< Spanish Grammar
When the noun is understood in the context, it can be omitted – but adjectives can't stand alone. In these cases, demonstrative pronouns are used. As shown below, demonstrative pronouns are almost exactly the same as demonstrative adjectives – but there's an accent on the stressed syllable. These accents are actually optional.
| Demonstrative Pronouns | |||||||
| singular | plural | singular | |||||
| English | Masculine | Feminine | English | Masculine | Feminine | English | Neuter |
| this | éste | ésta | these | éstos | éstas | this | esto |
| that | ése | ésa | those | ésos | ésas | that | eso |
| that (over there) | aquél | aquélla | those (over there) | aquéllos | aquéllas | that (over there) | aquello |
Sometimes a demonstrative pronoun refers to something abstract, not referring to any specific noun. Thus it doesn't have a gender, so neither can the demonstrative pronoun: the neuter form is used. Notice that the neuter form does not have accent marks.
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