Swedish grammar

Swedish grammar is either the study of the grammar of the Swedish language, or the grammatical system itself of the Swedish language. Swedish is descended from Old Norse. Compared to its progenitor, Swedish grammar is much less characterized by inflection. Modern Swedish has two genders and no longer conjugates verbs based on person or number. Its nouns have lost the morphological distinction between nominative and accusative cases that denoted grammatical subject and object in Old Norse in favor of marking by word order. Swedish uses some inflection with nouns, adjectives, and verbs. It is generally a subject–verb–object (SVO) language with V2 word order.

Nouns Nouns have one of two grammatical genders: common () and neuter (), which determine their definite forms as well as the form of any adjectives and articles used to describe them. Noun gender is largely arbitrary and must be memorized; however, around three quarters of all Swedish nouns are common gender. Living beings are often common nouns, like in "a cat", "a horse", "a fly", etc. (see also Gender in Danish and Swedish).

Swedish once had three genders—masculine, feminine and neuter. Though the three-gender system is preserved in a number of dialects and traces of it still exist in certain expressions, masculine and feminine nouns have today merged into the common gender in the standard language. A remnant of the masculine gender can still be expressed in the singular definite form of adjectives according to natural gender (male humans), in the same way as personal pronouns, and , are chosen for representing nouns in contemporary Swedish (male/female human beings and optionally animals).

There is a small number of Swedish nouns that can be either common or neuter gender. The database for Svenska Akademiens ordlista 12 contained 324 such nouns.

There are traces of the former four-case system for nouns evidenced in that pronouns still have subject, object (based on the old accusative and dative form) and genitive forms. Nouns make no distinction between subject and object forms, and the genitive is formed by adding to the end of a word. This genitive functions more like a clitic than a proper case and is nearly identical to the possessive suffix used in English. Note, however, that in Swedish orthography this genitive is appended directly to the word and is not preceded by an apostrophe. This does not cause confusion as it would in English because Swedish does not use an "-s" suffix for plurals.

Swedish nouns are inflected for number and definiteness and can take a genitive suffix. They exhibit the following morpheme order:

{| class="wikitable" style="background:white;" |- | Noun stem | (Plural ending) | (Definite article) | (Genitive )

Plural forms Nouns form the plural in a variety of ways. It is customary to classify Swedish nouns into five declensions based on their plural indefinite endings: , , , , and no ending. Nouns of the first declension are all of the common gender (historically feminine). The majority of these nouns end in in the singular and replace it with in the plural. For example: ("a girl"), ("girls"). A few nouns of the first declension end in a consonant, such as: ("a wave"), ("waves"); ("a rose"), ("roses"). Nouns of the second declension are also of the common gender (historically masculine), with the exception of ("a finger"), ("fingers"). They all have the plural ending . Examples include: ("an arm"), ("arms"); ("a dog"), ("dogs"); ("a lake"), ("lakes"); ("a boy"), ("boys"); ("an illness"), ("illnesses"); ("a stranger"), ("strangers"). A few second declension nouns have irregular plural forms, for instance: ("an evening"), ("evenings"); ("a summer"), ("summers"); or ("a mother"), ("mothers"). The third declension includes both common and neuter nouns. The plural ending for nouns of this declension is or, for some nouns ending in a vowel, . For example: ("a park"), ("parks"); ("a museum"), ("museums", also loses the Latinate suffix ); ("a shoe"), ("shoes"); ("an enemy"), ("enemies"). Some third declension nouns modify or shorten their stem vowels due to umlaut in the plural: ("a hand"), ("hands"); ("a country"), ("countries"); ("a book"), ("books"); ("a nut"), ("nuts"). All nouns in the fourth declension are of the neuter gender and end in a vowel in the singular. Their plural ending is . For example: ("a bee"), ("bees"); ("an apple"), ("apples"). Two nouns in this declension have irregular plural forms: ("an eye"), ("eyes"); ("an ear"), ("ears"). Fifth declension nouns have no plural ending and they can be of common or neuter gender. Examples of these include: ("a child"), ("children"); ("an animal"), ("animals"); ("a teacher"), ("teachers"). Some fifth declension nouns show umlaut in the plural: ("a mouse"), ("mice"); ("a goose"), ("geese"); ("a man"), ("men").

Articles and definite forms The definite article in Swedish is mostly expressed by a suffix on the head noun, while the indefinite article is a separate word preceding the noun. This structure of the articles is shared by the Scandinavian languages. Articles differ in form depending on the gender and number of the noun.

The indefinite article, which is only used in the singular, is for common nouns, and for neuter nouns, e.g. ("a bottle"), ("a letter"). The definite article in the singular is generally the suffixes or for common nouns (e.g. "the bottle"), and or for neuter nouns (e.g. "the letter"). In most dialects, the final of the definite neuter suffix is silent. The definite article in the plural is for the first three declensions, for the fourth, and for the fifth: for example ("the bottles"), ("the bees"), ("the letters").

When an adjective or numeral is used in front of a noun with the definite article, an additional definite article is placed before the adjective(s). This additional definite article is for neuter nouns, for common nouns, and for plural nouns, e.g. ("the new bottle"), ("the new letter"), ("the five bottles"). A similar structure involving the same kind of circumfixing of the definite article around the words ("here") or ('there') is used to mean "this" and "that", e.g. ("this bottle"), ("that letter") as a demonstrative article.

The five declension classes may be named , , , , and null after their respective plural indefinite endings. Each noun has eight forms: singular/plural, definite/indefinite and caseless/genitive. The caseless form is sometimes referred to as nominative, even though it is used for grammatical objects as well as subjects.

Genitive The genitive is always formed by appending to the caseless form. In the second, third and fifth declensions words may end with /s/ (spelled -⟨s⟩, -⟨x⟩, or -⟨z⟩) in the caseless form. These words take no extra in genitive use: the genitive (indefinite) of ("house") is . The invisible genitive suffix may however optionally be represented with an apostrophe in writing: . Morpheme boundaries in some forms may be analyzed differently by some scholars.

The Swedish genitive is not considered a case by all scholars today, as the is usually put on the last word of the noun phrase even when that word is not the head noun, much like in English usage (e.g. , "the man standing over there's hat"). This use of as a clitic rather than a suffix has traditionally been regarded as ungrammatical, but is today dominant to the point where putting an on the head noun is considered old fashioned. The Swedish Language Council sanctions putting the ending after fixed, non-arbitrary phrases (e.g. , "the King of Denmark's cough drops"); but otherwise they recommend to reformulate in order to avoid the construction altogether.

Some dialects in southwestern Sweden have a so-called , which is mainly used with proper nouns.Gunlög Josefsson. "Sydvästsvensk a‑genitiv – en levande relikt?". Arkiv för nordisk filologi, volume 124, pages 187–235, 2009. For example, the plain around Lund is called "Lundaslätten".

Examples These examples cover all regular Swedish caseless noun forms.

First declension: (common gender)

Singular Plural Indefinite () (a) bottle bottles Definite the bottle the bottles

Second declension: (common gender)

Singular Plural Indefinite () a chair chairs Definite the chair the chairs Singular Plural Indefinite () (an) old man old men Definite the old man the old men

Third declension: , (mostly common gender nouns, some neuter nouns)

Singular Plural Indefinite () (a) thing things Definite the thing the things Singular Plural Indefinite () (a) pastry pastries Definite the pastry the pastries Singular Plural Indefinite () (a) political party political parties Definite the political party the political parties

The set of words taking only as a marker for plural is regarded as a declension of its own by some scholars. However, traditionally these have been regarded as a special version of the third declension.

Fourth declension: (neuter) This is when a neuter noun ends in a vowel.

Singular Plural Indefinite () (a) heart hearts Definite the heart the hearts

Fifth declension: unmarked plural (mostly neuter nouns ending in consonants and common gender nouns ending in certain derivational suffixes)

Singular Plural Indefinite () (a) horn horns Definite the horn the horns Singular Plural Indefinite () (a) baker bakers Definite the baker the bakers Singular Plural Indefinite () (an) Indian Indians Definite the Indian the Indians

Pronouns

Personal pronouns The Swedish personal-pronoun system is almost identical to that of English. Pronouns inflect for person, for number, and, in the third person singular, for gender. Swedish differs, inter alia, in having a separate third-person reflexive pronoun ("oneself"/"himself"/"herself"/"itself"/"themselves" – analogous to Latin and Slavic sę), and distinct 2nd-person singular forms ("thou") and ("you", formal/respectful), and their objective forms, which have all merged to you in English, while the third-person plurals are becoming merged in Swedish instead (see below the table). Some aspects of personal pronouns are simpler in Swedish: reflexive forms are not used for the first and second persons, although ("self") and // ("own") may be used for emphasis, and there are no absolute forms for the possessive.

The Swedish personal pronouns are: {| class="wikitable" |- !colspan="4"|Singular !colspan="4"|Plural |- align="center" ! Person ! Nominative ! Objective ! Possessive: com./neut./pl. ! Person ! Nominative ! Objective ! Possessive: com./neut./pl. |- align="center" ! 1st

| , , ! 1st

| , , |- align="center" ! 2nd (familiar)

| , , ! 2nd(plural or formal sing.)

| , , (honorific) |- align="center" ! 3rd masculine

|- align="center" ! 3rd reflexive | — | | , , ! 3rd reflexive | — | | , ,

Demonstrative, interrogative, and relative pronouns

, , : this, these (may qualify a noun in the definite form). Literally "the ... here". , , : that, those (may qualify a noun in the definite form). Literally "the ... there". , , , : this/these (may qualify a noun in the indefinite form). : as, that, which, who (strictly speaking, a subordinating conjunction rather than a pronoun, is used as an all-purpose relative pronoun whenever possible in Swedish). : who, whom (interrogative). , , : which, what, who, whom, that. : what. : whose (interrogative). : whose (relative). : when. : then, when (relative). , , : here, there, where (also form multiple combinations such as , "where from", and , "thereof"). , , : hither, thither, whither (not archaic as in English). vem som , , , , : whoever, whichever, whatever, whenever, wherever, etc.

Swedish grammar

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