Recognizing Cognates Pt. III

Hola

Today we are going to continue study Cognates in Spanish.

In the past lessons we have learnt the meaning of Cognates and I have shown you some Spanish cognates- words that are similar in the way they are written and also have a similar meaning both in English and Spanish.

I hope you have started to create your own list of Spanish Cognates.

Some simple Spanish words have English cognates that we would consider old-fashioned words or even ''vocabulary" words. Compare the following:

Aumentar	To Augment (to increase)
Discordia	Discord (disagreement)
Escolástico	Scholastic (academic, scholarly)
Penúltimo	Penultimate (second to last)
Serpiente	Serpent (Snake)

One important benefit of learning these cognates is that you'll also improve your English vocabulary.

Although paying attention is to your advantage, it's important to keep in mind that not all cognates are true cognates-that is, not all cognates actually have a common or similar meaning in English and Spanish.

Many students of Spanish have been mortified to learn that embarazada means ''pregnant" and not "embarrassed," as may be concluded.

"Embarrassed" and embarazada are just one pair of false cognates.

In the following lesson I will share with you a comprehensive list of a few False Cognates that students regularly confuse with similar words in English but with different meaning.

Chao!

Hasta Pronto.