In today’s Spanish lesson we will have a look at the indefinite pronouns alguno and ninguno. We use these Spanish words to refer to the components of a group. They exist in both masculine and feminine forms as well as singular and plural forms, so they must agree with the nouns they refer to.
We use algún/ alguna/ningún/ ninguna and a singular noun to talk about the quantity of something in general or when we don’t know the exact amount of something.
Alguna cosa está mal. (Something is wrong.)
Note that Spanish words alguno and ninguno change to algún and ningún when used before masculine singular nouns and feminine singular nouns beginning with a or ha.
Algún lápiz (some pencil), not alguno lápiz
Ningún lápiz (no pencil), not ninguno lápiz
Algún águila, ningún águila (some eagle, no eagle)
However, if the feminine singular noun beginning with a or ha is preceded by an adjective, we use alguna/ ninguna.
Alguna gran águila (some big eagle)
We use algunos/ algunas/ ningunos/ ningunas + plural noun.
Algunos niños están llorando. (Some kids are crying.)
He visitado algunos países de África. (I have visited some countries in Africa.)
We use alguno/ alguna/ ninguno/ ninguna + de + los, las, mis, tus, estos, esos etc. + plural noun
¿Alguno de vosotros quiere tomar cerveza? (Anyone wants to have a beer?)
No veo a ninguno de los perros. (I don’t see any of the dogs.)
Ninguno and alguno can be used alone when it’s clear what or who we are talking about.
¿Has visto a alguno de mis compañeros? No, no he visto a ninguno. (Have you seen any of my colleagues? No, I haven’t seen anyone.)
Be careful. We use negative verb + ninguno:
No ha salido ninguno de mis amigos. (None of my friends went out.)
However, if we start the sentence with ninguno, the verb that follows is affirmative.
Ninguno de mis amigos ha salido. (None of my friends went out.)
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