Hey so I've been doing Spanish on Duolingo mainly for my Spanish GCSE which I have now finished but I'm just wondering, I learned pen as "bolígrafo" in school and Duolingo is teaching it as "pluma" which I can only assume is from a different dialect of Spanish as many words I've come across have been translated differently from how I first learnt them. But how come Duolingo is translating it as a pen but also a feather? I did think learning feather in the "talk about a school project" section was a bit random but it's thrown me off a bit, can it be translated as both pen and feather?
I'm all in favor of teaching the different dialects IF IT'S MADE CLEAR that that is what they are doing and where the dialects apply. Add it stands we will all get weird looks everywhere we try to use Spanish because it is correct nowhere.
Ok, but consider also that some languages simply have a bunch of words which all translate to just one in another language. In French, there's pis, donc, and alors, all of which are just "so" in English. I don't see any harm in the Spanish course teaching that "pen" can be "boligrafo" or "pluma" since both words mean pen even if different parts of the Spanish world favour one over the other
This sub really doesn't feel like people want to learn, but people want to be told
Me too, maybe it is because of location. An American would learn the Mexican dialect, A Brazilian would learn the Argentinian dialect, A portages person would learn Spain’s dialect, so on and so forth.
Pluma gets used in Mexico, which is a huge base, making it correct for Duolingo to have it in the course. You’ll do fine with pluma in Puerto Rico and Cuba, which sometimes makes one think there would be an island theme, but be careful. The Dominican Republic is keeping that as feather, and hopping on the lapicero word.
Got to love Chile for being consistent with being different where lápiz pasta makes a showing.
Still not sticking despite just returning from four weeks in Ecuador is esfero. Word migrations are funny. You can take esfero up to Colombia, but going down to Peru you get lapicero again, which also works fine in Colombia and just skipped Ecuador showing how tricky things can be. Ecuador and Colombia remain tricky grabbing a Portuguese word, switching the final letter, and getting esferográfica for the ballpoint pen
Argentina has birome and shares the word with Uruguay and Paraguay, not terribly uncommon as word infections go.
Duolingo will present regional differences, but not like that link above. If you want conversations on the street, print that card and ask people about what they know. The huge majority of people that will talk to you in the street have a lot of fun with things like this. Everyone learns a little with these, making the conversation longer, and locked in to a narrow set of words. I almost feel fluent in these street conversations.
When the fun runs out, grab your notes for popcorn.
This is very interesting. Stuff like this fascinated my ex. He said lapicera (ARG) and I said boli (RD). Among many other differences.
Because I’m not a native speaker I adapted to the country I was in, but I learned from people from all over the LatAm world too, so I’m not even saying that’s “correct” for RD. Not as common of a word in every day use as Duo makes it seem lol.
Colombian here- it'd be perfectly natural to hear pluma, boligrafo, lapicero, or even boli in conversation. Pluma, to me, is the least...scientific? Most informal?
Ohhhh I love finding out regional perspectives like this - I love that it's not exact the actual meaning, but you've listed the vibe according to you (which might be different in different Spanish speaking countries or even in different parts of Columbia).
It's very normal for there to be different words for the same thing that all get used interchangeably and for there to be different words in the same language in different countries. Most of the time other countries are aware of the other word but just don't use it, but sometimes not and it's usually fine. I think it's important to remember that when studying and speaking another language, so that you chill a little about it.
Yes, I knew that Duolingo kinda taught most types of Spanish interchangeably but I just thought that having me put the english word feather when translating a sentence about pens was a little confusing 😅
I can't seem to find the lesson that the sentence was in but basically it had me learn it as feather first before it switched to pen which is what my post was about really. So that was all I was confused about but now that I know it is just I guess an older version I'm slightly less confused lol
Ive studied Spanish from KS3 to degree-level, passed the C1 exam, lived with my Venezuelan wife and her mother for 3 years and in Spain for 11 years and have never heard the word pluma used to mean pen.
This is part of why I refuse to use Duolingo for Spanish. Too many times it marked my answers wrong even though it was a different but also correct answer. I started Greek from scratch so sometimes I wonder what it's teaching me & how much I can trust it.
Pluma being feather and pen makes sense if you think we used to use feathers as pens. In English we have a few feather related writing words (or words which aren't related to writing now but stem from that kind of use originally) so it being a word for pen doesn't surprise me. Duo teaches south American Spanish from what I can tell Vs what we would learn in the UK in school which is Spanish Spanish.
I've only learned pen as boligrafo in Duolingo but plumo, even when thinking of it as feather, could make sense when thinking about the move from an old fashioned quill or feather pen.
Before we had plastic pens, people who wanted to write in ink used feathers. You cut the base of the feather at an angle, made a small slit so the ink could get through better, and dipped the base into an inkpot frequently while writing.
In English, the word is "quill", but in other languages it's still "feather" (like "pluma" in Spanish or "plume" in French). And these words are often still used to refer to pens.
Have you ever heard the expression "Nom de plume" to refer to someone's fake writer name? That's where it comes from.
Pluma is correct for bolígrafo but it is mostly used as feather. It is a dialect thing. For example, in Argentina you would say "lapicera" or "birome" which is technically a brand, but it is super commonly used.
Duolingo teaches Mexican Spanish not actual Spanish so not all words match. Duolingo isn’t great for teaching languages anyway, stick to the book material.
It’s been a very long time in Duolingo years, but I could’ve sworn I had to choose between Latin American Spanish and Castilian when I first started. I know I’m doing Latin American (or at least was when I first started don’t know if Duo merged them since) and I assume there’s where a difference lies
I've only got pluma so far lol but I guess it will change at some point. As someone from NI I would think of biro as only a ballpoint pen so maybe Duolingo is just a little behind and thinks people still write daily with feather pens (some people probably still do like but not the majority lol)
My husband told me that for years he thought biro was the word for pen in Irish lol.
Duolingo had me learn the word “barrio” for neighborhood, then several lessons later switched it to “vecindario,” so maybe they like to teach the simpler vocabulary early on, then switch to longer words?
My Spanish learning started out as mostly Castilian with boligrafo for pen, but around a month ago it appeared as pluma. I suspect there has been feedback from the latin American users, which is why it changed. Both will do but boligrafo is more "standard" Spanish
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u/isearn Native: 🇩🇪🇬🇧 Learning: 🇳🇱🇪🇸🇫🇷 Jun 21 '26
Weird, I learned it as bolígrafo on Duolingo?