Posts under "Grammar"

The Days of the Week in Swedish

Posted by Marcus Cederström 2 Comments
Nov 28 2011

I was reading through some of our older posts here and realized it had been quite some time since we got down to some of the basics. The days of the week. And the months.

Luckily for you, Tibor did an amazing job of explaining the Time Adverbs with certain tenses. It’s a great way of explain what you did yesterday, what you’re doing today, and what you plan to do tomorrow. Of course, you might want to know exactly how to say the days of the week you plan on doing something.

They’re pretty straightforward. In fact, you’ll notice quite a few similarities between the English words and the Swedish words. So, without further ado, the days of the week:

måndag = Monday
tisdag = Tuesday
onsdag = Wednesday
torsdag = Thursday
fredag = Friday
lördag = Saturday
söndag = Sunday

You’ll notice I started with måndag when listing the days of the week. I did that on purpose. When listing the days of the week in Sweden, people star with måndag and work their way down to söndag.

You’ll also notice within the sentence that I did not capitalize the word måndag. That’s because you don’t capitalize days of the week or months of the year in Swedish. While this might not have any bearing on your ability to speak Swedish, it most definitely does on your ability to write in Swedish. Just something to keep in mind as you continue working on your Swedish production.

Now that we’ve got the weeks down, let’s work on the months of the year. Again, you’ll notice quite a few similarities between the Swedish words for each month and the English word for each month.

januari = January
februari = February
mars = March
april = April
maj = May
juni = June
juli = July
augusti = August
september = September
oktober = October
november = November
december = December

So there you have it. One of those things that sometimes gets neglected, but is incredibly important in your everyday life.  Plus, it’s super easy. And when learning a language, it really is important to get those little victories that remind you that you did learn something and that you are making progress.  If you find yourself struggling with your language skills, check out our post Swedish Language Learning Tips for a few more helpful hints.  As always, good luck!

Writing utensils in Swedish

Posted by Steve 1 Comment
Nov 25 2011

Sweden has just as many different types of writing utensils as any other country. And as in many languages (although certainly not all) there are different words for these different types of writing utensils. However, there is one main word used to refer to a writing utensil, and that is penna. Penna can mean either ‘pen’, ‘pencil’, or ‘marker’, to name a few, depending on the context.

If you are going to take a test and you’re told to use a ‘pencil’, then instead of saying blyertspenna in the following description of the test, the word is replaced with just penna. The same goes for bläckpenna, or what we know simply as ‘pen’—that is, an ink pen—if it is already understood that the speaker/writer means ‘pen’, then he or she may simply use the word penna in the following text. En markeringspenna is a ‘marker’, and this word can be used the same way.

In contrast to these scenarios, if there is no context, then you can assume that the speaker/writer means that you can use whatever type of writing utensil you will.

Here’s how you conjugate the word penna (here its translation will be simplified to ‘pen’):

en penna a/one pen
pennor pens
pennan the pen
pennorna the pens

Learning Swedish with Janne Lucas

Posted by Marcus Cederström 1 Comment
Nov 22 2011

I’ve written a couple of posts about Melodifestivalen here at Transparent, one titled (creatively enough) Melodifestivalen and the other (again, my creativity knows no bounds) Swedish Schlager. I am a shameless promoter of schlager music, whether it be Swedish, English, or German. I find the performances hilarious and the catchy songs even more so. It took a while to get used to, but by the time I left Sweden, I was hooked.

Of course, the challenge for me now, while living in the US, is trying to keep my love for schlager alive while also making it halfway useful to learning Swedish.  Luckily, old school Swedish schalger can do just that.

A friend of mine introduced me to this song after I mentioned that I was in search of a song that used the preteritum a lot.   She did not disappoint.

What I’ve done below is included the lyrics to the 1980 Melodifestivalen song Växeln Hallå by Janne Lucas. You’ll notice though that there are some holes in the text. I’ve removed several verbs in the preteritum (for a review of preteritum see the post Preteritum – the Swedish Past Tense). Watch the YouTube clip below, and try to fill in as many as you can. It’s a quick song at times, so I suggest you watch it a few times. Don’t be frustrated if you don’t nail them all the first time. Once you’ve done as best you can, check your answers below.

YouTube Preview Image

Växeln Hallå by Janne Lucas

Det _______ en kväll jag _______ ingenting för mig
Jag _______ till stadens hotell
Jag _______ i baren och där _______ hon framför mig
Wow, vad hon _______ sensationell

En liten blick, det _______ jag, sen _______ jag
Liksom i trans och _______ henne gå
Mitt hjärta _______, det ticka och ticka
Och där _______ du på rum tjugotvå

En telefon och jag _______ slå nummer nio
Och någon _______ då:

Växeln hallå, hallå, hallå
Växeln hallå, hallå
Fröken hallå, hallå, hallå
Koppla mig till tjugotvå
Det blir inget svar där, hon är inte kvar där
Ja, jag är ledsen, försök på nytt igen
Växeln hallå, hallå, hallå
Koppla mig till tjugotvå

Där _______ jag ensam på mitt rum och fundera
Tänk vad man kan hitta på
Som ni förstår så ville jag veta mera
Om henne på tjugotvå

Min telefon, den _______ jag, sen _______ jag
En nia till och vänta på svar
_______  det nåt fel? Det ringde och ringde
Sån tur att hon i växeln _______ kvar

Det spraka till och jag _______ höra en stämma
Och sedan _______ jag till svar:

Refräng

Växeln hallå, hallå, hallå
Växeln hallå, hallå
Fröken hallå, hallå, hallå
Koppla mig till tjugotvå
Växeln hallå, hallå

Check your answers here at LetsSingIt.com.

The current weather in Uppsala

Posted by Steve 1 Comment
Nov 18 2011

You can read all over the internet about the typical climate in Sweden and possibly even that in particular locations in Sweden. But today I’m going to give you something different: the current weather in Uppsala! What’s the point? Well, just imagine yourself in your favorite Swedish scenery with the following weather pattern for the day:

This morning: The sun rises at approximately 7:50. The temperature is below freezing: -4°C (25°F). The sky is cloudy, and the air relatively damp.

During the day: The sky is still grey, but the temperature has risen to about 5-6°C (37-39°F). The air is damper and the air pressure level decreases.

The evening: The sun sets at around 15:15 (3:15 pm), but yet the temperature still rises. At around 22:00 (10:00 pm) a downpour begins and continues through the night. No stars are to be seen, and the expected accumulation of rain adds up to 3-4 mm (0,12-0,16 in). Your shoes will be soaked tomorrow morning as you trudge through puddles in the streets.

If you would like a more statistical and less visual (or perhaps more visual, if you count the pictures) description of the weather in Uppsala/Sweden, check your favorite weather site or television channel—many are international and have weather reports from around the world. My personal favorite for Sweden is klart.se (which is where my statistics come from), but there are plenty more to choose from by searching the web!

As a side-note, the word väder (weather) is a neutral noun—in other words, it’s one of those nouns that end in -et (as opposed to -en). But it’s also part of a certain conjugation group. The definite form (‘the’-form) is not väderet, but vädret (‘the weather’). [As a rule of thumb, ett-words that end in -er are generally conjugated to -ret instead of -eret, such as väder becomes vädret and not väderet. The same rule applies for ett-words that end in -el, such as segel → seglet ('the sail'). Keep in mind that the ä and (first) e in väder and segel respectively remain long. Pronunciation of these letters is covered here: Vowels, Part 1 and Part 2.]

Time Adverbs with certain tenses

Posted by Tibor 4 Comments
Nov 16 2011
  • Yesterday

då (then)

i morse (this morning)

igår (yesterday)

i förrgår (the day before yesterday)

häromdagen (the other day)

förra veckan (last week)

förra månaden (last month)

i fjol/fjor (last year)

för….x år sedan ( x years ago)

*Use Swedish verb forms in Simple Past (preteritum aka. imperfekt)

I ate breakfast with her yesterday.

Jag åt frukost med henne igår.

I was in Spain last week.

Jag var i Spanien förra veckan.
  •  Today

nu (now)

 

i dag (today)

 

 

 

 

 

 

*Use Swedish verb forms in Present  Simple   past (presens)

They are drinking whisky at the moment.

De dricker whisky nu.

I like him.

Jag gillar honom.
  • Tomorrow

Sedan (later)

 

i morgon bitti (tomorrow morning)

 

i morgon (tomorrow)

 

i övermorgon (the
day after tomorrow)

 

*Use Swedish verb forms in Future Tenses and time adverb (Futurum and Presens + tidsadverbial)

She will talk to you soon.

Hon ska prata med dig snart.

I am flying tomorrow.

Jag flyger i morgon.
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