Tag Archives: Grammar
What do you usually, often, never do in Swedish? Posted by Chelsea B on Nov 19, 2019
Last week’s blog post was all about how helping verbs describe what we “can, need, must, may” do. In this post, we’ll discuss the Swedish word brukar, or “usually”, which also functions as a helping verb. This verb comes in handy when talking about your daily routine, what you usually do in your free…
Vikings, Verbs, and Very Old Swedish Posted by Marcus Cederström on Sep 23, 2016
“De gingo i land och kommo genast i strid med ställets innebyggare, som bodde tätt här” [They went ashore and immediately came in conflict with the inhabitants, who lived close together here], writes Frans G. Bengtsson in his novel Röde Orm about a Viking named Red Serpent. But what’s the deal with those weird verb…
A Swedish jingle for grammar Posted by Tibor on Jul 25, 2016
There is often a confusion when it comes to Part of Speech & Clauses. Clauses: Subject, Predicate, Sentence Adverb, Verb2 or several depending on the length and aspect of the sentence sometimes, Object/Predicative, Adverbials (time and adverbial of place or degree etc.). The clauses can contain several part of speech words sometimes for example: on…
Building Compound Words in Swedish Posted by Marcus Cederström on Jul 18, 2016
Compound words, known as sammansatta ord in Swedish, can be incredibly difficult for new learners of a language. The words can get long (like the longest word in the Swedish language) or they can just look confusing. What does örngott mean? Making it even more difficult is that there aren’t too many rules to guide…
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…