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SWEDISH

UNIT 1: Greetings

Alfred Nobel

1833 - 1896

The “Merchant of Death” title was given to Alfred Nobel due to Nobel inventing, and making most of his vast fortune off of, dynamite and other types of explosives, such as “ballistite”, which was the precursor to quite a lot of military grade explosive devices.

Nobel came up with the idea of using his money for these annual prizes after his brother, Ludvig, died in 1888 and a French newspaper mistakenly thought it had been Alfred Nobel himself who died.  The newspaper published the obituary under the title: “The Merchant of Death is Dead”, going on to state: “Dr. Alfred Nobel, who became rich by finding ways to kill more people faster than ever before, died yesterday.”

When Nobel read this, he began thinking of how to improve his public image after his death and decided on leaving his enormous fortune to fund a set of prizes named after himself. The Nobel Prizes were created as awards for people who made the greatest contributions to mankind in subjects that interested Nobel, namely Physics, Chemistry, Medicine, Literature and Peace.

 

See more facts here

English            

Swedish:

Transcription:

 

Dialogue 1

Swedish:    - Hej!  Jag heter Alfred Nobel.

                      [hɛj] [ˈjɑː ˈheter 'alfred no'bel]

English:   - Hello! My name is Alfred Nobel.

Please meet Alfred Nobel,

a Swidish armaments manufacturer 

who left 31 million Swedish kroner (today about 265 million dollar)

to fund the Nobel Prizes.

 

I think he's trying to say something:

Now, you have a chance to talk to the inventor of dynamite 

and ask him why he was once nicknamed “The Merchant of Death”.

But first, let's greet him back. 

Choose one of the following variants:

Good morning 

God morgon

[guː moron]

Good day

God dag

[gu: dɑː(ɡ)] 

Good afternoon

God eftermiddag

[gu: eftermida]

Alfred Nobel:      - Hej! 

You:                     - ............/e.g. Good morning/.

Alfred Nobel:      - Vad heter du? 

You:                     - Pardon?

Now, let's talk to him.

Relax, he died long time ago...

You might have already guessed that 

 "vad heter du"   means   "what's your name".

[vɑː(d̪) heter dʉː]

 

Before answering to this question

let's look at Swedish personal nouns.

Try to remember as much as you can. You'll need that in future.

How is it going? 

Hur går det?

[hʉːr gor də]

English            

Swedish:

Transcription:

 

How are you feeling? 

Hur mår du?

[hʉːr mor dʉː]

Let's not keep Alfred Nobel waiting. 

Here is how you can answer to his question:

English            

Swedish:

Transcription:

 

Just fine, thank you

Bara bra, tack 

[ˈboˌra broː tak] 

It's going well, thanks 

Det går bra, tack

[də gor bro: tak]

I'm feeling good, thanks 

Jag mår bra, tack

[yag mor bro: tak] 

Ready to continue

the conversation? 

Let's do it.

 

Ok, that was rude. Not you. Your response was totally appropriate.

He said he's bored - "Jag är uttråkad" [ˈjɑː eː utrokad]

and also said "goodbye" - hej då [hɛj do:].

Choose one of the following answers to bring this weird conversation to an and.

Goodbye (formal)

Adjö

[aˈjøː] 

We'll see each other (later)

Vi ses

[vi sehs] 

Good evening

God kväll

[gu: kvɛlː]

Good night

God natt

[gu: nat]

Dialogue 3

English            

Swedish:

Transcription:

 

Have a good day 

Ha en bra dag!

[ha: ɛn bro: dɑː(g)]

Alfred Nobel:      - Hej då.

Gabriel Macht:   - ........./e.g. Have a good day/. 

Dialogue 4

Have you made a choice?

Let's go.

Hello (formal)

Hejsan

[hejsan]

English            

Swedish:

Transcription:

 

Ponouns as Subject

 

                     Singular                                          Plural

                     I  -  jag [ˈjɑː(ɡ)]                                      we   -  vi [vi]

 

                you  -  du [dʉː]                                        you   -  ni [ni]

 

                  he  -  han [han]                  they -  de/dem/dom [de:/dem/dɔm]

 

                she  -  hon [hʊn]

 

  it   (words ending in en)   -  det [de]

 

  it   (words ending in ett)  -  den [dən]

 

                                                           Note: always use

                                                                         - "dom" while speaking and

                                                                        - "de"/"dem" in more or less                                                                                                  formal writing

Now, let's get back 

to the dialogue.

Dialogue 2

Alfred Nobel:      - Vad heter du? 

You:                     - ......../My name is... Gabriel Macht/.

Alfred Nobel:      - Hur är det med dig?

Gabriel Macht:   - Eh?

What?

Ah, rights, you don't know this expression yet.

"Hur är det med dig"  means  "how are you".

 [hʉːr æːr də meː dɛj]

Here are some other ways to ask a person how s/he is:

Alfred Nobel:      - Hur är det med dig?

Gabriel Macht:   - ......./e.g. Just fine, thank you/.

Alfred Nobel:      - Jag är uttråkad. Hej då.

Gabriel Macht:   - What the--?

© 2015 created by Anastasia Gubanova 

 

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