Spanish tildes (accent marks) and things to consider...
The tilde indicates which vowel carries the spoken stress within the word when it does not follow the usual word stress rule #1 and #2 (below). It also distinguishes word meaning from words that otherwise look or sound the same.
In Spanish, word stress follows 3 general rules:
#3 all exceptions to the rules have a tilde on the stressed syllable
Let's take a closer look at word stress rule #1:
📌 hablo vs. habló
hablo (I speak) vs. habló (he/she/you (formal) spoke)
yo form present tense vs. él/ella/usted form preterite tense
Hablo español. (I speak Spanish.) --> ha-blo
Ryan me habló por teléfono ayer. (Ryan spoke to me over the phone yesterday.) --> ha-bló
📌 papá vs. papa
papá (dad) vs. papa (potato; pope)
A mi papá le gusta montar en monociclo. (My dad likes to ride unicycles.) --> pa-pá
El papa visitará la catedral de Santiago de Compostela durante el Año Santo (2021). (The pope will visit Santiago de Compostela Cathedral during the Holy Year (2021). --> pa-pa
Homonyms
Some words get tildes just to distinguish them from other homonyms (words that are pronounced the same, but different in meaning).
el (the) >> él (he)
de (of) >> dé (give (usted command)) --> from dar
si (if) >> sí (yes)
tu (your) >> tú (you (familiar))
mi (my) >> mí (me)
se (himself, herself, yourself, themselves) >> sé (I know)
mas (but) >> más (more)
te (you, yourself) >> el té (tea)
como (as, like) >> ¿cómo? (how?)
que (which, that, who) >> ¿qué? (what?)
cuando (when) >> ¿cuándo? (when?)
donde (where) >> ¿dónde? (where?)
porque (because) >> ¿por qué? (why?)
Diphthongs: two weak vowels (i, u) or a strong vowel (a, e, o) and a weak vowel together form a diphthong and are normally pronounced as a single syllable.
An accent mark is needed when a diphthong is broken into two syllables:
frí-o // bio-lo-gí-a // Ma-rí-a // fo-to-gra-fí-a
but... far-ma-cia // su-cio // Ma-rio
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