📖LearnModule 14 · Lesson 2 of 30Proficient User · CEFR C2, continuedUnit 1 · Los niveles de lengua
El lunfardo y el vesre
Module 14 of the free Spanish course (CEFR C2, continued), lesson 2 of 30: Buenos Aires has a slang of its own, the lunfardo, and inside it a back-slang, the vesre. On this page: 9 words with their genders and respellings, the rule, a watch-out line and the audio — the study notes behind the workbook's QR.
The words
Spanish
English
Say it
el vesre
back-slang (Buenos Aires)
ehl BEHS-reh
el lunfardo
the slang of Buenos Aires
ehl loon-FAR-doh
el gotán
the tango (back-slang)
ehl goh-TAHN
el revés
the reverse
ehl rreh-BEHS
la jerga
jargon
lah HEHR-gah
la canción
the song
lah kahn-SYOHN
che
hey (Argentina)
cheh
oírse enseguida
to be heard straight away
oh-EER-seh ehn-seh-GEE-dah
dejarlo donde está
to leave it where it belongs
deh-HAR-loh DOHN-deh ehs-TAH
Respellings follow the course’s say-it key; the stressed syllable is in capitals. Print this lesson’s flashcards (PDF) — the words on the front, the English and respelling on the back.
La regla · The rule
Buenos Aires has a slang of its own, the lunfardo, and inside it a back-slang, the vesre, which reverses a word's syllables: café becomes feca, tango becomes gotán. The name is revés itself, turned round.
Y también · And also
This is a READING skill and nothing else. A non-native using vesre is heard immediately, and usually not kindly. Recognize it in a tango lyric or a film, and leave it there. The one word from Argentina everyone may use is che — hey, the vocative that gave a revolutionary his nickname.
Ojo · Watch out
The vesre is READ, never produced: a learner saying feca or gotán is heard at once. che is safe and everywhere in Argentina — a way of calling someone, never an insult. el revés (the reverse) is the noun; al revés (M13) is the phrase.
Do it now — on paper
Say all 9 words aloud twice from the respelling, then once from the Spanish spelling alone — begin with el vesre.
Copy every word with its accents on paper; then cover the English column and write each meaning back from the Spanish.
Write two sentences of your own that get the watch-out line right, then the two practice pages of workbook lesson 2 in Module 14 are the written half of this page.
This free course is the reading half. The writing half — write-in lessons, daily practice pages with built-in review, self-checks and a full answer key — is the companion workbook series, The Spanish Ladder: one workbook per module, fifteen in all, released band by band with the Basic band (Modules 1–5) first.
Keep these words
Turn this lesson’s words into flashcards, then space your reviews — the two habits the research behind our study guides backs hardest.