The part about Fart = Speed and the Smell (Smäll) = Impact is totally true! You should also check out "Svenska för nybörjare" (Swedish for beginners) from the show "Hipp Hipp", it's a real comedy classic here.
A classic confusion occurred when some Swedish stores had a shop sale. Sale is “rea” in Swedish. Traditionally, at the end of the sale, stores put “slutrea” on their signs, which is translated to “final sale”. Some stores started using the English word “sale” instead of “rea”. This sometimes led to awkward signs when store owners with poor English knowledge stated using the English word “sale” together with the Swedish word for final; slut. A minor shock for some English speaking tourists when there were signs with “SLUT SALE” were on display in the shop windows.
😂😂😂 In Danish we also have "slut" = end / final etc. For instance "slut-spurt" for the "final sprint" in a race, but also used in connection with "sales".
1:34 No, Swedish is not really a difficult language to learn, especially not for a British person! Because the two languages are very closely related and pretty similar in both syntax and vocabulary. But *all* languages demand a lot of work to master...
10 หลายเดือนก่อน +5
Yeah, you can at the very least make yourself understood by just translating word for word from one language to the other, even though you'll be grammatically way off. I've had some friends from the UK try to learn Swedish, though and they found it difficult... yet a friend from the US didn't really have any problem so I guess it's down to the individual. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
@@hnorrstrom Easy to learn but hard to master. Of all the English and American people I know or heard speaking, not a single one got rid of their accent. Not even after decades speaking Swedish.
@@herrbonk3635In deed you are right. I have heard some Germans that were almost impossible to spot, but it's very hard to truly master Swedish for sure.
I find it great how you interest yourself in Swedish humor. I'm from Gothenburg, a city with a strong Scottish heritage in its industrial history. And yeah, everything is 100 % true. Swedish language: many need to know situations.
It's funny how many words from the English language are found in Swedish too, but they mean something entirely different. For example, the words kiss and pink both are more childlike ways of saying urin (which is the same in both languages, though the pronunciation varies). That means that a Swedish child would be very confused when their parents says they're going to a concert to watch Pink and Kiss. Another example is the word gift. It has two meanings, married or poison. Two very different words, even though I've heard some people say that they are pretty much the same. Married and slowly being poisoned.
"Gift" in the marriage sense also existed in Old English - for instance "gift-hus" = a wedding house / chappel ( i.e. a place where the bride is "given" away by her family ). Another interesting related OE word that still exist as close cognates in the modern Scandinavian languages is "brydhlop" = "wedding". S bröllop, D & N bryllup And some familiar Germanic words in Old English have simply been lost over time. For instance "hropan" = "to shout" S ropa [roa-pA], N råpe, D råbe [roa-be] Thank you for correction of "S ropa" 😉
Yeah, we just don't know why. There are rules, but we have so many exceptions to the rules that the rules are kind of arbitrary and most of us don't know them. All he said is true. Impact is smäll for example. So he is really good, and funny.
Swedish Guy here. Over all the video is factual correct. A study I saw indicate that almost 80% of English words come from Scandinavian languages, thanks to the vikings😊 there are million example...when spelling is very different but original word is Scandinavian. Ie daughter = dotter. Window = vindue means the ey of the wind. Light came in and smoke when out in the viking houses. But this is in Norwegian and Danish. In Swedish we took the German word for window= fester that became Fönster. Between Norwegian and swedish, as same with Danish, just a few hundreds words that differs but it is easier for Swedish to understand Norwegian compare to Danish and vice versa. By the way, we ha 4 genus in the Scandinavian languages Feminin, Maskulina, Reale and neutrum😊
Danish is much more similar to Swedish than Norwegian in text. But we can't her what they say at all so that's why we find Norwegian easier even if they have a lot more different words.
Yes, the "-en" and "-et" postfix for the definite article are genera that nouns have, similar to femininum and masculinum, but separate from that. We used to have femininum and masculinum, as well, but it has disappeared from the language. I'm not sure, but I suspect the reason is that putting "-en" at the end of some words implies that it's plural, so if you want to say it in singular you have to put"-et" instead. [EDIT: The video did mention this, later.] For example, "bord" (table) in definite article is "bordet", because if you say " borden" it means "the tables", plural. But this is only true for T-genus words, not N-genus words. There are also a very few specific nouns where you can use either genera, it doesn't matter. "Apelsin" (the fruit "orange") can be either "apelsinen" or "apelsinet". There is no hard rule for whether a noun is N-genus or T-genus, but there are a few "rules of thumb": N-genus are commonly the living things and nouns ending in a wovel. T-genus are commonly objects, concepts, and nouns ending with a consonant. If you're guessing, I'd bet on whether the word ends in a consonant or wovel. And yes, Swedish is indeed one of the harder languages to learn. Not as hard as some, but on the harder side, statistically. They measure this by how early children become fluent in their native language. The later this happens the harder we consider the language to be to learn.
Femininum and masculinum were during Middle Ages transformed into reale / utrum ( the n-type) . There still exists neutrum ( t-type). Appox 75% of the words are n-type, but don´t look for rules. Still better than German with 3 types.
I used to teach Swedish to adult immigrants and the answer to the question if there are any rules to how to conjugate substantives, verbs and adjectives...yes!
When a word is for example: Bord > Bordet you can look at the word previous to it, "ett bord" = "A table" and when you mean the table specifically "The Table" you can use the "ett" and create "Bordet", this also works for example: "En banan" = "A banana", and its specifics becomes "Bananen" = "The banana", So En Banan, Bananen, Ett Bord, Bordet, this was told to me by an immigrant friend when he was learning Swedish, the teacher he had told him this really great tip to learning the grammar
I think the hardest thing for english speakers learning swedish is the pronounciation of certain sounds that you don't have. ÅÄÖ are certainly new letters for you but you probably use the sounds to some variation. The real test is the pronounciation of the sj- sound like in sju (seven) and sk- sound. In the word sjuksköterska (nurse) you get both as a bonus.
For example in British English you say "Paul" and "Or", that au and o sound is the Swedish Å. The ai sound in "Fair" is like our Ä. You can find the Ö in a word like "bird", or "her". I've heard more difficulties with the Swedish Y and R and that there's a mix-up with A and Å and Ä, same with mixing up O and Ö. So they throw in a lot more Å, Ä and Ö than they need to like "Ja, jag gjörde det" insted of "Ja, jag gjorde det". The sj-sound doesn't have to be difficult. It's pronounced different depending on where in Sweden you are anyway so you can choose wichever way that is easier for you.
The gender thing in Sweden is from my understanding the hardest to master, since there is no real rule about it. The only thing though is that the definite article and the indefinite article correlates. So in Swedish we have two different forms for one (or "a"); 'en' or 'ett'. So if you know that the indefinite article for, say, 'A glass' is 'ETT glas', then you can know that 'THE glass' is 'glasET'. And to take the other "one" for example: If you know that 'A dog' is 'EN hund', then you can derive that 'THE dog' is 'hundEN'.
This. The most commonly stated rule is that living things use "en", while non-living things use "ett", but there are so many exceptions to this rule it's gone way past being not even funny and reached outright hilarious. Basically as a learner of the Swedish language, you simply have to learn the indefinite articles noun by noun, because there is no trick that's infallible.
According to the American Foreign Service Institute's (FSI) language difficulty ranking, Swedish is one of the easiest languages to learn (24-30 weeks or 600-750 class hours).
Coming from german it seems we have a lot of common ground. Like the whale thing - its exactly the same in german: Wal, Wahl, Wahl for whale, choice, election. And they all sound the same, too. Or the swedish Slut for end, is Schluß in german. Unfortunatly it is also just as complicated as german when it comes to the "the" usage, or the plural form. "You just have to know it" is not really a helpful advice for learning a language. But its just the same with the gender words - der, die, das - in german. Why a tree is male, and a lamp is female nobody can explain - you just have to know it. :)
We have had influences over time from both german and french. But the word windows is funny, in swedish we took the german fenster and now call it fönster. But old swedish name was vindöga that we exported to english in window.
I remember teaching my kids grammar when they where in school, they kept asking me why we bent the words they way we do, and all I could answer them was "- I don't really know why, we just do" Simply put, there is no real reason to swedish grammar, it's just odd and weird because it's an old norse language mixed with german and english :D
Actually, English is the language that are mixed with Norse, not the other way around (like egg, window, husband, die etc). We have something called borrowed words from English, but there are a Swedish word for the same thing.
The words for steals, soul and reason are also kind of similar. Steals - stjäl, soul - själ, reason - skäl. Sounds very familiar for most and in many cases exactly the same. Depends a bit on witch dialect you have. So "han stjäl en själ utan skäl" is "he steals a soul for no reason". Although reason have to swedish words, skäl and anledning. If you want to hear it pronounced type it in google translate. Choose from swedish to english and then type the swedish line as I wrote it. Otherwise google translate will choose anledning instead och skäl.
As a Swede my teachers growing up said ”you feel if it’s wrong you just have to learn how to feel when it’s wrong” I have dyslexia too so school was hell😂
It’s The pronunciation that’s the most difficult since Swedish is a “singing language “ (don’t remember the correct label), just like Estonian and some few other languages around the world.
English and swedish are much closer than english speakers generally get the impression of. Vast amounts of words are pretty much the same or very similar. What makes it difficult for many are the vowel sounds and the stress, or just pronounciation in general. One thing that is easier though is where you have: am, are and is - we have only "är". Grammer is a bit different though.
As a native english speaker you would find the grammar very similar, and as for vocabulary a lot in common. The only real struggle will be mastering pronunciation. It's very likely you'd never sound like a native. That's okay though, that's not necessarily a goald you need to aspire to.
oh it just occured to me, i was watching another reaction u did about things Sweden have influenced onto the world and now it hit me that english is full of old Swedish words from viking times.
To speak Swedish so well that a native Swede will think you grew up in Sweden is hard, but to speak Swedish well enough that we understand you, is pretty easy :3
Swedish is a very hard language to master, due to all the irregular verbs, false friends (when two words look very similar but means two very different things) etc. This is why automatic translation suck when Swedish is involved (if I use it, I often translate it into English instead). When Amazon opened in Sweden, they used an automatic translation program with hilarious results like "Earings for European whores" and the colour brown were translated to "Poo". And don't get me started on the adpositions. Like if you have gone to IKEA, in Swedish you say "I'm on top of IKEA" even if you aren't standing on the buildings roof.
Swedish is harder to learn in some ways, but easier in others. If you come across a new Swedish word, you're almost guaranteed to know how it's pronounced if you know the rules. But with English you have to memorize the pronunciation of every single word, because there are no rules
What are you on about? The English language has strict rules for pronunciation just like any other language. There are always exceptions to the rules and loanwords that are different. But no rules? Give me a break.
@@sharatainx3990 Dude, this isn't a personal attack on your language. It's just a simple fact that English is wildly inconsistent. Name any English word, and I can give you a valid alternate pronunciation. That simply isn't a thing in Swedish. No language has STRICT rules for pronunciation by the way, but the "rules" of English are wrong more times than they are right. Like "I Before E Except After C." The syllable "su" has 17 different pronunciations in English (that you indeed have to just memorize). Swedish has 2. And you know instantly which one to use depending on the following letters
@@sopastar How is this a matter of attacking a language? Are you projecting your own feelings? I'm simply pointing out that you were wrong in your claim that you have to memorise the pronunciation of EVERY word in English because there are NO rules. You have to memorise the exceptions like in any other language. As I wrote in my previous comment there are always exceptions. I never said that the amount of exceptions are the same for every language. I never claimed that English can't be a jungle to navigate at times. So yes, when I say the rules are strict that doesn't mean there are no exceptions. About 75% of the words in English do follow basic rules. Only around 4-5% of words are truly irregular. All the others might not follow basic rules but they still follow patterns and still have limited possibilities of how they can be pronounced. This leads me to another of your claims. "the "rules" of English are wrong more times than they are right". When did 4% or even 25% become larger than 75%? Or as you claim 100%? This is the problem with your claim, and that's all I commented on. Swedish example of inconsistent pronunciation is for example "kex" and "lakrits". How do you know how to correctly pronounce words like banan, kort, bete if you know the rules but you've never heard the words before? Can they not be mistaken and pronounced in multiple ways?
@@sharatainx3990 Idk, mate. You didn't simply point it out. You were being a dick about it, and I gave you the benefit of the doubt that maybe you were only emotional. I'm sorry I was wrong. The statistics you bring up are mainly about the spelling of prefixes and plurals when you already know how a word is pronounced. You can't apply something unrelated to my statement and have me defend it. You seem to have a non-standard definition of "strict" and I suspect some of the confusion stems from there. English does indeed have common patterns that you can learn, which grants you the chance to make educated guesses. That isn't what rules are at all, let alone "strict". "Kex" and "lakrits" have regional differences which are both correct. The others are examples of the few exceptions I acknowledge in my first post. My point is that Swedish pronunciation is easily acquired by learning the basic rules, as opposed to English. Let me demonstrate what it's like for a beginner learning Swedish and English with these "new" words: biend, twear, laip, bei, thi, loing, supe, yre, tata. You can only make qualified guesses how to pronounce these in English, and that's if you have encountered many similar words before. The basic rules of Swedish enable you to say these words with confidence immediately, without having to suss out silent letters and vowels having wildly different sounds, etc. The bottom line is I can give a complete beginner a text to read aloud in Swedish, and they will be coherent if I only teach them the sounds of the letters. Yes, there are a few exceptions which you do bring up, but English is impossible to just read. You have to have lots of experience, and in the end, there's still a high chance of guessing wrong.
Basicly we have two word for what the english have for saying a infront of a thing, like a chair = En Stol, words that have an A end with EN like stolEN and the other word infront of a word is ETT, like he said its ETT bord so it ends BordET. Then some words like a bridge is EN Bro but just becomes Bron as in that bridge. I dont know if I can explain it better. In english you have A and AN depending if it start with a Consonant or Vowel, but have exceptions.
One simple way to know if it is ET or EN at the end is to know how it is specified in "Bestämd form singularis" _Ett_ bord (one table) Det bordET (That table) _En_ arm (one arm) Den armEN (that arm) You also noticed it in the whay to determine the thing D _et_ and D _en_ (D _et_ bordET, D _en_ armEN ) Well, except Piano... Ett Piano (one piano) Det pianoT (That piano)
Yeah, it's gendered. We mostly have two active genuses in Swedish, in modern grammar T-gender and N-gender. In some odd cases we also have Feminin and Masculine gender. We used to have five genders: Neuter, Utrum, Real, Feminine and Masculine. Swedish also more or less is a tonal language, making it sound sing-songy.
I had many coworkers asking about why the apple and the orange is called "äpplet" and "apelsinen"; and not "äpplet" and "apelsinet" or "äpplenen" and "apelsinen". Still have no idea!
a little quick tip for pronouncing Å and Ä you can think of the beginning of the song Pompeii with Bastille. The beginning of the song is pretty much. Ä Ä Å Ä Å Ä Ä Å Ä Å
Hello! Thanks for your posts! Try “Danish language”. It’s Norwegians making fun of Danish language but here in Sweden we love making fun of our neighbours!😅
I really like your way of reacting to us stupid swedes ;-)). I actually haven't thought so much before on how inconsequent our language is. Must be a nightmare for anyone who wants to learn... Anyway - like your approach and it's always a treat to watch!
Maybe someone already replied to this but the endings of a noun is decided if the noun is a "en" or "ett" word. In english that wound be a a "a" or "an" word. If you are not sure, choose "en" since around 70% of the swedish nouns are "en". And I am a certified SFI-teacher, you can trust me ;)
I love this video. Always depends on what your native language is in terms of how hard a language is to learn, but I'd say Swedish is on a medium level a lot of the time. But coming from English it's pretty easy, since they are closely related, a lot of stuff came from the same place and we also took a lot of English in to Swedish. Yes, we don't do censorship on TV or anything almost. I hate how that happens in the US and it's soooo bloody silly! Especially when it's not for kids anyway! It's insulting. But we don't get the censored stuff on TV here anyway. I used to watch Hell's Kitchen on TV but then when I "got it" online cause I wanted to see it earlier it was censored and I was like wth is this crap!? Swearing is no big deal here and just a normal part of language. Slut doesnt rally mean the end, just end, but in the movie context it would be the end. The end would be slutet. Smäll is like bang. No, no rule for en- and ett-words, the only way to know except just learning it per word is if you know how to say one (noun), because those are connected and almost the same. ETT bord, EN hand, bordET, handEN. Just two t with the first "one". And then vise versa.
Regarding Å, Ä, Ö. As a Swede, I will hävda that you already have this sounds in your language, and use them all the time, every day. Ö = Sounds like A in _A_ pen, _A_ dog, etc, or U in the name Urkel (Ööörkel) Å = O in mOre (mÅÅÅre) , gOre (gÅÅÅre) Ä = HE in There (Thääär) is actually DÄR in Swedish, sounding almost the same. But pls notice that this is the way most Swedish speaking people have been thought to pronounce these words, so "ta det med en nypa salt" 😄😉
@@paulingvar I have no education experience in the French language, but if *Deux* is equal to _Two_ I agree with you, from the preferences I have in french pronunciation... (Un, dö, trä, katrä, sä, sis, nöff as far as I know 😄)
Apparently there are rules to reale and neutrum (en/ett) in Swedish that you learn when you study the language but no Swedish person would be able to tell you those rules and there are a lot of exceptions to them.
The good news is that a britt can pretty much use English broken gramar and still be understood AND you can mix in a bit of English in to your Swedish of course 😄. So its a language where you early can learn by doing... Also its probably why Swedes in general have a easy time speaking English.
You should watch "grotesco - liverlellie". It's a 3 minute sketch in English by Grotesco, uploaded here on TH-cam. A parody of Jane Austen-esque British movies/series.
He's not wrong. We also put En or Ett in front of the words. Ett Äpple (An apple), En apelsin (an orange). But English has rules. Does the word start with a wovel, you use an. If not, a. WE HAVE NO RULES. We know because "it sounds right". That make it a little difficult. :D
A lot of context depending words in the Swedish language, so that doesn't make it any easier. Then we have: fart =speed smäll=bang/slam were "smäll" is almost pronounced like the English word smell. So the to the Swinglish frase: [It is not the "fart" that kills, but the "smäll"] Which is only funny for a Swede that knows a bit of English.
En/ett are quite similar to genders in other languages, there are some guidelines but it's fairly random. I'd think plural would be the most confusing, perhaps in combination with en/ett. Eg, House=Hus, The house=Huset, the Houses=Husen; while Chair=Stol, The Chair=Stolen, and the Chairs=Stolarna. The good thing is that many words are pretty similar, but there are some false friends
Indoeuropean languages have three genders, masculine, feminine and neuter. Some languages have (often quite recently, say the last 500-1000 years or so) simplified this scheme. In English they have all become one, in Swedish, Danish, Norwegian and Dutch, masculine and feminine have merged to become one gender, while neuter is still its own. Do note that the definite article is replaced by an addition to the end of the noun, but apart from exceptions (of which I can't bring to mind any) it's just a choice between the two. This means that you have to learn the gender with the noun, which is also the case in any other Indoeuropean language I know of, except for English. Definite articles seem to be a new invention in some western Indoeuropean languages, but is not in general a feature of the whole group of languages. In Swedish, Danish and Norwegian, they are appended to the end of the word. This is also the case in Romanian: "tapirul" means "the tapir" in Romanian, to use an example I often have been asked about.
Clarification: There definitely are just two genders in (standard) Swedish. In the merged masculine/feminine gender you append "-en" to the noun in lieu of a definite article, and in neuter you append "-et". It's the last statement that I can imagine there are some exceptions to (though I can't think of any), but all nouns belong to one of the mentioned genders for all other purposes.
I am a swede and as far as I know, the "en" and "et" has no specific rules at all, we basically just use what sounds the best and laugh when people get it wrong.
Yes. the different endings is grammatical gender, but both "genders" are neutral. The N-gender is old norse male and female combined in a single category, and the T-gender is what was already the third neutral gender in old norse. But that doesn't mean that there is any logic to what noun is considered belonging to which category. So you really need to know for every noun. Although if you don't know and have to guess, go with -en because it's more common. As for how difficult swedish is: Think of it as similar grammar to german but easier. And it's fairly closely related to english so it shouldn't be too difficult.
Never two "vokaler" After each other, that's when you break it with an. Try say a apple and an apple. Which flows better when spoken... I might be wrong but I also use an for a few other words as well just because it flows better in speech. But sometimes I might say "a uniform" just because it flows better and "an umbrella".
Yeah, I've heard that Swedish is one of the most difficult languages to learn, especially if you're also learning a dialect like skånska or something. A lot of the grammar is just learned by speaking whilst we grow up, so it's all just natural. Honestly, the grammar lessons we had in school kinda messed me up a bit because of how much just didn't make sense to me 😅 Like, over all it's kinda logical, but there are so many exceptions to the rules and stuff so when you're actually trying to learn all the different grammatic terms and stuff, I just found it kinda confusing even though it's so incredibly obvious when you're actually using the language. It's just not something you even think about, things just are the way they are you know? So I can definitely imagine it being incredibly confusing and hard to learn when you've grown up with a language that isn't grammatically similar.
People learning swedish has said that it *is* really difficult because, like he said, you kind of just have to know. Some swedish grammar literally DON'T have any rules to them. So I could see why that would be hard to learn.
No, Swedish is actually a fairly easy language for an English speaking person to learn, since there are a lot of very similar basic words compared with English - and the grammar is not that difficult either. And it even has some deep similarities with English grammar - same word order at the basic level (or very nearly), no grammatical cases for nouns and their articles ( except for the simple s-genitive ), same conjugations of verbs for ALL grammatical persons ( English is nearly there 😉), similar ways of forming tenses, many parallel strong verbs and NO "backwards" sentences, unlike in German 🙄 ( the same things apply to the closely related Danish & Norwegian languages btw. ). In Denmark we even have a town called "Middelfart" 😂 - and a village called Horreby 🙄 And there are even light signs in our lifts saying "I [ee*] fart" = "In motion / speed" - i.e. "moving" 😂 "fart" is related to your English word "fare", which makes it more sensible, I hope? D & N + S even have the verb "fare" [fA-re] / fara [fA(w)-rA] = "to fare" btw.
@@ReptilezDzn At the basic level, I said. It's one of the reasons that English is fairly easy for Scandinavians to learn - unlike the dreaded Gernan with its complicated grammar. It's as if we already "know" half of it in advance and just need to fill in the gaps so to speak.
The definite article in Swedish is from an old era before Swedish was a thing, that's a remnant of Old Norse. M -inn , F -in , N -it, And they're all derived from the word hinn(meaning the other or that). And it's declensions is what's caused the definite article suffixes to look and behave so weirdly. Nom. Hinn, Hin, Hitt. Acc. Hinn, Hina, Hitt Dat. Hinum, Hinni, Hinu Gen. Hins, Hinar, Hins and now for the Plurals... Nom. Hinir, Hinar, Hin Acc. Hina, Hinar, Hin Dat. Hinum, Hinum, Hinum the easy one to remember... Gen. Hinna, Hinna, Hinna...
This is interesting. Since im Swedish. I have never ever thought about this EN ET and which is which. But i know for sure. But no. I cant tell someone which is which. Haha. Explains why people moving here get it messed up on a regular bases. So know I learned something to. Cool !!!!
He keeps translating the English indefinite plural to the Swedish plural with the definite article, though. Hands = Händer (= Happens) The hands = Händerna
No, it's actually fairly easy to learn for an English speaking person, as there are lot of very similar basic words as well as many similarities in the grammar at the basic level.
Totally depends on where you are coming from and what language you speak natively. If you come from an already Germanic speaking country, its not gonna be that difficult. Same if you come from for example Japan, then you just have to learn the alphabet but we both have a "melody" when we speak so its easier. If you come from Middle east its going to be harder because its not the same alphabet and you dont have the same melody like language. And ofcourse grammatical stuff is going to be hard depending on where you come from aswell. If you are from Germany its going to be easier than their own language. But if you are American for example its going to be a little harder.
Look, no foreign language is easy to learn. But for an English speaker, Swedish is as easy as it gets, at least to learn basic vocabulary, grammar and syntax, much of which is the same or similar. Pronunciation is a different story. Your Swedish boyfriend/girlfriend will laugh at you.
One: Bord (Table) Two or more: Borden (Tables) Specific: Bordet (The table) One: Banan (Banana) Two or more: Bananerna (Bananas) Specific: Bananen (The Banana) The EN and ETT works for only specifics since two or more just get weird. "erna", "arna" etc ;D
I would say that for a native english speaker, swedish is a really easy language to learn, at least the words, the pronunciations is the only real problem.
lol i was playing battlefield 2 long time ago and typed to a guy in swedish and for some reason the word slut was in there and i got automaticly kicked from the game. To answer u if its hard to learn Swedish, i dont think learning basic Swedish to be understood and also understand what people say, but to pass a Swedish language test im not sure most Swedes would.
The -en/-et thing is because of a bad language unification. One part of the country used -en, the other -et. In the unified version they chose both 50/50 at random. No way to know except noun by noun memorization.
The part about Fart = Speed and the Smell (Smäll) = Impact is totally true! You should also check out "Svenska för nybörjare" (Swedish for beginners) from the show "Hipp Hipp", it's a real comedy classic here.
I totally agree! Hipp Hipp is hilarious!!
Hipp Hipp is kind of like the Swedish counterpart of ”Little Britain”
"It's not the fart that kills, it's the smäll."
Fart = speed. Smäll = crash/impact/slap/sound of explosion
4:39
(Just wanted to clarify) 😅
A classic confusion occurred when some Swedish stores had a shop sale. Sale is “rea” in Swedish. Traditionally, at the end of the sale, stores put “slutrea” on their signs, which is translated to “final sale”. Some stores started using the English word “sale” instead of “rea”. This sometimes led to awkward signs when store owners with poor English knowledge stated using the English word “sale” together with the Swedish word for final; slut. A minor shock for some English speaking tourists when there were signs with “SLUT SALE” were on display in the shop windows.
😂😂😂
In Danish we also have "slut" = end / final etc.
For instance "slut-spurt" for the "final sprint" in a race, but also used in connection with "sales".
"Slut sale" is too funny a word. 😂
🤣
Hahaha I’m Swedish and this is true 😂😂
The Numbers of Word in Swedish with different meaning is what makes the stand up comedy here amazing 😂
Not really, that's more Göteborg-jokes... ;)
@@herrbonk3635 Framstjiertlaborg jokes! ;)
@@herrbonk3635 words like hans,val,bot,tunna,sko,hinna,van,springa,sår,snor,bar,kast,sex,lotta,håll,bi,hög,mm,mm,mm… is not typical for Gothenburg
As a swede, I love these videos. Both yours and the Swedish lesson ones 😂
1:34 No, Swedish is not really a difficult language to learn, especially not for a British person!
Because the two languages are very closely related and pretty similar in both syntax and vocabulary.
But *all* languages demand a lot of work to master...
Yeah, you can at the very least make yourself understood by just translating word for word from one language to the other, even though you'll be grammatically way off.
I've had some friends from the UK try to learn Swedish, though and they found it difficult... yet a friend from the US didn't really have any problem so I guess it's down to the individual. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
It's in the top easiest for English speakers to learn together with Dutch and Norwegian.
So basically very easy.
@@hnorrstrom Easy to learn but hard to master. Of all the English and American people I know or heard speaking, not a single one got rid of their accent. Not even after decades speaking Swedish.
@@herrbonk3635In deed you are right. I have heard some Germans that were almost impossible to spot, but it's very hard to truly master Swedish for sure.
I can't understand how he missed the swedish word for End Station. When approaching the end stations in a train, they announce SlutStation
I find it great how you interest yourself in Swedish humor. I'm from Gothenburg, a city with a strong Scottish heritage in its industrial history.
And yeah, everything is 100 % true. Swedish language: many need to know situations.
It's funny how many words from the English language are found in Swedish too, but they mean something entirely different. For example, the words kiss and pink both are more childlike ways of saying urin (which is the same in both languages, though the pronunciation varies). That means that a Swedish child would be very confused when their parents says they're going to a concert to watch Pink and Kiss. Another example is the word gift. It has two meanings, married or poison. Two very different words, even though I've heard some people say that they are pretty much the same. Married and slowly being poisoned.
"Gift" in the marriage sense also existed in Old English - for instance "gift-hus" = a wedding house / chappel ( i.e. a place where the bride is "given" away by her family ).
Another interesting related OE word that still exist as close cognates in the modern Scandinavian languages is
"brydhlop" = "wedding".
S bröllop, D & N bryllup
And some familiar Germanic words in Old English have simply been lost over time.
For instance "hropan" = "to shout"
S ropa [roa-pA], N råpe, D råbe [roa-be]
Thank you for correction of "S ropa" 😉
But Swedish does have however have "kyss" [sh'ue's] for "kiss".
D & N kys ( with a k-sound! )
Kiss buys pink sheet
@@Bjowolf2 S ropa = shout/call.
@@magnusnilsson9792 Yes, my mistake, sorry 🙄
Yeah, we just don't know why. There are rules, but we have so many exceptions to the rules that the rules are kind of arbitrary and most of us don't know them.
All he said is true. Impact is smäll for example. So he is really good, and funny.
Agree 100%
Swedish Guy here. Over all the video is factual correct. A study I saw indicate that almost 80% of English words come from Scandinavian languages, thanks to the vikings😊 there are million example...when spelling is very different but original word is Scandinavian. Ie daughter = dotter. Window = vindue means the ey of the wind. Light came in and smoke when out in the viking houses. But this is in Norwegian and Danish. In Swedish we took the German word for window= fester that became Fönster. Between Norwegian and swedish, as same with Danish, just a few hundreds words that differs but it is easier for Swedish to understand Norwegian compare to Danish and vice versa. By the way, we ha 4 genus in the Scandinavian languages Feminin, Maskulina, Reale and neutrum😊
Danish is much more similar to Swedish than Norwegian in text. But we can't her what they say at all so that's why we find Norwegian easier even if they have a lot more different words.
Yes, the "-en" and "-et" postfix for the definite article are genera that nouns have, similar to femininum and masculinum, but separate from that. We used to have femininum and masculinum, as well, but it has disappeared from the language.
I'm not sure, but I suspect the reason is that putting "-en" at the end of some words implies that it's plural, so if you want to say it in singular you have to put"-et" instead. [EDIT: The video did mention this, later.]
For example, "bord" (table) in definite article is "bordet", because if you say " borden" it means "the tables", plural.
But this is only true for T-genus words, not N-genus words.
There are also a very few specific nouns where you can use either genera, it doesn't matter. "Apelsin" (the fruit "orange") can be either "apelsinen" or "apelsinet".
There is no hard rule for whether a noun is N-genus or T-genus, but there are a few "rules of thumb":
N-genus are commonly the living things and nouns ending in a wovel.
T-genus are commonly objects, concepts, and nouns ending with a consonant.
If you're guessing, I'd bet on whether the word ends in a consonant or wovel.
And yes, Swedish is indeed one of the harder languages to learn. Not as hard as some, but on the harder side, statistically.
They measure this by how early children become fluent in their native language. The later this happens the harder we consider the language to be to learn.
Femininum and masculinum were during Middle Ages transformed into reale / utrum ( the n-type) . There still exists neutrum ( t-type). Appox 75% of the words are n-type, but don´t look for rules. Still better than German with 3 types.
I used to teach Swedish to adult immigrants and the answer to the question if there are any rules to how to conjugate substantives, verbs and adjectives...yes!
When a word is for example: Bord > Bordet you can look at the word previous to it, "ett bord" = "A table" and when you mean the table specifically "The Table" you can use the "ett" and create "Bordet", this also works for example: "En banan" = "A banana", and its specifics becomes "Bananen" = "The banana", So En Banan, Bananen, Ett Bord, Bordet, this was told to me by an immigrant friend when he was learning Swedish, the teacher he had told him this really great tip to learning the grammar
Sure, but you still have to memorise for each noun if it’s en or ett.
I think the hardest thing for english speakers learning swedish is the pronounciation of certain sounds that you don't have. ÅÄÖ are certainly new letters for you but you probably use the sounds to some variation. The real test is the pronounciation of the sj- sound like in sju (seven) and sk- sound. In the word sjuksköterska (nurse) you get both as a bonus.
For example in British English you say "Paul" and "Or", that au and o sound is the Swedish Å. The ai sound in "Fair" is like our Ä. You can find the Ö in a word like "bird", or "her".
I've heard more difficulties with the Swedish Y and R and that there's a mix-up with A and Å and Ä, same with mixing up O and Ö. So they throw in a lot more Å, Ä and Ö than they need to like "Ja, jag gjörde det" insted of "Ja, jag gjorde det".
The sj-sound doesn't have to be difficult. It's pronounced different depending on where in Sweden you are anyway so you can choose wichever way that is easier for you.
Swedish are among the easiest languages for an English speaker to learn. Pronunciations however might be a tad tricky.
The gender thing in Sweden is from my understanding the hardest to master, since there is no real rule about it. The only thing though is that the definite article and the indefinite article correlates. So in Swedish we have two different forms for one (or "a"); 'en' or 'ett'. So if you know that the indefinite article for, say, 'A glass' is 'ETT glas', then you can know that 'THE glass' is 'glasET'. And to take the other "one" for example: If you know that 'A dog' is 'EN hund', then you can derive that 'THE dog' is 'hundEN'.
This. The most commonly stated rule is that living things use "en", while non-living things use "ett", but there are so many exceptions to this rule it's gone way past being not even funny and reached outright hilarious.
Basically as a learner of the Swedish language, you simply have to learn the indefinite articles noun by noun, because there is no trick that's infallible.
According to the American Foreign Service Institute's (FSI) language difficulty ranking, Swedish is one of the easiest languages to learn (24-30 weeks or 600-750 class hours).
Coming from german it seems we have a lot of common ground. Like the whale thing - its exactly the same in german: Wal, Wahl, Wahl for whale, choice, election. And they all sound the same, too. Or the swedish Slut for end, is Schluß in german.
Unfortunatly it is also just as complicated as german when it comes to the "the" usage, or the plural form. "You just have to know it" is not really a helpful advice for learning a language. But its just the same with the gender words - der, die, das - in german. Why a tree is male, and a lamp is female nobody can explain - you just have to know it. :)
We have had influences over time from both german and french. But the word windows is funny, in swedish we took the german fenster and now call it fönster. But old swedish name was vindöga that we exported to english in window.
Another awesome Grotesco-product is "1 kg mjöl". Can't find any video with english subs, but I think you'll "get it" anyway
I remember teaching my kids grammar when they where in school, they kept asking me why we bent the words they way we do, and all I could answer them was "- I don't really know why, we just do" Simply put, there is no real reason to swedish grammar, it's just odd and weird because it's an old norse language mixed with german and english :D
Actually, English is the language that are mixed with Norse, not the other way around (like egg, window, husband, die etc). We have something called borrowed words from English, but there are a Swedish word for the same thing.
The words for steals, soul and reason are also kind of similar. Steals - stjäl, soul - själ, reason - skäl. Sounds very familiar for most and in many cases exactly the same. Depends a bit on witch dialect you have.
So "han stjäl en själ utan skäl" is "he steals a soul for no reason".
Although reason have to swedish words, skäl and anledning. If you want to hear it pronounced type it in google translate. Choose from swedish to english and then type the swedish line as I wrote it. Otherwise google translate will choose anledning instead och skäl.
As a Swede my teachers growing up said ”you feel if it’s wrong you just have to learn how to feel when it’s wrong” I have dyslexia too so school was hell😂
4:45 Yes its true, "smell" is also the same pronunciation as "smäll" which means Impact
It’s The pronunciation that’s the most difficult since Swedish is a “singing language “ (don’t remember the correct label), just like Estonian and some few other languages around the world.
aaahahaha this one is but hillarious and actually kinda brilliant.
Dont miss out on part 2 and 3
Funny guy. Making learning Swedish more receptacle.
English and swedish are much closer than english speakers generally get the impression of. Vast amounts of words are pretty much the same or very similar. What makes it difficult for many are the vowel sounds and the stress, or just pronounciation in general. One thing that is easier though is where you have: am, are and is - we have only "är". Grammer is a bit different though.
Please react to “De Arbetslösa”.
It’s comedic social commentary
Lol I have to show this to my dutch friend who moved to Sweden recently and is learning swedish haha
The ET and EN at the the end have no rules, you just have to know which is which it’s kinda funny
-en (en) and -et (ett) are probably without discernable rules in order to spot foreigners 😂👀
As a native english speaker you would find the grammar very similar, and as for vocabulary a lot in common. The only real struggle will be mastering pronunciation. It's very likely you'd never sound like a native. That's okay though, that's not necessarily a goald you need to aspire to.
Smäll can also mean the loud sound from for example an explosion. Or giving someone a slap/punch.
Swede here, hated grammar in school, never got it, I know how make a sentence but don't ask me about why it is the way it is.
Don't worry. Finnish grammar rules are even worse
@@orangeeeeeee so if I ever want to right a horror story for people with dyslexia there is a obvious subject🤔
oh it just occured to me, i was watching another reaction u did about things Sweden have influenced onto the world and now it hit me that english is full of old Swedish words from viking times.
To speak Swedish so well that a native Swede will think you grew up in Sweden is hard, but to speak Swedish well enough that we understand you, is pretty easy :3
That's because our language is confusing as feck
I failed "Swedish B" when i was in school, but most of our grammar solvers itself beforehand the age of 10
The word for marriage is the same word for poison in Swedish. Gift
Pretty funny
Swedish is a very hard language to master, due to all the irregular verbs, false friends (when two words look very similar but means two very different things) etc. This is why automatic translation suck when Swedish is involved (if I use it, I often translate it into English instead). When Amazon opened in Sweden, they used an automatic translation program with hilarious results like "Earings for European whores" and the colour brown were translated to "Poo".
And don't get me started on the adpositions. Like if you have gone to IKEA, in Swedish you say "I'm on top of IKEA" even if you aren't standing on the buildings roof.
"I'm on top of IKEA"? Which Swede says that?
@@Vinterfridjag är PÅ ikea
@@Vinterfrid "Jag är på IKEA"
"Jag är på Ica"
You mean "uPOn" = "på" [poa], but sometimes "på" translates to "in" in English.
"Upon", not "On top of"
Swedish is harder to learn in some ways, but easier in others. If you come across a new Swedish word, you're almost guaranteed to know how it's pronounced if you know the rules. But with English you have to memorize the pronunciation of every single word, because there are no rules
True. English is a mix of all kinds of European languages. That's why the words have such poor grammar consistency.
What are you on about? The English language has strict rules for pronunciation just like any other language. There are always exceptions to the rules and loanwords that are different. But no rules? Give me a break.
@@sharatainx3990 Dude, this isn't a personal attack on your language. It's just a simple fact that English is wildly inconsistent. Name any English word, and I can give you a valid alternate pronunciation. That simply isn't a thing in Swedish.
No language has STRICT rules for pronunciation by the way, but the "rules" of English are wrong more times than they are right. Like "I Before E Except After C."
The syllable "su" has 17 different pronunciations in English (that you indeed have to just memorize). Swedish has 2. And you know instantly which one to use depending on the following letters
@@sopastar How is this a matter of attacking a language? Are you projecting your own feelings? I'm simply pointing out that you were wrong in your claim that you have to memorise the pronunciation of EVERY word in English because there are NO rules. You have to memorise the exceptions like in any other language. As I wrote in my previous comment there are always exceptions. I never said that the amount of exceptions are the same for every language. I never claimed that English can't be a jungle to navigate at times. So yes, when I say the rules are strict that doesn't mean there are no exceptions. About 75% of the words in English do follow basic rules. Only around 4-5% of words are truly irregular. All the others might not follow basic rules but they still follow patterns and still have limited possibilities of how they can be pronounced. This leads me to another of your claims. "the "rules" of English are wrong more times than they are right". When did 4% or even 25% become larger than 75%? Or as you claim 100%? This is the problem with your claim, and that's all I commented on.
Swedish example of inconsistent pronunciation is for example "kex" and "lakrits".
How do you know how to correctly pronounce words like banan, kort, bete if you know the rules but you've never heard the words before? Can they not be mistaken and pronounced in multiple ways?
@@sharatainx3990 Idk, mate. You didn't simply point it out. You were being a dick about it, and I gave you the benefit of the doubt that maybe you were only emotional. I'm sorry I was wrong.
The statistics you bring up are mainly about the spelling of prefixes and plurals when you already know how a word is pronounced. You can't apply something unrelated to my statement and have me defend it.
You seem to have a non-standard definition of "strict" and I suspect some of the confusion stems from there. English does indeed have common patterns that you can learn, which grants you the chance to make educated guesses. That isn't what rules are at all, let alone "strict".
"Kex" and "lakrits" have regional differences which are both correct. The others are examples of the few exceptions I acknowledge in my first post. My point is that Swedish pronunciation is easily acquired by learning the basic rules, as opposed to English.
Let me demonstrate what it's like for a beginner learning Swedish and English with these "new" words: biend, twear, laip, bei, thi, loing, supe, yre, tata.
You can only make qualified guesses how to pronounce these in English, and that's if you have encountered many similar words before. The basic rules of Swedish enable you to say these words with confidence immediately, without having to suss out silent letters and vowels having wildly different sounds, etc.
The bottom line is I can give a complete beginner a text to read aloud in Swedish, and they will be coherent if I only teach them the sounds of the letters. Yes, there are a few exceptions which you do bring up, but English is impossible to just read. You have to have lots of experience, and in the end, there's still a high chance of guessing wrong.
Basicly we have two word for what the english have for saying a infront of a thing, like a chair = En Stol, words that have an A end with EN like stolEN and the other word infront of a word is ETT, like he said its ETT bord so it ends BordET. Then some words like a bridge is EN Bro but just becomes Bron as in that bridge.
I dont know if I can explain it better. In english you have A and AN depending if it start with a Consonant or Vowel, but have exceptions.
One simple way to know if it is ET or EN at the end is to know how it is specified in "Bestämd form singularis"
_Ett_ bord (one table)
Det bordET (That table)
_En_ arm (one arm)
Den armEN (that arm)
You also noticed it in the whay to determine the thing D _et_ and D _en_ (D _et_ bordET, D _en_ armEN )
Well, except Piano...
Ett Piano (one piano)
Det pianoT (That piano)
Yeah, it's gendered. We mostly have two active genuses in Swedish, in modern grammar T-gender and N-gender. In some odd cases we also have Feminin and Masculine gender. We used to have five genders: Neuter, Utrum, Real, Feminine and Masculine. Swedish also more or less is a tonal language, making it sound sing-songy.
I had many coworkers asking about why the apple and the orange is called "äpplet" and "apelsinen"; and not "äpplet" and "apelsinet" or "äpplenen" and "apelsinen". Still have no idea!
a little quick tip for pronouncing Å and Ä you can think of the beginning of the song Pompeii with Bastille. The beginning of the song is pretty much.
Ä Ä Å Ä Å
Ä Ä Å Ä Å
And then you have "the roof is on fire" Bööörn mother f...
he was 5/5, rly nailed it
Hello!
Thanks for your posts!
Try “Danish language”. It’s Norwegians making fun of Danish language but here in Sweden we love making fun of our neighbours!😅
Another fun swedish session is mastering swedish by slay radio. I think there is 5 episodes. Though there is no video since its a radio show
I really like your way of reacting to us stupid swedes ;-)). I actually haven't thought so much before on how inconsequent our language is. Must be a nightmare for anyone who wants to learn... Anyway - like your approach and it's always a treat to watch!
Maybe someone already replied to this but the endings of a noun is decided if the noun is a "en" or "ett" word. In english that wound be a a "a" or "an" word. If you are not sure, choose "en" since around 70% of the swedish nouns are "en". And I am a certified SFI-teacher, you can trust me ;)
My favourite thing in the world is listening to people trying to pronounce å ä and ö lol-
Åw Äw and UWGH
I love this video.
Always depends on what your native language is in terms of how hard a language is to learn, but I'd say Swedish is on a medium level a lot of the time. But coming from English it's pretty easy, since they are closely related, a lot of stuff came from the same place and we also took a lot of English in to Swedish.
Yes, we don't do censorship on TV or anything almost. I hate how that happens in the US and it's soooo bloody silly! Especially when it's not for kids anyway! It's insulting. But we don't get the censored stuff on TV here anyway. I used to watch Hell's Kitchen on TV but then when I "got it" online cause I wanted to see it earlier it was censored and I was like wth is this crap!? Swearing is no big deal here and just a normal part of language.
Slut doesnt rally mean the end, just end, but in the movie context it would be the end. The end would be slutet.
Smäll is like bang.
No, no rule for en- and ett-words, the only way to know except just learning it per word is if you know how to say one (noun), because those are connected and almost the same. ETT bord, EN hand, bordET, handEN. Just two t with the first "one". And then vise versa.
Regarding Å, Ä, Ö. As a Swede, I will hävda that you already have this sounds in your language, and use them all the time, every day.
Ö = Sounds like A in _A_ pen, _A_ dog, etc, or U in the name Urkel (Ööörkel)
Å = O in mOre (mÅÅÅre) , gOre (gÅÅÅre)
Ä = HE in There (Thääär) is actually DÄR in Swedish, sounding almost the same.
But pls notice that this is the way most Swedish speaking people have been thought to pronounce these words, so "ta det med en nypa salt" 😄😉
Lots of Swenglish here. But as for the " ö" -sound: if you know French , think of the vowel in " deux "
@@paulingvar
I have no education experience in the French language, but if *Deux* is equal to _Two_ I agree with you, from the preferences I have in french pronunciation...
(Un, dö, trä, katrä, sä, sis, nöff as far as I know 😄)
@@grotgrusson5124 That's it!
Apparently there are rules to reale and neutrum (en/ett) in Swedish that you learn when you study the language but no Swedish person would be able to tell you those rules and there are a lot of exceptions to them.
The good news is that a britt can pretty much use English broken gramar and still be understood AND you can mix in a bit of English in to your Swedish of course 😄. So its a language where you early can learn by doing... Also its probably why Swedes in general have a easy time speaking English.
There are no rules for the endings of the words, you just have to know it for every word and I just know it because it sounds right. lol
There are grammar rules and most of them are quite logical, so it is by all means possible to learn Swedish grammar. It is fun!
You actually did very well !
6.45 yes it´s something people just know
You should watch "grotesco - liverlellie". It's a 3 minute sketch in English by Grotesco, uploaded here on TH-cam. A parody of Jane Austen-esque British movies/series.
He's not wrong. We also put En or Ett in front of the words. Ett Äpple (An apple), En apelsin (an orange). But English has rules. Does the word start with a wovel, you use an. If not, a. WE HAVE NO RULES. We know because "it sounds right". That make it a little difficult. :D
Also you have, ...borden.../ things you aught to do but have'nt gotten to yet 😁
Regardless, I think you learn a lot through humor and ambiguous words.
A lot of context depending words in the Swedish language, so that doesn't make it any easier.
Then we have:
fart =speed
smäll=bang/slam were "smäll" is almost pronounced like the English word smell.
So the to the Swinglish frase:
[It is not the "fart" that kills, but the "smäll"]
Which is only funny for a Swede that knows a bit of English.
En/ett are quite similar to genders in other languages, there are some guidelines but it's fairly random. I'd think plural would be the most confusing, perhaps in combination with en/ett.
Eg, House=Hus, The house=Huset, the Houses=Husen; while Chair=Stol, The Chair=Stolen, and the Chairs=Stolarna.
The good thing is that many words are pretty similar, but there are some false friends
More than one hand , in Swedish = Händer
But that also mean …’happening” … 🙉
The most common reason for T or N at the of a word in swedish is plural or singular. N being plural.
Indoeuropean languages have three genders, masculine, feminine and neuter. Some languages have (often quite recently, say the last 500-1000 years or so) simplified this scheme. In English they have all become one, in Swedish, Danish, Norwegian and Dutch, masculine and feminine have merged to become one gender, while neuter is still its own. Do note that the definite article is replaced by an addition to the end of the noun, but apart from exceptions (of which I can't bring to mind any) it's just a choice between the two. This means that you have to learn the gender with the noun, which is also the case in any other Indoeuropean language I know of, except for English. Definite articles seem to be a new invention in some western Indoeuropean languages, but is not in general a feature of the whole group of languages. In Swedish, Danish and Norwegian, they are appended to the end of the word. This is also the case in Romanian: "tapirul" means "the tapir" in Romanian, to use an example I often have been asked about.
Clarification: There definitely are just two genders in (standard) Swedish. In the merged masculine/feminine gender you append "-en" to the noun in lieu of a definite article, and in neuter you append "-et". It's the last statement that I can imagine there are some exceptions to (though I can't think of any), but all nouns belong to one of the mentioned genders for all other purposes.
Buy C chair 10 = bajs i stjärten (= poop in the butt)
I buy pink sheet = aj baj, pink, skit (ouch, poop, pee, shit)
Swedish is one of the hardest too learn.
As a swede ”benet” ”handen” I don’t know Why they are diffrent. It just ”sounds good”😂
I am a swede and as far as I know, the "en" and "et" has no specific rules at all, we basically just use what sounds the best and laugh when people get it wrong.
Yes. the different endings is grammatical gender, but both "genders" are neutral. The N-gender is old norse male and female combined in a single category, and the T-gender is what was already the third neutral gender in old norse. But that doesn't mean that there is any logic to what noun is considered belonging to which category. So you really need to know for every noun. Although if you don't know and have to guess, go with -en because it's more common. As for how difficult swedish is: Think of it as similar grammar to german but easier. And it's fairly closely related to english so it shouldn't be too difficult.
Swediah is quite difficult I hear but English can be complicated for us Sweish as well. The a or an gets me everytime.
Never two "vokaler" After each other, that's when you break it with an. Try say a apple and an apple. Which flows better when spoken... I might be wrong but I also use an for a few other words as well just because it flows better in speech. But sometimes I might say "a uniform" just because it flows better and "an umbrella".
Yeah, I've heard that Swedish is one of the most difficult languages to learn, especially if you're also learning a dialect like skånska or something.
A lot of the grammar is just learned by speaking whilst we grow up, so it's all just natural.
Honestly, the grammar lessons we had in school kinda messed me up a bit because of how much just didn't make sense to me 😅 Like, over all it's kinda logical, but there are so many exceptions to the rules and stuff so when you're actually trying to learn all the different grammatic terms and stuff, I just found it kinda confusing even though it's so incredibly obvious when you're actually using the language. It's just not something you even think about, things just are the way they are you know? So I can definitely imagine it being incredibly confusing and hard to learn when you've grown up with a language that isn't grammatically similar.
You could check out Björn Gustafssons song to Carina Berg at melodifestivalen. Really funny.
Handen= this hand
Benet= the leg
People learning swedish has said that it *is* really difficult because, like he said, you kind of just have to know.
Some swedish grammar literally DON'T have any rules to them. So I could see why that would be hard to learn.
As always, swedes rules.
Had to learn Swedish in school. Swedish grammar is very logical and easy to learn. English grammar was (and is) mess.
No, Swedish is actually a fairly easy language for an English speaking person to learn, since there are a lot of very similar basic words compared with English - and the grammar is not that difficult either.
And it even has some deep similarities with English grammar - same word order at the basic level (or very nearly), no grammatical cases for nouns and their articles ( except for the simple s-genitive ), same conjugations of verbs for ALL grammatical persons ( English is nearly there 😉), similar ways of forming tenses, many parallel strong verbs and NO "backwards" sentences, unlike in German 🙄
( the same things apply to the closely related Danish & Norwegian languages btw. ).
In Denmark we even have a town called "Middelfart" 😂 - and a village called Horreby 🙄
And there are even light signs in our lifts saying "I [ee*] fart" = "In motion / speed" - i.e. "moving" 😂
"fart" is related to your English word "fare", which makes it more sensible, I hope?
D & N + S even have the verb "fare" [fA-re] / fara [fA(w)-rA] = "to fare" btw.
i disagree, our grammar is very different, hence to why you cant translate most sentences without rephrasing
@@ReptilezDzn At the basic level, I said.
It's one of the reasons that English is fairly easy for Scandinavians to learn - unlike the dreaded Gernan with its complicated grammar.
It's as if we already "know" half of it in advance and just need to fill in the gaps so to speak.
our grammar is similar to german.@@Bjowolf2
@@ReptilezDzn Not really, only some bits - it's far more similar to that of English 😉
alright, im still pretty sure you are wrong, since swedish is a language that is germanic@@Bjowolf2
Yup, the "en" or "et" for "the" in english is completely random; there's no consistent rule for it (without going into a lot of language history).
there are two super easy words in Swedish if you just learn the letters Å and Ö.
Å= creek or fleet (small river)
Ö= island
An English man and a Swedish man were talking. English: A dog.
Swedish: What?
English: The dog.
English: Two dogs.
Swedish: Okay. We have: En hund, hunden, Två hundar, hundarna.
German: Wait, I wan't to try it too!
English: No, go away.
Swedish: No one invited you.
German: Der Hund.
English: I said go away....
German: Ein Hund, zwei Hunde.
Swedish: Stop it!
German: Den Hund, einen Hund, dem Hund, einem Hund, des Hundes, eines Hundes, den Hunden, der Hunden.
Finnish: Sup.
English: NO.
Swedish: NO.
German: NO. Finn, you go away!!
Finnish: Koira, koiran, koiraa, koiran again, koirassa, koirasta, koiraan, koiralla, koiralta, koiralle, koirana, koiraksi, koiratta, koirineen, koirin.
German: WHAT?
Swedish: You must be kidding us!
English: This must be a joke... v Finnish: Aaaand... koirasi, koirani, koiransa, koiramme, koiranne, koiraani, koiraasi, koiraansa, koiraamme, koiraanne, koirassani, koirassasi, koirassansa, koirassamme, koirassanne, koirastani, koirastasi, koirastansa, koirastamme, koirastanne, koirallani, koirallasi, koirallansa, koirallamme, koirallanne, koiranani, koiranasi, koiranansa, koiranamme, koirananne, koirakseni, koiraksesi, koiraksensa, koiraksemme, koiraksenne, koirattani, koirattasi, koirattansa, koirattamme, koirattanne, koirineni, koirinesi, koirinensa, koirinemme, koirinenne.
English: Those are words for a dog???
Finnish: Wait! I didn't stop yet. There is still: koirakaan, koirankaan, koiraakaan, koirassakaan, koirastakaan, koiraankaan, koirallakaan, koiraltakaan, koirallekaan, koiranakaan, koiraksikaan, koirattakaan, koirineenkaan, koirinkaan, koirako, koiranko, koiraako, koirassako, koirastako, koiraanko, koirallako, koiraltako, koiralleko, koiranako, koiraksiko, koirattako, koirineenko, koirinko, koirasikaan, koiranikaan, koiransakaan, koirammekaan, koirannekaan, koiraanikaan, koiraasikaan, koiraansakaan, koiraammekaan, koiraannekaan, koirassanikaan, koirassasikaan, koirassansakaan, koirassammekaan, koirassannekaan, koirastanikaan, koirastasikaan, koirastansakaan, koirastammekaan, koirastannekaan, koirallanikaan, koirallasikaan, koirallansakaan, koirallammekaan, koirallannekaan, koirananikaan, koiranasikaan, koiranansakaan, koiranammekaan, koiranannekaan, koiraksenikaan, koiraksesikaan, koiraksensakaan, koiraksemmekaan, koiraksennekaan, koirattanikaan, koirattasikaan, koirattansakaan, koirattammekaan, koirattannekaan, koirinenikaan, koirinesikaan, koirinensakaan, koirinemmekaan, koirinennekaan, koirasiko, koiraniko, koiransako, koirammeko, koiranneko, koiraaniko, koiraasiko, koiraansako, koiraammeko, koiraanneko, koirassaniko, koirassasiko, koirassansako, koirassammeko, koirassanneko, koirastaniko, koirastasiko, koirastansako, koirastammeko, koirastanneko, koirallaniko, koirallasiko, koirallansako, koirallammeko, koirallanneko, koirananiko, koiranasiko, koiranansako, koiranammeko, koirananneko, koirakseniko, koiraksesiko, koiraksensako, koiraksemmeko, koiraksenneko, koirattaniko, koirattasiko, koirattansako, koirattammeko, koirattanneko, koirineniko, koirinesiko, koirinensako, koirinemmeko, koirinenneko, koirasikaanko, koiranikaanko, koiransakaanko, koirammekaanko, koirannekaanko, koiraanikaanko, koiraasikaanko, koiraansakaanko, koiraammekaanko, koiraannekaanko, koirassanikaanko, koirassasikaanko, koirassansakaanko, koirassammekaanko, koirassannekaanko, koirastanikaanko, koirastasikaanko, koirastansakaanko, koirastammekaanko, koirastannekaanko, koirallanikaanko, koirallasikaanko, koirallansakaanko, koirallammekaanko, koirallannekaanko, koirananikaanko, koiranasikaanko, koiranansakaanko, koiranammekaanko, koiranannekaanko, koiraksenikaanko, koiraksesikaanko, koiraksensakaanko, koiraksemmekaanko, koiraksennekaanko, koirattanikaanko, koirattasikaanko, koirattansakaanko, koirattammekaanko, koirattannekaanko, koirinenikaanko, koirinesikaanko, koirinensakaanko, koirinemmekaanko, koirinennekaanko, koirasikokaan, koiranikokaan, koiransakokaan, koirammekokaan, koirannekokaan, koiraanikokaan, koiraasikokaan, koiraansakokaan, koiraammekokaan, koiraannekokaan, koirassanikokaan, koirassasikokaan, koirassansakokaan, koirassammekokaan, koirassannekokaan, koirastanikokaan, koirastasikokaan, koirastansakokaan, koirastammekokaan, koirastannekokaan, koirallanikokaan, koirallasikokaan, koirallansakokaan, koirallammekokaan, koirallannekokaan, koirananikokaan, koiranasikokaan, koiranansakokaan, koiranammekokaan, koiranannekokaan, koiraksenikokaan, koiraksesikokaan, koiraksensakokaan, koiraksemmekokaan, koiraksennekokaan, koirattanikokaan, koirattasikokaan, koirattansakokaan, koirattammekokaan, koirattannekokaan, koirinenikokaan, koirinesikokaan, koirinensakokaan, koirinemmekokaan, koirinennekokaan.
English:
Swedish:
German:
Finnish: Aaand now the plural forms!
Crikey!
Swedish is extremely easy to learn since its roughly the same structure as english.
Tje different endings (en or et), you can kind of compare to (a or an) so its a table and an office.
That's is swedish in a nutshell xD it's hard if u don't come from Sweden :)
Need to look at Johan Glans. So funny if you can find it with text.
The definite article in Swedish is from an old era before Swedish was a thing, that's a remnant of Old Norse.
M -inn , F -in , N -it, And they're all derived from the word hinn(meaning the other or that). And it's declensions is what's caused the definite article suffixes to look and behave so weirdly.
Nom. Hinn, Hin, Hitt.
Acc. Hinn, Hina, Hitt
Dat. Hinum, Hinni, Hinu
Gen. Hins, Hinar, Hins
and now for the Plurals...
Nom. Hinir, Hinar, Hin
Acc. Hina, Hinar, Hin
Dat. Hinum, Hinum, Hinum the easy one to remember...
Gen. Hinna, Hinna, Hinna...
Cherry picking the irregularities in any language and make a video about it without linguistic context and you’re gonna have a fun time! 😝
This is interesting. Since im Swedish. I have never ever thought about this EN ET and which is which. But i know for sure. But no. I cant tell someone which is which. Haha. Explains why people moving here get it messed up on a regular bases. So know I learned something to. Cool !!!!
Btw. I like your videos alot lately so good work i like them and i Will hitta that sub button :)❤
He keeps translating the English indefinite plural to the Swedish plural with the definite article, though.
Hands = Händer (= Happens)
The hands = Händerna
Hm... I'm a bit inquisitive when you wonder about our endings, definite form singular. Is it weirder (grammatically) than any other language?
im pretty sure swedish is one of the hardest languages any nonnative thats decent at it impresses me i probably wouldnt be able to learn from scratch.
Back in the day I learnt Swedish in 2 months. Swedish is imo the easiest language to learn.
No, it's actually fairly easy to learn for an English speaking person, as there are lot of very similar basic words as well as many similarities in the grammar at the basic level.
Totally depends on where you are coming from and what language you speak natively. If you come from an already Germanic speaking country, its not gonna be that difficult. Same if you come from for example Japan, then you just have to learn the alphabet but we both have a "melody" when we speak so its easier.
If you come from Middle east its going to be harder because its not the same alphabet and you dont have the same melody like language.
And ofcourse grammatical stuff is going to be hard depending on where you come from aswell. If you are from Germany its going to be easier than their own language. But if you are American for example its going to be a little harder.
Look, no foreign language is easy to learn. But for an English speaker, Swedish is as easy as it gets, at least to learn basic vocabulary, grammar and syntax, much of which is the same or similar. Pronunciation is a different story. Your Swedish boyfriend/girlfriend will laugh at you.
Swedish is somewhat easy to learn but difficult to master, i would say
One: Bord (Table)
Two or more: Borden (Tables)
Specific: Bordet (The table)
One: Banan (Banana)
Two or more: Bananerna (Bananas)
Specific: Bananen (The Banana)
The EN and ETT works for only specifics since two or more just get weird. "erna", "arna" etc ;D
I would say that for a native english speaker, swedish is a really easy language to learn, at least the words, the pronunciations is the only real problem.
lol i was playing battlefield 2 long time ago and typed to a guy in swedish and for some reason the word slut was in there and i got automaticly kicked from the game. To answer u if its hard to learn Swedish, i dont think learning basic Swedish to be understood and also understand what people say, but to pass a Swedish language test im not sure most Swedes would.
The -en/-et thing is because of a bad language unification. One part of the country used -en, the other -et. In the unified version they chose both 50/50 at random. No way to know except noun by noun memorization.