Tag Archives: Vocabulary
Swedish News on President Biden’s Inauguration Posted by Chelsea B on Jan 22, 2021
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…
Hot Topic: Mellandagsrea and Corona Posted by Chelsea B on Dec 29, 2020
Welcome to “the between days!” Mellandagarna refers to the days between the Christmas and New Year’s holidays. Children are home on school break, employees enjoy some much needed respite, and Swedish retailers offer end of the year sales. In a typical year, the streets are bustling with shoppers taking advantage of sales. This week, we’ll…
Building Particle Verbs with Gå Posted by Chelsea B on Dec 11, 2020
Verbs start out as just one word like in the example “Speak.” But when they add a particle “Speak” + “up” = “Speak up” the meaning changes completely. The short words that help transform regular old verbs into particle verbs, or phrasal verbs, are common prepositions or adverbs – so you’ll recognize them! Words like…
The Swedish Kitchen Series: Cozy Friday Posted by Chelsea B on Nov 12, 2020
Fredagsmys literally means “Friday cozy.” This Swedish concept is about treating yourself after a long week. Oddly enough, it was made famous by a marketing campaign for chips. This week on the blog, we’ll pull from a resource called Det svenska köket and dig into the fredagsmys concept. Svenska institutet’s Det Svenska köket från fika…
Swedish Idioms Round Two, Go to Hekla and Fox Sleep Posted by Chelsea B on Oct 29, 2020
Last week, I wrote about some common idioms that you’re bound to hear in every day Swedish. In doing research for that post, I discovered some rather obscure ones too. I’ll share some of those in this post as well as share the origin stories behind a couple of classic idioms. Nu kör vi! Let’s…
Let’s Vote! Election Vocabulary på svenska Posted by Chelsea B on Oct 16, 2020
‘Tis the Season…for holiday Cheer? No, not quite. Why it’s the season for the American Election of course. Whether you’re “celebrating” or not, we are inundated with the latest polling numbers, debates, headlines, etc. The American Election, especially with a presidential race on the ballot, is covered in world news quite closely, especially in Sweden…
Transforming Words with Swedish Suffix -het Posted by Chelsea B on Sep 24, 2020
Ärlighet, öppenhet, verklighet… Honesty, openness, reality. These dynamic words are made possible by the Swedish suffix -het. Its English equivalents are -ty, -ity, and -ness, making it a noun-forming suffix. The three-letter addition of -het transforms simple adjectives into big-concept nouns. Words ending in -het are excellent additions to your intermediate and advanced vocabulary…