ayudarle or ayudarla

In lesson 8.4, “you should help her” is translated as “debes ayudarle a ella”, but isn't ayudar a transitive verb that can take a direct object pronoun? So should it be “debes ayudarla” or “debes ayudarle”？

Hola JinH,

It should be “debes ayudarle”  “le” is the redundant indirect object pronoun. Even though there is “ella” it's needed. Voy a darle el libro a Juan. Not, voy a dar el libro a Juan. Hope this helps and hopefully Liss will reply.

Saludos,

Ricardo

Amendment: I think  the redundant IO  though not “needed”,  seems to be quite commonly used. So voy a dar el libro a Juan is not wrong.  Including the “le”, according to Spanishland School and other resources, is the way it's usually said.

Liss, ayúdanos por favor.

Saludos,

Ricardo

Thank you Ricardo. I'm confused why it's not “ayudarla”, with “la” as the object pronoun of “ella”. 

De nada JinH,

 I guess I'm confused as well, as I can't answer that and  look forward to Liss's reply.

Saludos,

Ricardo

¡Hola JinH y ricardo-rich!

Thanks very much for your question! This kind of sentence can indeed get quite confusing. What's happening here is actually a type of leísmo. 

In general, leísmo is when a direct object pronoun (most often the masculine lo) is replaced with the indirect object pronoun le (or les in the plural). This is a regional phenomenon that mostly only crops up in Spain, although it does appear in some parts of Latin America too.

Now, leísmo doesn't normally happen with the feminine pronoun la, like in the sentence we're discussing; however, ayudar “to help” is a bit of a special case! This is because centuries ago, when Spanish was more closely modeled on Latin, the Spanish verb ayudar was considered to take the dative case like its Latin counterpart (which this means that it needed to take indirect object pronouns). Over time, though, Spanish has changed. Nowadays, ayudar is normally considered to take the accusative case (and therefore to need direct object pronouns). However, there are still some areas (mostly in Spain, but in some parts of Latin America too) where the shift hasn't quite been finalized and where people still find it natural to use indirect object pronouns with ayudar.

So, ultimately, you can hear native speakers use both versions: Debes ayudarle a ella (treating the object as being indirect/dative) and Debes ayudarla (treating the object as being direct/accusative). 

I'll pass this on to the Spanish team and ask them to see if they can update or clarify what's happening here in the lesson, to make things less confusing!

Saludos,

Liss

 

Hola Liss, 

Thank you for clarifying. This is very helpful and informative .

Saludos,

Ricardo

Thank you Liss, the explanation is very clear and helpful.