Spanish and English are similar enough in their punctuation that a beginner might look at something in Spanish and not notice anything unusual except for a few upside-down question marks or exclamation points. However, there are a few differences, some of them subtle, in the way the two languages are punctuated. As already mentioned, the most common difference is the use of inverted question marks and exclamation points, a feature that is almost unique to Spanish. (Galician, a minority language of Spain and Portugal, also uses them.) The inverted punctuation is used at the beginning of questions and exclamations. They should be used within a sentence if only part of the sentence contains the question or exclamation.

• ¡Qué sorpresa! (What a surprise!)
• ¿Quieres ir? (Do you want to go?)
• Vas al supermercado, ¿no? (You're going to the supermarket, aren't you?)
• No va ¡maldito sea! (He's not going, darn it!)

Another difference you're likely to see often is the use of a dash — such as the ones separating this clause from the rest of the sentence — to indicate the beginning of dialogue. The dash is also used to end dialogue within a paragraph or to indicate a change in speaker, although none is needed at the end of dialogue if the end comes at the end of a paragraph. It isn't necessary to start a new paragraph with a change in speaker as is customary in English. These dashes are used by most writers instead of quotation marks, although the use of quotation marks isn't uncommon. Less common still is the use of angular quotation marks, which find more use in Spain than Latin America.

• —¿Vas al supermercado?— la preguntó. —No sé. ("Are you going to the store?" he asked her. ¶"I don't know.")

A third difference you'll see in writing from Spanish-speaking countries is that comma and period usage in numbers is reversed from what it is in English; in other words, Spanish uses a decimal comma. For example, 12,345.67 in English becomes 12.345,67 in Spanish, and $89.10 becomes $89,10. Publications in Mexico and Puerto Rico, however, generally use the same number style as is used in the United States.

Other less common or less significant differences in punctuation between Spanish and English are detailed in a more advanced lesson on punctuation.

Spanish uses significantly fewer capital letters than does English. Whenever Spanish capitalizes a word, the corresponding word in English is capitalized, but the opposite is far from true. There are numerous instances where English capitalizes that Spanish does not.

What Spanish does capitalize are proper names for people, places, newspapers and magazines; abbreviations of personal titles such as Dr., the equivalent of the English "Dr.," and Sr., the equivalent of "Mr."; and the first word in the titles of books, plays, movies and similar works.
Here are the most common cases where English capitalizes that Spanish does not:

 Calendar: Names of the days of the week and months of the year use lower-case letters. Hoy es martes. (Today is Tuesday.) México celebra su independencia el 16 de septiembre. (Mexico celebrates its independence on September 16.)

Composition titles: In formal written Spanish, titles of movies, books, plays and similar works capitalize only the first word and proper nouns. La guerra de las galaxias ("Star Wars"), Harry Potter y la piedra filosofal ("Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone") Note: In informal written Spanish, and on book covers and movie posters, it is not unusual to see such composition titles capitalized as in English.

Personal titles: Introductory titles are not capitalized, although common abbreviations of them (such as Sr. for señor, Dr. for doctor, D. for don and Srta. for señorita) are. ¿Conoces a la señora Wilson? (Do you know Mrs. Wilson?) ¿Conoces a la Sra. Wilson? (Do you know Mrs. Wilson?) La reina Victoria fue mi abuela. (Queen Victoria was my grandmother.)

Religions: Names of religions and their adherents aren't capitalized. Mi madre es católica. (My mother is Catholic.) Estudio el cristianismo. (I'm studying Christianity.)
Ordinal numbers: When an ordinal number is used after a name, it isn't capitalized. Luis catorce (Luis the Fourteenth), Carlos octavo (Charles the Eighth)

Place names: Although the given name of rivers, lakes, mountains and other geographic features are capitalized, the place identifier is not. No vimos el río Amazonas. (We didn't see the Amazon River.) Vivimos cerca de la montaña Rainier. (We live near Mount Rainier.)

Nationality: Although names of countries and cities are capitalized, words derived from them are not. Soy inglés. (I'm English.) Prefiero los cocos puertorriqueños. (I prefer the Puerto Rican coconuts.)


Languages: Names of languages aren't capitalized. Hablo inglés. (I speak English.) Quiero estudiar alemán. (I want to study German.)

One reason many people pick Spanish as their choice for a foreign language is because they've heard that it's easy to learn its pronunciation. Indeed that's the case — even though some of the sounds can be difficult for foreigners to master. Its relative ease in pronunciation stems from the phonetic nature of Spanish: By knowing the spelling of a word, you can almost always know how it's pronounced. The biggest exception is recent words of foreign origin, and it that case you have a head start if you know English, because most of the words in this category - words such as camping, tweet and sport (yes, those are Spanish words) — come from English.
The key, then, to learning Spanish spelling is to learn how each letter is pronounced. You can find guides to each of the letters on the following pages:

• Pronouncing the vowels: A, E, I, O, U, Y
• Pronouncing the easy consonants (ones pronounced roughly like they are in English): CH, F, K, M, P, Q, S, T, W, Y
• Pronouncing the difficult consonants (ones pronounced differently than in English): B, C, D, G, H, J, L, LL, N, Ñ, R, RR, V, X, Z

Here are some general principles of Spanish pronunciation that you may find helpful:

• The vowel sounds of Spanish are usually purer than those of English. Although the vowel sounds of English can be indistinct - the "a" of "about" sounds much like the "e" of "broken," for example - that isn't the case in Spanish.
• It is very common for words of sounds to blend together, especially when a word ends in the same latter that begins the next word. For example, helado (ice cream) and el lado are pronounced identically. This process is known as elision.
• Sounds of consonants tend to be softer or less explosive than they are in English. One notable example is the sound of the h, which has become so softened over the centuries that it is become silent in modern speech.
• The rules of which syllable is stressed is clear and ambiguous in Spanish. If a word has a nonstandard stress, an orthographic accent can be placed over a vowel to indicate the correct stress.

Unfortunately, although you can tell how a word is pronounced by its spelling, the reverse isn't always so. In fact, native Spanish speakers are often poor spellers. That's because Spanish has a fair number of homophones, words that are spelled differently but pronounced alike.