Mastering Spanish Subordinate Clauses: A Comprehensive Analysis
Types of Subordinate Clauses
1. Substantive Clauses
- Conjunction 'that': You need to call; this is necessary.
- Conjunction 'if': He asked if I wanted to go to the movies.
- Interrogative (who, what, why, how, where, when): Tell me who was there; tell me why.
- Relative pronouns: (Which, that) with no history of espresso.
Substantive clauses function as nouns:
- Award the prize to whoever merited it.
- My car is parked there.
2. Indirect and Infinitive Links
- No direct link: I said: "Come."
- Infinitive link: Decided to sell the bike.
Adjective Clauses
- Replaced by an adjective or equivalent phrase.
- Function as a modifier to the antecedent.
- Introduced by relative pronouns (who, what, which) or relative adverbs (where, when).
Narrative clauses have two functions: Nexus and Syntactic Role (Subject, Direct Object, Indirect Object, Circumstantial Complement, Prepositional Complement).
Types of Adjective Clauses
- Restrictive (Specifying): The guests who were in a hurry left.
- Non-restrictive (Explanatory): The guests, who had hastily left, were gone. (Uses commas).
Bipolar Clauses
These clauses are united by a relation of interdependence or coordination.
Types of Bipolar Clauses
- Adversative: Expresses contraposition (thesis-antithesis) using: more, but, however.
- Concessive: Expresses an objection to an existing situation using: although, despite, even though.
- Causal: Expresses the reason or cause (effect-cause) using: because, since, as.
- Conditional: Expresses a condition using: if, provided that, on condition that.
- Consecutive: Expresses a result using: therefore, so that, thus.
Adverbial Dependent Clauses
These can almost always be replaced by an adverb and function as a Circumstantial Complement (CC):
- Place (where): Eat where you want / Eat there.
- Time (when, while, until, as soon as): Eat when you want.
- Manner (as): Eat as if we were kings.
- Purpose (so that, in order to): Eat to avoid starvation.