaló, he said
indicó, he said
sostuvo, he said
aseguró, he said
explicó, he said
argumentó, he said
advirtió, he said
opinó, he said
recalcó, he said
subrayó, he said
enfatizó, he said
reiteró, he said
destacó, he said
insistió, he said
agregó, he said
And to wrap up someone’s speech reporting:
finalizó, he ended
concluyó, he ended
It’s like in English, he indicated, he asserted, he declared, he said.
Originally published on 20070913. Latest update 20210307 (spanishNY.com) top
