ellosUds

EllosUds is a compact label used in discussions of Spanish pronouns to refer to two closely related forms: ellos and ustedes (often abbreviated Uds.). Ellos is the third-person plural pronoun used for groups that are male or mixed gender, while ustedes is the second-person plural pronoun used to address a group of people. The term helps contrast how Spanish marks number and person in different syntactic roles.

Ellos and ellas are third-person plural pronouns. Ellos covers masculine or mixed-gender groups, while ellas is used for all-female groups. They function as the subject of a sentence and require third-person plural verb endings (hablan, comen). Ustedes, abbreviated Uds., is the second-person plural pronoun used to address a group as you all. In Latin America, ustedes has largely supplanted formal and informal distinctions and is used in most contexts. In Spain, vosotros is typically the informal second-person plural, while ustedes is used in formal address or in many regional varieties for both formal and informal situations.

Conjugation and agreement follow the person and number of the pronoun. Verbs with ellos/ellas and with ustedes use the third-person plural endings in most dialects (ellos hablan, ustedes hablan). In Spain, the traditional vosotros form exists for informal address (vosotros habláis), while ustedes still uses the third-person plural endings (ustedes hablan). Pronoun placement and clitic combinations (me, te, lo/la, nos, os, los/las, les) align with the same syntactic rules across ellos/ellas and ustedes.

Regional usage varies: la forma de tratamiento, claridad en la conversación y las convenciones formales pueden influir en cuándo se prefiere usar ellos/ellas versus ustedes.