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Norwegian Pronouns – it’s personal Posted by on Apr 15, 2016 in Uncategorized

Not exactly Norwegian, but I thought it was a perfect fit for the text. :-) (Photo courtesy of Dave Bleasdale at Flickr, CC License.)

Not exactly Norwegian, but I thought it was a perfect fit for the text. 🙂 (Photo courtesy of Dave Bleasdale at Flickr, CC License.)

Nothing speeds up communication like a good pronoun! 🙂 Instead of having to repeat a personal name umpteen times, it’s really great that once everybody agrees on a topic, ”you” can manage with a short ”I” or ”she”. At first glance, Norwegian pronomen look a lot like the English ones:

Jeg venter på trikken. (I’m waiting for the tram.)

Unnskyld, du mistet noe! (Excuse me, you lost something!)

Hun tenker mye. (She thinks a lot.)

Han har aldri tid. (He never has time.)

Vi bor i Molde. (We live in Molde.)

De besøker ofte Ålesund. (They often visit Ålesund.)

Then of couse, Norwegian’s got a special plural you (”thou and thou”):

Hva synes dere om Norge? (What do you guys think about Norway?)

The language has also got two different ways of saying ”it” – depending on whether the thing referred to is neuter (an ”et noun) or masculine/feminine (an ”en”/”ei” noun):

Har du sett veska mi? Den er svart med sølvstriper. Have you seen my bag? It’s black with silver stripes.

Har du sett passet mitt? Det er fra USA. (Have you seen my passport? It’s from the U.S.)

When ”it” is referring to something other than a noun – like a phrase or a situation – only det is used:

Jeg hater at det er så mye krig i verden. Det gjør meg så deppa! (I hate that there’s so much war in the world. It makes me so depressed!)

I think the greatest difficulty for English-speakers comes with the ”me” forms of pronouns (accusative/dative/reflexive, if you speak grammar!)

Du ser meg, og jeg ser deg. (You see me, and I see you.)

Kjeder dere dere? (Are you guys bored? – Literally: Do you guys bore yourselves?)

Nei, vi kjeder oss aldri! (No, we’re never bored! – ”We never bore ourselves.”)

Jeg ringer når jeg finner den/det. (I’ll give you a call when I find it!)

Hun ser ham, og han ser henne. (She sees him, and he sees her.)

Hun ser seg i speilet. (She sees herself in the mirror.)

Seg points back to either han, hun or de, and can be translated as ”herself”, ”himself”, ”themselves”. But this is where you need to be careful! 🙂 Because if you drop the phrase

Hun ser henne i speilet

it means that she sees someone else in the mirror, like her friend standing nearby! This is a Norwegian oddity which will become even more tricky in the next post, where we’ll look at possessive pronouns! 🙂

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About the Author: Bjørn A. Bojesen

I was born in Denmark, but spent large parts of my childhood and study years in Norway. I later returned to Denmark, where I finished my MA in Scandinavian Studies. Having relatives in Sweden as well, I feel very Scandinavian! I enjoy reading and travelling, and sharing stories with you! You’re always welcome to share your thoughts with me and the other readers.


Comments:

  1. renate:

    I grew up in Niebuell, near the Danish border.
    I took 3 years of Danish in school, had good grades and spoke it very well,much better than English, which I took for 6 years, did not like it, had boring teachers, and bad grades.
    (My Danish teacher was my favorite teacher, plus his son was my first crush.)
    1955 I went to America. After 2 yrs. in the suburb Los Angeles, we became very good friends with a Norwegian couple from Stavanger. When we did not know an English word, she would say it in Norwegian, I in German. 90% of the time we figured it out. After 8 yrs. they went back to Norway and I had no one to speak Danish to any more.

    Sadly, over the years my Danish went bye bye too. I don’t think I could understand when people speak anymore, so I enjoy trying to read and decipher the Norwegian Blog. Since I speak “low-German” too, it works.

    I too enjoy reading and traveling. Since retiring we have taken 18 cruises all over the world.

    • Bjørn A. Bojesen:

      @renate Hei renate,
      thank you for your comment. Yes, German and Norwegian have a lot in common! Since you also learnt Danish, chances are high you’ll be able to speak Norwegian if you really want to and keep learning. (There are many cruises going to the fiords in western Norway, BTW, but you maybe already know this…) I’m happy you enjoy the blog. That means a lot! 🙂