News of President Biden’s inauguration are dominating global huvudrubrikerna (headlines). Today on the blog, we will learn how Swedish news publications have covered the last two days of American history by looking at 4 Swedish online newspapers. 

Language teachers love telling you to read the news! Why? For starters, if you are reading about a global event, chances are you already know the context in your native language. The pressure’s off in understanding crucial points of the news story because you already know what happened. In turn, you are left with a great opportunity to grow your foreign language vocabulary. So, with that approach in mind, let’s get into some inauguration news! 

You will see screenshots from 4 different new sources below. Click on the links and find the original articles if you’d like to dig in more! I recommend having your favorite dictionary at the ready to look up words you don’t know. But, be sure to give yourself the chance to digest the material and build understanding first. Use the context to be your guide instead of looking up every single word you come across.

DAGENS NYHETER

Okay, let’s start with the most widely distributed newspaper in Sweden: Dagens nyheter. Not a surprising choice of photo, Biden is shown signing his first presidentordrar (presidential order). The headlines on this page are as follows:

De är Joe Bidens första beslut som president
Joe Biden’s First Presidential Orders.

“Det här är USA:s dag, det här är demokratins dag”
“This is America’s day, this is democracy’s day.”

AFTONBLADET

Next is Aftonbladet. This publication dominates Swedish online news, consistently ranking as one of the top 5 most visited websites in Sweden each day. The main news pages are free for readers to access. With that being said, I do find that Aftonbladet tends to favor juicier headlines…perhaps to earn them those extra reader clicks 😉 For instance, see the main headlines below:

JUST NU: Bidens varning till Vita husets personal
Just In: Biden’s Warning to White House Personel.

Snabba besluten: backar direkt från Trumps politik
Quick Decisions: backing quickly away from Trump’s policies

Tuffa uppgiften: att ena USA
Tough Tasks: to Unite the U.S.

Göteborgs-Posten

Göteborgs-Posten is published in Gothenburg and is the main news source for Sweden’s west coast region. I found these headlines to be a nice combination of the tone of the last two publications. The main events are covered, as well as a wee bit of drama. The headlines are:

Joe Biden har skrivit på Parisavtalet
Joe Biden har signed the Paris Agreement

Nu är det allvar för President Biden.
Now it’s serious for President Biden.

“Biden måste städa efter Trump.”
“Biden has to clean-up after Trump.

 

These articles are written for native Swedes, so the language level is best for B2-C2 level students. But, for you folks who aren’t quite there, there’s always 8sidor.se, which I adore as a teaching resource. In this article, you’ll see that the headline is only 3 words, very digestible, Bidens första beslut / “Biden’s First Decisions.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Alright, are you all caught up on the news? I challenge you to put it into practice! Use these headlines to summarize this news with your Swedish teacher and classmates!  …if you don’t have either of those at the moment, write to me in the comments 😄