En and Ett words (Swedish genders) - How do they work and when should you use each?
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En and ett words. The Swedish "gender" for nouns. This is what this video is about.
How to use "en" and "ett"?
How do I know if a Swedish word is an en or an ett word?
Those are some of the most common questions we get from swedish learners.
Swedish grammar is generally, quite simple. But when it comes to Swedish nouns, the "en" or "ett" question get super complicated.
However, if you want to speak Swedish, knowing which words are "en" or "ett" is not the most important thing ever. So don't worry about it too much.
Some of the Swedish grammar tips for en and ett:
1- Dont worry about Swedish en and ett too much. It is good to get them right, but they are not that important. Don't let them get in the way of your progress with Swedish.
2- Most words are en words. If you are going to guess, guess en words.
3- Make a list of the most commonly used Ett words. And just try to remember those. 70% to 80% of all Swedish nouns are en words. So focuss on the ett words instead.
4- Look at the definite form of Swedish nouns. The ending will tell you if it is an en word or an ett word. And single words are easier to remember than combinations.
The scariest part on Duolingo is when I need to choose between them and I have to gamble
Same😭 It doesn't explain it
Or Din/ditt😭
That's why I'm here 😅
I feel your pain
Same here 😂😢
This makes sense. Duolingo doesnt explain this AT ALL! Tack! Och mitt favoritord är ’en ö’
I think Swedes must think English is so easy, having just one type of noun! However, I love that Swedish doesn't conjugate verbs! The funniest sentence I learnt is "får får får, farfar?" haha. Thanks Daniella.
😂😂😂 Great sentence. English has it's pros and it's cons. It can also be a pronunciation nightmare, like with though thought tough through thorough
"får får får, farfar?" What does this mean? :(
Näe, får får inte får, får får lamm..
@@MonikaPetkanova Får = Sheep, and får = get, but we can say sheep gets sheep. But they dont Sheep gets Lambs. Så Farfar = Grandpa so, farfar needs to awnser the question. Sheep gets sheep, grandpa? "No, Sheep doesn't get sheeps, they get lambs.
@@mattislidbeck1566 My Goodness Lord !!!
I’ve started learning Swedish and I’ve already had some frustration over en and ett. From when I learned French and German, genders always struck me as an unnecessary complication. Maybe it’s because I’m English and we don’t actually have genders at all, so I’ve never really understood why they are there and thought “why don’t we just do away with this and simplify things?”. Anyway, great video and thank you. I’m subscribing!
Teacher: i am going to divide nouns into ett and en. Me: to make it easier, right? Teacher smiling..... Me: to make it easier....right? Teacher continues to smile. As i understand most en words refer to people and animals with a few exceptions such as Ett barn, ett djur.
😂 True story
I started learning Swedish about three weeks ago! Mitt favoritord på svenska är 'sköldpadda'. It has a funny sound to it, and I was very pleasantly surprised to learn 'sköld' and 'padda' each translate to 'shield' and 'toad' respectively. I'm pretty sure it's an en word.
That is a great word! 😂 Keep going and you will be speaking Swedish in no time.
@@FunSwedish Tack så mycket! ✌️
It is.
Thanks for a well English translation so that new comers like us can understand. May God bless you
Our pleasure! Happy to hear that you find it sort of a welcoming expericence and not scary. That was exactly our goal 😊
One of my favorite Swedish words is en dammsugare. I think it’s an en word. Love the videos. En or Ett is so hard.
It is an En word! You could use this: folkets-lexikon.csc.kth.se/folkets/#lookup&dammsugare&1 Or this: svenska.se/tre/?sok=dammsugare&pz=8 To find out when in doubt 😁
Putting “en” or “ett” at the end of the words just opened a whole new world to me. 😁 When I started to go through the very basics of Swedish in DuoLingo, I kind of saw it works the same as English “a”, “an” and “the”, but as a Latvian by heart couldn’t really understand where this goes. 😅 In Latvian we also have divided nouns in two genders, so, in the beginning I thought maybe it’s that, but then again Wikipedia said, Swedish don’t do it the same way Latvian does. So, it’s kind of English way, but no. 😆 Also, was asking one of my Swedish friends how this thing works, and he said, he doesn’t know, it just works. 😃 But your way of explaining it surely works both ways and makes it more logical, not like it’s a random thing that just happens to a language, which surely has to have a certain system and rules like every other language. 👀 Thanks for that, will try to keep it in my mind! 🙌🏻 Edit: Also, isn’t it, like, ett or en might also depend on if a word starts with a vowel or consonant? I’m just guessing, trying to find my ways to look at the regular things I’ve noticed in the language so far, and I’ve seen pretty often already that, if in Swedish one word ends with a consonant and the next one starts with a consonant, the previous in the speach can disappear or it can change the next one in the pronounciation. I mean, this is a an art already, sorry for silly questions, I just saw the patterns in DuoLingo and since it wasn’t giving any explanations, I just follow the patterns. Usually they don’t let me do a mistake. 😅
Happy to hear you found the explanation helpful and logical 😁. Native speakers are often not aware of how and why they say the things they say. So it is hard for most Swedes to go into the details of grammar and structures. Ps: Not real good way of knowing if a word is en or ett just by looking at it 😅 The logic ends there 😅.
I think this is the most beautiful and useful content about EN/ETT words! Tack så mycket! ❤️✨
So glad to hear ❤️✨
Very helpful! Min favoritord på svenska är ”ett ögonblick” (a moment).
I observed something very intriguing! And I'm sure I'll get a "Hej" from Daniella! 2:43 ett glass (a glass) 9:42: en glass (an ice cream)
😅
Hej hej hej! :) Good observation!
Thanks Daniella. I like the words that can be "en" or "ett". En lag. Ett lag. Different meanings of course, but they are easy to remember.
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"Vilket är ditt favoritord på svenska?" Punkt. Punkt är mycket bra!👍🏻😊
Thank you for making amazing videos. Your videos are really helpful.
Glad you like them! 😍
Very interesting and helpful, thank you!
Glad it was helpful!
Effective learning ❤ Thanks a bunch.
My pleasure 😊 If you want to learn more Swedish with us check our our Swedish courses. Live courses: elansutbildning.com/courses/ Pre-recorded courses: elansutbildning.teachable.com/
Jag håller på lära fyra barn här i USA att prata och skriva svenska. Jag är inte Svensk själv, men jag bodde där i tjugo år, nu bor jag i USA, men jag verkligen gillar din kanal, och det har varit väldigt hjälpsam för mig. Så jag tackar, Bill från Skottland.
Thank you, this is really helpful!
Glad it was helpful!
This is the most helpful video I've watched in ages - this channel is really good at making Swedish an accessible language to learn :)
Oh, we are so happy to hear that you feel that way! 😍
Very nice and clear video 👍
Fantastic lesson
😍
Thank you 🙏🙏
I am from Colombo, Sri Lanka. Your explanation is very nice. Thank You .
Happy to hear that!
Great teacher. I have learnt alot
Glad to hear that!
Easy understand, hope you have more video.
More to come! 🙂
Thanks for the lesson
My pleasure! If you want more lessons then you can join our Swedish courses. We have both live courses and pre-recoreded courses. Here are the links. Live courses: elansutbildning.com/courses/ Pre-recorded courses: elansutbildning.teachable.com/
Best teacher 😍😍 thank youuuuu 🌺🌺
Thank you! 😃
It helps me a lot! Tusen tack!
Glad to hear that! ❤️
i love learning about how different languages grammar works, it’s like discovering a civilizations culture i never thought would be different. adding the en at the end of the word is such a cool idea and it makes so much sense for some reason.
I agree with you! It is just like that. Different grammar, different ways of seeing the world :)
Amazing explanation very very educative and definitely a life time saving while learning Swedish!
Oh, thanks for the sweet comment! Glad you liked it :)
I love the Swedish word en jordgubbe (Strawberry)! These videos are great! Tack!
Glad you like them! I agree with you! Jordgubbe IS a great word :)
thank you a lot... you are really great at this
Glad it was helpful! 😍 Good luck with your Swedish studies!
Tack så mycket
Great explanation! I'm just a beginner in learning Swedish, and this video has made so clear a key topic!Tack så mycket!
Glad it was helpful! :)
Brilliant video ! I knew which words to use “en” or “ett” but I didn’t know why and when to use it , this video made it so clear so tack så Mycket!
Glad it was helpful!😍
hey dear jus want to say honestly while watching your video I am new to Swedish language n Sweden too you have lovely energy around and it feels so easy Swedish when u trying teach your own way n it sounds easy and not monotonous like others . happy to learn from you. hope I make it through learning Swedish. thank you so vey much
Thank you so much! So sweet of you to write this 😍
Tack så mycket! Mitt favoritord på Svenska är tack. It just sounds so warm and nice, hospitable in summary.
Yes! It is a great word. I like it as well. Tack för din kommentar! :)
Tack så mycket 👍
😁
Legal! Gostei!
Tack så mycket! Jag har nu skrivit ner dina ett orden på papper och ska följa med dina recommendationer. Den här videon hälper repetera grund svensk grammatik på en lätt och roligt sätt.Bra jobbat!
Bra att du skriver på svenska, heja heja! =D Såg en grej du kan tänka på dock. När du skriv "dina ett orden" så kom det med en en-ords ändelse. Orden i sig är korrekt, och betyder då, ord i plural. Men då du redan skrivit "dina" så ska inte ordet efter böjas. Annars så är ord ett ett-ord~ Mycket en och ett och ord, krångliga meningar =P Lycka till =]
Thank you so much, I was very confused as to if there was a rule for en and ett words, but you explained it perfectly. Tack så mycket!
Glad it helped!
By the way, I often hear something like "a apple" in English, but always (!) this "a" is pronounced in its long form, like the letter "A" in the alphabet.
OMG!!! Tack så mycket!!
😍
Thank. You. So. Much.
Welcome!
tack så mycket!
Varsågod!
Hi, this video helps me differentiate between en-ord and ett-ord. Now it's more clearer for me. Learning a new language that requires taking time and practicing a lots. Tack så mycket.
Glad it was helpful!
En jordgubbe, because it's cute hehe I was so confused about it T-T You helped a lot! Tack så mycket ^^
Glad I could help!
Great content... Track så mycket! My favourite word is ett äpple because it's easy!
Good one!
Thank you for your videos. Please keep on uploading. :-) Can you also explain to us the difference between "pa" and "i"? "ska" and "vill"?
Glad you like them! Great ideas. We will try to make them :)
Me encantó tu video. Me estaba dando un dolor de cabeza porque no encontraba el porqué los adjetivos cambiaban con “ett” y “en”. Por fin encontré la respuesta en tu video. Desde ahora tienes un nuevo suscriptor n.n. Saludos desde México n.n 🇲🇽
Me alegro que te haya ayudado a entender el misterio de "ett" y "en". México que lindo, un saludo enorme desde Suecia
If you were my teacher i would learn in days 😀👌
Great!
😍
Tack så jättemycket! Jag var förvirrad hur använder en/ett 😩 Nu jag förstår mer 🤩👍🏼 Dina tripp är jättebra.
Kul att höra att det hjälpte dig! :)
I love your videos.
😍
mig favoitord på svenska är älskar 😍
😍
My favorite one is ett äpple, sounds so posh, just love it. I get a bit confused when it comes to the plural versions, like in ett barn - barnet / flera barn - barnen... I get is about memorize the ett words, but when I'm trying to remember which one is the singular and which one is the plural my mind freezes a little bit, LOL. Thanks, great explanation!
Thank you! Just "Barn" is a complicated word, because it is very irregular. But there are other that follow more logical patterns 😊 We will soon make a video about those.
@@FunSwedish Thank you! 🤗 I appreciate your work, you're a great teacher!!!
Muchas gracias. Acabo de comenzar con el aprendizaje del sueco (por mero gusto), y este video me ha ayudado un montón. Tenía serios problemas con el uso de estas dos palabras. Me encanta este canal, la forma en que explicas los temas, a alegría y empatía que pones en ello. Además me he enterado por otro lado que también hablas español, por eso te escribo en español, ahora mismo me resulta más fácil que el sueco para expresarme,pero todo se andará. ¿Algún canal en youtube donde pueda familiarizarme con la escucha del sueco?. Muchas gracias. Un cordial saludo.
Muchas gracias! Me alegro mucho de que te guste nuestro canal :) Sí, te recomiendo "slow Swedish" con Katrin.
Oh, I do have my favorite word in Swedish! It's regeringen. It sounds very badass. "Min favorit ordet är regeringen".
I always have to do a little mental gymnastics to get the indefinite right... the definite version is usually pretty obvious (or I remember it easier)... so when I want to say "an apple," my mind takes a little trip to get there: äpplen or äpplet > oh it's ett > ett äpple! I still prefer that over having to conjugate verbs 7 different ways (like German) haha!
Yeah expect then "äpplen" turns out to be the plural and then you run for the hills screaming again :)
Exactly! That is a great way to do it. Beacuase it is easier to remember one word (the definite form) rather than a 2 word combination!
Thanks a lot for this easy to understand explanation! This was always confusing because I always thought the article would change according to the grammatical genders male and female and that adjectives would be conjugated accordingly ^^ PS: "en parfymtant" är mitt favoritord på svenska xD
Glad to hear!! Haha, It IS a great word 😀
Tack så mycket för videon! Min favoritord på svenska är Fika :)
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My vocabulary is limited (just early in my learning), but a couple words that I made sure to learn are "brandkåren" and "brandstationen" (because I'm a "pensionerad brandman"). When we visit (2022 plans might be waiting until 2023), I know I'll want to see some fire stations and talk to firefighters. Quick question: When pronouncing the "i" sound for words like "fin", am I hearing correctly that the vowel sounds from way back in the throat and resonates in the nasal cavity? Am I hearing it right?
2:06 Have an ett book :)) nice thing
I don't know many words yet but "en sköldpadda" has to be up there hehe. Shout out to my course 1's on Duo 😉
Haha, great word! :)
Tack Tack!!!! Mitt favorit ord är "ett hjärta" och "en blomma".
my favourite word at present is Skådespelerskorna
oh wow!
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Mitt favoritord på Svenska är sköldpaddor because I am obviously a Duolingo noob and the word is so much fun to say! .. Thanks for the helpful video and for being adorable!!
In english a and an seems easy because an a i used when the next word begins in a consonant and a when it begins with a vowel.
With a few exceptions of course.
@@UpcomingJedi more to do with how it’s spelled phonetically. Take the word “university” - it begins with a vowel, but we say “a university”, not “an university”. To me that’s because when spelled phonetically the word begins with a y - “yoo”. (I’m aware of the debate about y being a vowel as well as a consonant).
I kinda understand the differens between en & ett(ett a vawol & en a consanent. but en when your refering to the. it upers in Swedish as book the.🇧🇸🇸🇪🤗💗
Awesome video, as always!!!! Could you please recommend an online dictionary english-swedish, or swedish, or something, that is good? I don't seem to find any... Thanks a lot!!! Greetings from Spain!
Hola España! Happy it helped! Yes, here is a video we made about it kzhead.info/sun/qqaMh8qEh4mnqGw/bejne.html&ab_channel=FunSwedish Hopefully it helps!
@@FunSwedish Tack so mycket!!!! ❤️
Tack så mycket jag kommar nu i Sverige jag studera SFI ......och jag vet inte en och ett.... du berätta jag vet tack🎉❤
I used to think that "vatten" was an en word, but actually is "vattnet". So I'm going to do min ett-bok too.
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my favourite words en slutsats ett sjukhus i think they are both fun to say
In Hebrew, we also have genders but we don't have anything like en/ett and our version of "The" is the same for every noun xD Also, en/ett are much more complicated than a/an in English :\ Thank you for making so many fun and understandable classes ♥ They're very helpful!
Min favorit ord på svenska är Sverige eller ost Tak så mycket :3 But seriously thank you I was confused by this because I am using both Duo-lingo and channels like this to learn and Duo-lingo and other websites just confused me so much. I hope to learn more Swedish :3
9:18 hi i can't help but notice that the pronoun there changed too - din in en sentence & ditt in et sentence. is that because of the ett too? thank you for these wonderful videos! very engaging!
That is exactly right! You got it! Din - Ditt we use depending on in the word is an en or an ett word 😊
English is not lazy, it's a pragmatic language with a very pragmatic grammar, I grew up speaking Spanish and then learned English at an early age, the fact that in Spanish (as well as French, the other language I speak) objects have gender is illogical, a table is a table, no gender there
It is grammatical gender, a rule made to make language more fluent
Mitt favoritord är "orka!" My favourite word in Swedish is "orka!". It was explained to me as meaning "to have the energy to" but used on its own (or as "jag orkar inte") to mean "I can't be bothered!"
Tack för videon! Mitt favoritord hittills är en stjärna, men jag kan fortfarande inte många ord! ⭐
Bra ord! 😍
Well, I've started to learn Swedish. Hope, it's easier to remember "en-ords" and "eat-ords" in Swedish than to learn all articles in German or to learn all irregular words in English or remember all the III form words in French
i was also the same when i started learning swedish but if you are unsure then just use en and you might be right since it is a lot of words that are an en word. I also have a channel where I share some lessons about swedish. LYCKA TILL !! 👍💖 kzhead.info/tools/E0SqVmZlaF62BNV3uL1iXw.html
Don't stress about it too much. At least not in the beginning 😊. It might be the hardest part of having flawless Swedish, but it is also not the most important step. Probably the last step 😊
@@FunSwedish Agree, it will make you sound foreign "misusing" en/ett but it does not (normally) make the sentence intelligible. Most times context will solve the possible misinterpretations anyways.
Right now I'm still learning the basics. So far my favorite thing to say is jag dricker vatten. 🤣
Dear laerar, I like you so much because your easy good explainations about those ett , en < very usefull, more I learn more I could read those swedisk Book...I m looking lor a new mumm, it s important for me to asleep with poem and nice fairy tales, I want to read swedish of course,
Happy to hear that! One step closer 😊
Very similar to Norwegian’s en and et indeed! ;) XD
"a apple", made me laugh 🤣👏🏻
😊
ive only just started learning swedish on duolingo but my favourite word so far is 'ett lejon' because it is so similar to english 🤣I also like 'tilsammans'
I’m just going to state that with Duo-lingo it is very helpful to use other sources such as this channel to help learn as duo lingo isn’t always right or it may get confusing with certain things that need better explanations. I wish you luck in learning it :3
I started taking Swedish lessons a couple of months ago, and it's a bit chaotic, I'm guessing as with any new language. So far they have lots of similarities with English in terms of how some words sound, but man are they different from Greek! (my native language.) It's been years since I've learned a new language and I'm kinda afraid! What really helped me in English was having constant stimulation around in English (via video games, films, music etc). Can you guys recommend some good Swedish movies or even music with Swedish lyrics? (preferably metal, but I'm not gonna be picky on this one!)
Super exposure is great for learning a language! Here is a video we made about some movies kzhead.info/sun/p8OLmN2NbqN4p68/bejne.html Check out the comments as well. There are some good recommendations.
@@FunSwedish Tack så mycket Daniella! God Jul och gott nytt år!
@@GTAPanos I don't know how much you would enjoy her music (it's definitely not metal, more romantic pop-ish) but I have been loving Melissa Horn's songs. I recently found Maxida Märak's music as well, she makes more hip-hop style music but there is some variety to it. An interesting artist for sure.
Ας μάθουμε σουηδικά φίλε μου :)
@@dennercassio Έχω αρχίσει εδώ και έναν χρόνο! Let's do this together ❤ 💪
Hi! 😊 Would you say En and Ett are like Spanish El (masculine) and La (feminine)?
It sort of has the same function as "el" and "la". But it is a genderless gender 😊. So there is no masuline or feminine asociation to the words. En man = Un hombre. ManEN = El hombre. En kvinna = Una mujer. KvinnaN = La mujer.
Min fru är jättesnygg!
Vad fint!
Tack för film And correct me if i spelled for wrong lol
Maybe "Tack för filmen" or "Tack för videon" since it would be "THE video" 😁.
@@FunSwedish oh right, thanks!
@@FunSwedish tack för filmen
Could you introduce the Swedish pop song ? I think listening music is good for learning an language.
Spotify is full of them Swedish songs and Swedish playlists, which doesn’t consist from worldwide blockbuster Swedish artists only. 😁 Or, if you prefer KZhead over Spotify, you can try to find smth over here as well. I’ve been adding kind of a lot of Swedish music to my Liked Songs in past 2 years, and from what I’ve got I would suggest Kent, they’re kind of popsy, and, I’ve heard, they were a huge thing locally in Sweden. My personal favorites from them are “Sverige”, “Den Sista Sången” and “Tänd På”, kind of popsy, kind of chill. But suggest you to check it out on your own. Lately I have fell for Veronica Maggio’s “Solen Har Gått Ner”, it just goes on repeat for me. 😆 Found out she has a lot of nice songs that I plainly like, cuz I don’t understand much of Swedish, it’s just amazing music for my liking on it’s own. 😅 But I would really suggest you to start a Swedish music playlist on Spotify, you can start with these examples, and when the playlist is there containing at least few songs, Spotify will immediatelly give you suggestions of smth similar, so, you can also go through the artists and find smth that you would like the most. :)
Freja Kjellberg thanks so much for your suggestions 🥰🥰 Love those songs
Listen to Thomas Ledin, Ted Gärdestad, Gyllene Tider, Harpo, etc
I like that the sweds have en & ett both for undefined en __/ett __ & defined __en/__ett 😍😍😌 I fined it so attractive (Well mb there are exceptions at the bestok ... but still :)) ) Also the fact that their grammatical genders aren't called masculine & feminine makes it less personal... (like I remember from a language the woman example it was a masculine gender noun & I learnt from that grammatical genders don't always coincide at least in some languages w their personal or how to say forgot the word & concept lol... Like a woman is feminine, but grammatically in Hebrew is masculine :)
I study Swedish and these are the things that I struggle with, I then get stressed out and want to give up😂 I'm Australian and English is our native language, so it makes it a lot harder to learn something foreign 😩😭
Mitt favoritord på svenska är sjuksköterska för att det är väldigt svårt att uttala ❤️
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Mitt favoritord är 'en servitör' och 'ett djur'. I am Japanese so I am still struggling with basic grammers😢, but this video helps me a lot , tack så mycket
When we can meet each other here in Holland or by you in Sweden?
I've found a tip at least for German speakers: half of this "ett words" are words of neuter gender in German, so "das" words, so if you know German it may help with the majority of words, It's suitable not for cognates as well, for example "ett barn"= "das Kind"
So, this topic is not easy as I thought. As my conclusion, the difficult one is in the indefinitive article because if we can learn by heart the ETT and EN words in this form, the rest one will be easy.
You are right. It is probably the hardest thing to master (becuase remembering all the en and ett coupling is super hard). But one you have it, you know all the rest.
@@FunSwedish so real. Thank you so much, so the the thing that we have to do is starting studying them,
There's something I don't understand though. You mentioned "en fin bok", and then "ett fint språk", but why doesn't "fin" have an extra 'n' when it's paired up with "en"? Also, this channel is a blessing. It's hard to find channels like these. Tusen tack!
Good question! If the word ends with an N like Fin then we don't add an extra n. We just leave it like it is "En fin bok" but we need to add the t if it is refering to an ett-word "Ett fint språk".
@@FunSwedish Ahh I see now. That DOES make sense. Tack så mycket!
Gracias por la explicación. Lo entendi.
i don’t know why but i find it funny that barn is an ett word. like yes, my kid is as important as my apple 😂