Archive for 'Grammar'
How to Impress Your Swedish Friends: Abbreviate Your Clauses Posted by Marcus Cederström on Apr 28, 2014
As you get more and more comfortable with Swedish, you’ll start to notice that some of those pesky bisatser, or subordinate clauses, are being shortened by Swedish speakers. In Swedish, it’s called a satsförkortning. In English, it just means that you’re abbreviating the clause. For example: Han såg att hon sjöng. He saw that she…
Swedish with Steve Returns to Life Posted by Stephen Maconi on Mar 3, 2014
Hej, dear readers! On the 10th of June, 2011, I posted my last Swedish language video, a review of my series Swedish with Steve, here on the Transparent Swedish Blog. It was my final year of high school and I was planning a return back to Sweden to study Swedish at university level. My plans ended…
What an Ugly Baby! Exclaiming in Swedish Posted by Marcus Cederström on Feb 28, 2014
Admit it. You’ve been on Facebook and thought the exact same thing as everyone starts fawning over the newest addition to your world. It happens. Don’t be ashamed. But don’t say it out loud either. Unless you can say it in another language that the parents might not understand. Like Swedish. So let’s learn how…
Än or Ännu? Posted by Marcus Cederström on Feb 11, 2014
This is one of those questions that seems relatively simple, when should you use än and when should you use ännu? Or are they just the same word? Quick answer, when än acts as an adverb the two words can generally be considered synonyms and you can usually switch between the two, so feel free…
The Laid-Back Swedish Sentence – S-Passive! Posted by Marcus Cederström on Jan 30, 2014
We’ve written a bit about passive verbs here in the past (Where does the -s-passive come from?, Making active verbs passive in Swedish, Passive in Swedish), but it’s been a while, so I thought I would revisit the subject by focusing exclusively on the s-passive. First, the passive gets used quite a bit in newspaper…
That’s just the worst. In Swedish. Posted by Marcus Cederström on Jan 27, 2014
Are you struggling to complain about things in Swedish? Not sure how to say something is worse than something else? Or the worst even? It may be because there are actually two words for the English word, “worse.” Värre and sämre both, technically, mean “worse.” But there are some nuances that will help you learn exactly…
Particle Verbs Posted by Marcus Cederström on Nov 28, 2013
Particle verbs (or phrasal verbs) aren’t always easy. In fact, tacking on that particle, usually a preposition or adverb, at the end of a verb can really change the meaning of a word. We have them in English too: pick on, look after, make out. So how do you tell the difference? When speaking (and…