Narciso G. answered • 11/16/20
Native Spanish Speaker, Friendly Mechanical Engineer
I need to start my answer by explaining that both words you indicated are extremely rare tense forms of the verb “to specify”, and both are in imperative mood, because both express a command. So, I am going to give you the only real example of use I have been able to come up for each word.
But first, I have to clarify that, in Spanish, we have two ways to address a person, so the singular “you” is applied with two words, which are “tu” and “usted”. In Venezuela, “tu” is used between family members, friends, or even between coworkers that have a good relationship, while, on contrary, “usted” is used when talking with unknown people for the first time, or with people with whom we have to show respect, either because they are older or are in an authority position, for example the general manager of a company where we are working. However, I have talked with people of other Latin American countries, and they use “tu” and “usted” in opposite way. And, to make the situation even more confusing, for the plural “you”, in Venezuela and other countries, we use “ustedes” in both informal and formal contexts. This distinction between these two words is useful to make here, because the letters of the verb tense are slightly different depending of the informal or formal “you” we are using. For example, to say “please explain your plan to me”, informally we would say “por favor, explícame tu plan” but formally we would say “por favor, explíqueme su plan”, so please notice that the tone change affects two different words in this phrase.
Now, back to your first word, “especifíquenle” is the formal word to give such command in plural. To put this in a real example, let’s say that I am the general manager of a large company, and I am talking in a formal meeting to two or more supervisors, and I want them to give the following instruction to new employees on their first day with the company: “please specify to new employees that they have to take a 30-minute lunch break between noon and 1:30 PM”. So, I would tell to two or more supervisors: “por favor, especifíquenle a los nuevos empleados que tienen que tomar el descanso de 30 minutos para almorzar entre el mediodía y la 1:30 PM”. But if I, as general manager, I talk informally with the supervisors that work for me, I would give them this command with exactly the same words, no difference between formal and informal in plural. However, if I am talking formally with a single supervisor, then in singular the word I would use is “por favor, especifíquele a los nuevos empleados…”, please notice that the difference is just to remove an “n”. To talk informally with a single supervisor, the difference now is a little bigger, we need to replace letters: “por favor, especifícale a los nuevos empleados…”. Finally, please notice that to decide which form to use, the singular or plural, we have to look how many supervisors I am talking to, and not how many employees they will talk to.
Now, for your second word, “especifíquense” is a plural command that would be used, for example, if I am listening to ideas being explained to me by two or more people, and we are all together in a single meeting. If I am not understanding their ideas and I need them to provide clarifications and specifications to me, to tell them “please, specify your ideas”, I would say “por favor, especifiquen sus ideas”. Now, let’s say that they are providing those details to me as I requested, but they are not doing a good job, so I am still confused so I repeat my command. So, they continue to explain their ideas, but the ideas are really complex and I still don’t understand. Then, if I don’t want to repeat the same five words for the third time, that is when I would say “por favor, especifíquense” in this case the ending particle “se” substitutes “your ideas” because they are already understood by my listeners by this moment. Suffixes like this “se” are very frequent in Spanish. In the same way as in the previous word, both the full form and the abbreviated form are applicable to both formal and informal conversations, but only in plural, to address two or more people. Now, in singular informal, in I am talking with just one person, the equivalent phrases are “por favor, especifica tus ideas” and “por favor, especifícate”, while in formal singular they are “por favor, especifique sus ideas” and “por favor, especifíquese”. Finally, please notice that this is similar to the previous word, in that the difference between formal plural and formal singular is just the removal of an “n”.
Well, I hope this explanation is satisfactory, but I would be happy to clarify further.
