False friends in Spanish (falsos amigos)
False friends or false cognates are words that sound and/or look the same in two languages but different meaning. Not all familiar sounding words in Spanish mean the same as they do in English.
Many words that end in -tion in English end in -ción in Spanish and many of them have the same or similar meanings. For example action is acción, description is descripción, invitation is invitación and civilization is civilización. However there are some exceptions (excepciónes): decepción means disappointment, not deception, which is engaño; and insulation is not insulación, which doesn’t exist in Spanish, but aislamiento.
Other false friends in Spanish include:
- Actual = current, at the present time (actual = real / verdadero)
- Argumento = scheme, arrangement (argument = discución)
- Asistir = to attend, to be present, e.g. Asisto a la oficina cada día, I go to the office every day. (to assist/help = ayudar)
- Constipación = a cold, e.g. estoy constipado = I have a cold / my nose is blocked up. (I am constipated = estoy estreñido)
- Contestar = to answer (to contest something = contender)
- Disgusto = displeasure or misfortune. (disgust = asco / repugnancia)
- Efectivo = cash (effective = eficaz)
- Embarazada = to be pregnant (to be embarrassed = tiene vergüenza / se siente avergonzado)
- Grapa = staple (grape = uva)
- Lectura = reading (lecture = conferencia)
- Librería = bookshop (library = biblioteca)
- Noticia = a piece of news (notice = aviso)
- Particular = private (particular = especial)
- Policia = police (policy = politica)
- Pretender = to intend, try, seek (to pretend = fingir)
- Realizer = to become real (to realize = darse cuenta)
- Suburbio = slum (suburb = Barrio residencial)
- Suceso = event (success = éxito)
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Neqitan said,
April 9, 2009 @ 10:50 pm
Exceptions is written “excepciones”, no vowel bearing an accent.
Police is written “policía”, with an accent over the second i.
[i]*Realizer[/i] doesn’t exist in Spanish… [i]Realizar[/i] instead means “to carry out, to fulfil, to achieve” in various contexts and phrases, rather than “to become real”.
Also, it’s worth mentioning that various of all these false cognates are starting to disappear taking the meaning of the corresponding English word instead. I’m a speaker from El Salvador, and for me [i]asistir[/i] also means “to help”, [i]asistieron a los enfermos[/i] isn’t wrong in my speech.
Another good example is [i]bizarro[/i], which used to mean “brave” as in its original Italian meaning (from which it was borrowed), but now it means “bizarre” as in English and French.