The gerund in Spanish is a non-personal verbal form. What does it mean? Well, the infinitives, participles and gerunds are not conjugated forms, that express, in addition to their verbal sense, other meanings.

The infinitive has nominal uses and the participle, adjective ones, whereas the gerund expresses an adverbial sense. Today, we’ll focus on these last uses.

Temporal meaning of the gerund in Spanish  

It’s very common to use the gerund in Spanish to express an action that happens before another or simultaenously. Notice that it’s a mistake if you use an action that happens after the main one. It can be replaced by ‘cuando’.

Previous action: Terminando la clase, iremos al parque.

Simultaneous action: Añade el aceite, batiendo los huevos.

Incorrect subsequent action: Los romanos conquistaron la Península Ibérica, expandiendo el latín durante siglos.

 

The gerund with a modal use   

The use of the gerund as a modal adverb is maybe the most used by the speakers. With it, we can express how an action is done. It can answer the question ‘¿cómo?’.

For example: – ¿Cómo puedo estudiar español? – Reservando una clase en www.spanishviaskype.com

Causal meaning of the gerund in Spanish          

Making the cause and reasons of the actions clear, are the key to have a good communication. When we speak, we often try to justify what we do. We can replace these gerunds using ‘porque’.

For example: Derritiéndose los glaciares a este ritmo, Europa estará bajo el agua en pocos siglos.

The use of the gerund as a conditional clause   

We learnt about the conditional clauses on this article. However, there are more ways to express conditions in Spanish. The gerund in Spanish is an easy one. It can be expressed using ‘si’, instead.

For example: Aprobando el DELE A2, podrás obtener la nacionalidad española.

Concessive meaning with the gerund in Spanish     

Finally, if you need to express an obstacle that complicate the resolution of an action, you can use words such as ‘aunque’ or ‘a pesar de que’. Nevertheless, you can also use the gerund in Spanish, placing ‘aun’ ahead of the it.

For example: Aun estudiando mucho por mi cuenta, necesito un profesor de español.

Well, now you know more ways to use the gerund in Spanish. However, from Spanishviaskype.com, we recommend you not to abuse these forms. You can sound, quite unnatural if you repeat them all the time. If you want to learn more about this topic, don’t hesitate and reserve lessons with us.