¿............... el timbre? / Can you hear the doorbell?

Colin H.A2Kwiziq Q&A regular contributor

¿............... el timbre? / Can you hear the doorbell?

Hi,

I have just completed a test which included the above.

I answered: Oyes tu (sorry, can't get accents to work), which was marked wrong.

Another question was: ¿..................... la chimenea?  Two answers were given: Enciendes and Enciendes tu.  This was marked nearly right.

Are the answers with 'tu' (or any other personal pronoun) not acceptable in Spanish?  Is the only way to ask a question in Spanish to raise the tone at the end?

Look forward to your reply.

Thank you.

Best regards,

Colin

Asked 3 years ago
InmaKwiziq team memberCorrect answer

Hola Colin

With reference to ¿Oyes tú el timbre?, it is also correct. We didn't include it as a possible correct answer because we don't tend to place the subject after the verb - it would sound a bit less natural. In questions we generally keep the same order as the statement and add the ¿ ? using a different intonation for a question. 

So, the most natural way would be ¿Oyes el timbre? or ¿Tú oyes el timbre?

With reference to "la chimenea" question, I imagine that Kwizbot only gave you "nearly correct" because you may have missed the accent on "tú".

The only way we recognize a question when we are speaking is the change in intonation, yes. And if you see it written it'd be the question marks of course. 

I hope this helped.

Saludos

Inma

Colin H.A2Kwiziq Q&A regular contributor

Thanks for the clarification, Inma.

Colin

¿............... el timbre? / Can you hear the doorbell?

Hi,

I have just completed a test which included the above.

I answered: Oyes tu (sorry, can't get accents to work), which was marked wrong.

Another question was: ¿..................... la chimenea?  Two answers were given: Enciendes and Enciendes tu.  This was marked nearly right.

Are the answers with 'tu' (or any other personal pronoun) not acceptable in Spanish?  Is the only way to ask a question in Spanish to raise the tone at the end?

Look forward to your reply.

Thank you.

Best regards,

Colin

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