Learning Swedish - How I Went About It
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 5 ก.พ. 2025
- Learning Swedish? Check out LingQ's free Swedish grammar guide: www.lingq.com/...
I will do these videos in the order of the requests. French to follow, then Spanish, Russian and Italian.
Timelines:
0:15 My Swedish background.
3:55 Sources I used for learning Swedish.
6:08 My gaps in Swedish.
7:01 People enjoy speaking their native tongue to you.
7:37 A few gourmet things I enjoy about Sweden.
Learn a language at: www.lingq.com
Visit my blog: blog.thelinguis...
A Swedish Canadian this man must be the nicest person in the world.
Hey Steve. I have been watching many of your videos lately. I am 70 years old, and have recently been teaching myself Swedish. My plan is to soon spend some quality time in Sweden, with the hope of spending a good part of each year there. So with that in mind, and the culture that appeals to me, I'm motivated to learn the language. Not to mention the fact that it will be a useful language to learn, even though most Swedes speak English. Keep up the good work. You're approach is the best I've seen on TH-cam, in my opinion.
Thanks for posting this video, your passion is contagious. :)
It's true C;
Loved this Steve! Currently trying to learn Swedish from the ground up, and this has provided me with some good goals and motivation. Thanks!
I'm Swedish and trying to learn German as my third language. I just found your channel and you're a real inspiration! Languages haven't really been an interest of mine until recently, but it's so facinating, I just want to learn more and more! It's interesting to watch these videos and get to know how you've managed to learn all these languages. Good luck with your Swedish, you're doing well!
Thanks.
How’d it go
@@idkwhattonamemyself1730 it went well! This channel or it's language course hasn't been my main way of learning, but I speak decent German now. Actually in Germany on holiday visiting my girlfriend right now lol :)
@@StratovariusFTW fantastiskt hahaha. De är la grammatiken som är svårast med tyskan xD
Yes I relearned it, as the video here explains.
@fvo911 Well I was born there, but my parents were from Czechoslovakia and moved there in 1939 and then we moved on to Canada in 1951. I do love going to Sweden though and feel a sense of attachment to the country where I was born, a country which accepted my parents at a very difficult time for them.
Thank you, Steve . . . My maternal granny - mormor - had 100% Svenska DNA as both her parents were born i Sverige and immigrated to the U S about 1900 . . . when she would visit us for about one week/year she would drop some Svenska phrases, like, "Jag alska dig," the memories of which I treasure to this day. In fact, at age 74 I am embarking on a self-study course in Svenska and my goal is to sit for the standardized European exam in the language when I reach a high enough proficiency leve. . . . Keep up the good work, Adjo . . .
Good for you Steve. So nice that people outside Sweden wants to learn our tiny language. A fun thing - you actually kinda speak like Herman when you speak Swedish.
I love listening to his audio books.
Steve Kaufmann - lingosteve You should watch his old tv-show "Hermans Historia" if havnt. :)
I wish I had more time!!
Men det låter bra, eller hur? Jag började lära mig svenska på grund av en kvinna, men jag älskar fortfarande språket ändå! Svenska liknar inget annat språk.
@koolibrii Just for the sake of all, I will answer in English. I think this is a personal choice. My uncle in Sweden spoke Swedish with his son, and a mixture of Swedish and German with his wife who was from Germany, but over the years, more and more Swedish. When we immigrate we basically abandon our original identity and take on a new one, or at least that is how I see it.
@Superworldblock In declining order of proficiency I would say English, Cantonese, Japanese, Mandarin, French, Spanish and Portuguese. The latter three are not really all that fluent but she kind of knows what people are saying and can contribute. In the first four she is strong.
@LearningFrenchNow Of course, we speak often in both English and Swedish and when I am there with his kids around the table it is all in Swedish.
Very interesting! Bra jobbat, herr Kaufmann! Your situation about the Swedish language is quite similar to mine regarding Russian. I'm half Swedish, from my father''s side, and half Russia, from my mother's side, and I was born here in Sweden, so, naturally, I speak Swedish very good. I spoke good Russian in the beginning, too, but sometime in my early childhood, I lost the language and my mother started talking to me in Swedish. Sadly enough, that was what happened. However, at the age of 12 or 13, after I had started learning German and got into language learning and linguistics for real, I started learning Russian via the Internet and I and mum gradually switched from Swedish to Russian. Two years later - here I am! I got a C in Russian last year (we have a subject called hemspråk here) and now I'm going to Russian classes with some kids at my age who were born in other Russian speaking countries (Belarus, Kazakhstan, Ukraine etc.) and am compared side by side with real native speakers of Russian. Isn't that just splendid? :D
I started picking up my ancestral language by choice at a relatively young age, but not everyone has that opportunity. Your story shows that it's never to late to learn a new language. Thank you very much for sharing, mr. Kaufmann! Tack så jättemycket!
fram = forward
tid = time
framtid = future
Be mindful of those spaces they make all the difference.
A large amount of swedish language words consists of two parent words combined into one. Most of the time this makes sense to a swede. Fun fact is you can make your own combinations and jokes come out the other bend.
Great video!
It has been 40 years or so. I listened to the Izu Dancers by Kawabata Yasunari, and a history of the Showa Era from NHK. There is a much wider selection available today.
I enjoyed your stories about your experiences in Sweden, a great land full of magnificent people.
I plan on learning Swedish for when I hopefully attend university there :). No doubt you have helped a lot just my getting my love for History involved to! Learning languages is difficult for me so this could be just what I need to give me that helping push xD
Matthew North I'm moving back for University, I don't know why I'm here.
Matthew North did you?
How’d it go?
Hej! Coolt att du kunde lära dig svenska igen!
Han är ju riktigt mätkig
Very interesting. I'm Swedish and I love when there are interactions between Sweden and other countries/people of any kind.
@tias90 I don't even think about it. I have no idea if I use it correctly and nobody has ever commented on it.
I thought you looked rather Scandinavian, because you remind me of my partner's Grandfather, who is actually Norwegian. I am glad to see that you speak Swedish, more people should learn Scandinavian languages in my opinion.
Yeah, considering English came from those languages in part, but popular languages like Japanese, Chinese, Spanish, French are more used cause they control more trade, ig that's how it works, not an expert xD
I wanna learn a lot of languages.....And i mean....ALOT but then i realized i can't do that in theory cause it would take way to dam long, so just learn a bit of everything and it'll eventually come together
He's not Scandinavian he's ethnically Jewish.
He was actually "born in Sweden in 1945 to Czechoslovakian parents who immigrated there" according to his book.
medium.com/@gentryalex13/my-favorite-language-learners-series-steve-kaufmann-founder-of-lingq-44962e68b643
Another excerpt from the article: "he spoke Swedish before English and came back to Swedish gradually resurrecting his Swedish at various points in his life".
agreed
My parents were not Swedish, they were Czech.
Canadian, just Canadian. My wife is half-Costa Rican and half-Chinese, and all of us, including sons and grandchildren are just Canadian.
You'd love Hermans Historia. I've never watched it but it is a Swedish-language history series.
very interesting, steve. I look forward to see the next videos in this series. keep it up.
@Neuroneos I will add it to the list.
Yes
Varför inte försöka LingQ?
It depends on how you think of yourself. With each generation people are more mixd in their ancestry. More and more people just identify as Canadian.
the last thing he sed "with every language you learn it brings so much with it, so many things you can enjoy" the only thing i can think about japanese and speaking it fluently OMG that is my biggest wish and dream!!!
What a good video. You gave me some good ideas. Excellent. I enjoyed the whole thing and will watch more.
Your life story is very interesting. Language learning was always a part of it, it seems.
I’m so inspired by your passion Steve....it’s very motivating and confidence inducing.
You’ve completely sold LingQ to me!....I’ve watched several of your videos now including LA ENTREVISTA CON GORDON Y CYNTHIA EN LIGHTSPEED SPANISH Y TAMBIEN ESPAÑOL CON VINCENTE
LingQ COULD BE THE NEXT STEP FOR ME I THINK 🤔
I’m definitely going to try out the LingQ Premium for six months to improve my B2 Spanish and maybe, as I’m half Danish but don’t know very much Danish, I’m going to check out the Danish beginner’s Beta option too. I might even try to improve my ‘schoolboy” French and have a stab at Italian and Portuguese as well.
But first I need to keep working on my B2 Spanish and endeavour to improve that.
Thanks Steve.
Good luck! Let me know if you have any questions?
This guy speaks so many languages lol.
yeah, hes a polyglot.
ja.
@roedgroedudenfloede Yes, that was my first reaction and we should really rely on our instincts, but then I though why would the title be from the Ice Age to the future. Thanks.
@qzchris Don't scare yourself and do a lot of listening and noticing.
Such a nice video Steve! :) and it's such a shame that your website is not free anymore, it was very useful
My respect to your work and knowledge,Mr.Kaufman
@Sugaku496 I would begin by visiting LingQ where both languages are offered, and links to other resources can be found.
First of all, I love your videos, sir! I understand your swedish very well, but how well do you understand norwegian? Would you even bother learning it, or do you consider your swedish sufficient to communicate "in norwegian". I personally wouldn't have any problem understanding you, but how do you feel about norwegian yourself? Maybe a video about this?
This is so worth stressing, the way to learn languages - or for that matter other stuff - by using two or more kinds of input of information about the thing to learn. I actually learnt how to use the computer program of Photoshop by a similar technique.
I had a book, an instructional video and finally also a tutorial version of the program itself. These three different ways of getting the basics was a superb way of learning it. I got very well versed in how to use Photoshop in almost no time!
Thanks for share with us your experiences learning foreign languages is motivating.
So you 're swedish!! Cool
Very interesting video. I speak Norwegian so I can understand a lot of Swedish. By the way, you are correct. "Framtid" means future. It's almost the same in Norwegian, where the word is "Fremtid". Very nice video series. I have a question for you, Steve. Are there any languages that you would really love to learn that you haven't ever done before?
@barkatthemoon6 Yes, that was my first reaction and we should really rely on our instincts, but then I though why would the title be from the Ice Age to the future. Thanks.
Your Swedish is fine,You seam to have had an adventures life . It is nice to hear that someone from your continent knows more about Sweden than just the standard things about cold, dark and polarbears on the streets or getting us mixed up with the Switzerland.
I would hate to be attacked by a Swiss polar bear. That's why I don't intend to visit Sweden any time soon.
I have learned dutch and my first language is English and I cant wait to start a new language with a fresh start! here I come Sweden!
So it's bin 6 years since you said that.. you know how to speak swedish now? 🤪
Your swedish pronunciation is really good
Herman Lindqvist really is a Swedish legend in writing i must say!
And his audio books.
I understand the term but I have no experience with this phenomenon and therefore can't do a video on it.
I doubt if the term refers to people who lose a language at age 5.
Cuanto lo envidio, verdaderamente pienso que aprender varios idiomas es un don, yo estoy estudiando sueco y es realmente difícil para mi, se muy poquito inglés, será porque casi no hablo más estudio y cuando leo es más fácil pero cuando lo escucho casi no entiendo, es muy frustrante, como usted dijo en un video los tímidos esperan hablar bien para recién atreverse a hablar con extraños, usted es una maravilla lo felicito 😊
Steve - big fan of your videos, they provide great motivation. I'm kind of more interested in why you would learn Swedish (or any of the less 'useful' languages? (please excuse the implied lazy tone of that question...I'm genuinely curious). I know you have numerous languages under your belt at this stage. Will enough ever be enough? Or do you just get more curious of the next language, the more you learn? (I could ask you a thousand questions, but I will leave it there for now!!)
I was born in Sweden, moved to Canada when I was 5 and forgot my Swedish but I have relatives there. I also did a lot wood business in Sweden over the years. My parents were from Czechoslovakia, thus the interest in Czech. all languages are interesting, as well as the histories of those countries, and they are all connected.
What a wonderful story. I just bought a 70 acres farm ( which is relatively big with our standards ) near Avesta city in Sweden. I joined LRF Farmer's National Union and every 4 th day or so I recieve their magazines Farmland and ForestLand.
This is so boring for most people but since I can earn lots of money with a traditional wood burned in the basement I suddenly find Forestry Interesting as well.
well well...
The "less useful" languages are not less useful if you live there, or if you have an interest in the language and culture, or if you want to go and study, or work there, or have a friend or boy/girl friend who comes from there, or ... or ... or ...
Steve, I know you do not like poetry. But the Nobel Prize in 2011 was won by a Swede, Tomas Transtromer, who is one of the greatest poets in the world. Recommended. I want to learn Swedish just to be able to read him in the original.
Yes, and I will go back go him to refresh my Swedish.
Mycket intressant med en liten djupare diskussion om svenskan så här :)
Studera grammatik,läs och prata så mycket du kan! Lycka till
Great video - I'm learning Danish, which is similar, yet while I tend to watch films and read books, I hadn't thought of audiobooks! You're absolutely right that it's better to read texts which deal with one's hobby - I tend to read books on soccer or music, rather than (say) fashion or hockey! By the way, "fremtid" is Danish for "future", so I'm guessing it's the same in Swedish.
@BLOCKEDbyPOM Yes I do, good sleuthing. My parents were lucky to get out.
I'm learning Swedish too, and have been for the past two years or so. I think it's wonderful being able to listen to Swedes speak Swedish. Supposedly I'm "duktig på svenska", but I still make many mistakes! Even though they're often minor grammar mistakes.. What would you say about being able to become nearly fluent in a language even if you don't live in the country in which it's spoken?
When I was younger I used to listen to Herman Lindqvist talking about Swedish kings and queens. My last name is Lindqvist too btw.
You should go about learning Norwegian
0:55 same but from kazakhstan to germany :D (i also was 5 when i moved) i am 19 now and still speak russian though
You could try to speak with swedish people on the internet (ofc in swedish), that would improve your swedish a lot or any language you learn by speaking it.
Hello, Steve.
I have the fortunate chance to travel to Finland later this year. Being a language learner myself, I was wondering if it would be possible for you to do a video on Swedish and Finnish resources such as dictionaries, phrasebooks etc, if time permits of course.
If I have missed a video which outlines this request, could you link me to it?
Thanks,
Steven
Interesting videos. Keep them coming.
I have a question for you lingosteve, it is also something I would like to know about other polyglots. In which language do you think? also in which language do you dream? Sorry weird question, but It's something I want to know. I'm thinking you think in the language(s) you are best at. In your case probably English. But can you also think and have dreams in Japanese, French, Chinese, or Spanish?
Yes, "framtid" means "future". "Fram" = "farward" ; "tid" = "time" (fram+tid = farward+time = future).
I quote the languages that you know, relatively well: " English, Swedish, Russian, Japanese, Korean, Italian, French, Czech, German, Italian, Chinese ". Correct me if I am wrong on one or more of these languages, but that would make you a hyper-polyglot or Undecilinguist, if I am right about the definition of Hyperpolyglot - knows 11 languages decently fluently. I also studied Avarsky/аварский язык, but can't find any courses in English in this Language, only in Russian, and I am not really fluent in Russian enough in order to study Avarsky/аварский язык Grammar in Russian. I am very intrigued by Avarsky, but I think it is because I had a past life in S.W. Dagestan probably before my life in Russia. I do like Avarsky songs. Link for Avarsky Songs: th-cam.com/play/PLfqEoBNvFTlP9H7i2g1OAwnvIWOKNpLBk.html I am very slow with learning languages, and the fact that I desire to learn so many means that I can't learn one language very well.
So, you're called Анастасия Юревна and you're not really fluent in Russian enough? Весьма интересно.
I had Swedish Grandfathers (I live in Canada) and believe me, you have a slight Swedish/Maritime Provinces accent....
Just a lot of listening, and then try to get it. It takes a lot of exposure.
You are such an inspiration! I myself way born in Germany and lived there up until the age of four and then moved away and have completely forgotten my german. Considering what you have experienced, would you say that the fact that you once did speak Swedish did it help with picking up the language? Did you uncover any Swedish that you thought you had forgotten but was still there? I am hoping to pick up German again and just wanted to hear about your experience. Thank you in advance!
Have you read any Peter Englund? You should if you like history.
Love your pronounciation of Swedish by the way, it's great.
Does anyone know what the woman is singing about in this short Swedish music video below:
John Peel's Sporten Är Död - John Peel
It's some weird amateur punk band recording from 1981 (_The sport is dead_), nothing to be concerned about :)
I had a friend who came from America to live with his Swedish dad, we were friends for 6 years before he went back to America and he knew nothing when he came, and he was fluent and not much accent when he left.
Even on Microsoft Word they correct och to ock, but u can use it either way, as och most common one or ock
Hey there Steve, great channel, good balance of personality and content! I'm teaching myself Swedish - with English, Dutch and some German as background, all's plain sailing except the prosody / pitch accent / tones. What's the secret?? Is there one? Do you know it? Can you help? I can't get the hang of it, especially teaching myself, with no contact with Swedes. Many thanks, Jason, Cape Town
@qzchris I KNOW! they don't explain which words have which tones, sometimes i see stuff about how many syllables are in the word but its basically a crap shoot. Im not even sure if there are no rules and that its completely random... if you find something that helps with those please let me know haha.
Hi Steve. Can you do a video on first language attrition (i.e. when a person starts losing their mother tongue).
Framtid means future, if you were still wondering.
So, what is your Swedish like now? Have you decided to 'relearn' it or not?
I also love Aquavit! Too bad I can't get it in either Ontario or Quebec. I have to ask my relatives in the US to get it for me. I became addicted to Aquavit when I lived in Minneapolis - I lived 5 blocks away from American Swedish Institute. To change the topic a little bit: Do you think mastering the Chinese tone help you with the Swedish / Scandinavian pitch accent? They sound very similar to my ears. Oh and my profile pic is taken in Uppsala!
The best way to learn swedish is to learn it from a finnish person speaking swedish (that is, someone speaking finlands-svenska) because that dialect, or variation of swedish, is pronunced like it is spelled, and not with a lot of letters being rushed through or not spoken at all like we swedes do. And it is a lovely dialect.
(And yes, Herman grew up on the swedish embassy in Helsinki so he speaks in kind of a finnish way)
Jonas Bobjörk I've noticed that Swedish-speaking Finns pronounce the 'sj' sound as 'sh', not with that strange sound that charaterizes the Swedish language, anyway, I'd like to learn Swedish no matter the dialect, because I like it, and also because I wanna learn Finnish, so, knowing these two languages, I could visit Finland knowing its two official languages, and even though I know that Finland has a Finnish-speaking majority, knowing the two official languages is kind of a dream to me.
Are there words that you feel are "intuitive" from when you were
I would love to hear your Portuguese experience.
How did you deal with learning 'en' and 'ett'? It's just as hard as 'un' and 'une' in French, isn't it?
Ofc, primarily most Swedes spells it 'och' i guess, i do aswell but i have never heard any swedish teacher say that to spell it ock is incorrect, I know a few ppl that spells it ock, and in fact on microsoft word it even corrects u if u spell it och to ock and i personally have used the word ock several times in some of my articles and the teachers have never deined it..so
This is fascinating!
In that case, u can only blame my teachers, ive handed in lots of essays, but they have never told me that the word ock is miss spelled and should be an och instead so..i guess both works
I have seen the word ock in old Swedish texts, but then I think is (was) another word for also.
How do you keep motivated to read complicated books about history e.g. in another language?
I wanted to read Karlsson på taket, it is a children book so it is not that difficult as history books I think, but still I have to look up about 20 vocabularies per page, so in whole I would maybe need to look up 3000 words to be able to understand this book.
This is frustrating because it just takes too much time and I cannot remember these words right away, so it feels like I am not doing much process.
I think a problem of my method is that I am often too picky, I write all the vocabularies into an excel table and then I as well aways look for the gender of nouns, the different tenses of verbs.
How do you approach to understand difficult texts? Do you look up all the missing words in a dictionary or are there some more effective ways?
I start with easier texts, designed for beginners. I use LingQ. I don't use children's books.
Hey Steve, can I find that book "Historien of Sverige" in the Internet?
Mycket intressant video. Kan inte tänka mig hur svårt det måste vara att ha bott i ett land i fem år och precis börjat prata för att sedan flytta till ett helt annat land med annat språk och allt.
I actually thought you were Swedish when I first heard you speak English.
You kind of has this "famous" Swedish-English accent.
Ofc:), u can say them both, although the sentence ' Jag har varit och studerat Svenska' is more like a recent happening for example if someone says : What's up? U could reply 'Jag har varit och studerat Svenska if thats what uve been doing:) So that sentence is a previous activity that has occurred recently. Jag har varit i Sverige och studerat Svenska i ett år you r litterally telling someone that i have been to sweden and studied swedish for a year now
I have a question! Can you even say jag har varit och studerat Svenska? I mean that sounds a little strange, maybe he means: jag har varit i Sverige, och studerat Svenska i ett år nu? ( Also I thought you have to ease ''i'') Please correct me if I'm wrong.
Kul att du lär dig svenska! framtid = future
But wouldn't you have experienced it though if you said your first language was Swedish?
Anyways, thanks for the videos. I have learnt some useful things about language learning from your channel and all the best, from Australia:)
Yea, it was a little dumb maybe to write ock but it is actually practically the same word as och many ppl use it so.