"The man speaks Swedish, but not the woman."
Translation:Mannen talar svenska, men inte kvinnan.
29 Comments
My guess was "Mannen talar svenska men kvinnan inte." Why is this word order wrong?
1881
Here the woman is negated, the man speaks the language, not the woman, so 'inte' is put before the woman = 'inte kvinnan'. If this phrase had had a verb it would have been = "men kvinna talar inte svenska", here we negate the language she does not talk.
- 1881
No, we say: "Mannen talar svenska men INTE engelska" (not English), the language is negated by having 'inte' before the word negated.
- 1881
BUT :-) if it is the verb that is negated, then 'inte' comes after: "Han talar inte" - He does not speak.
I think I'm getting it!
How about:
I cook for the man, but not her (I don't cook food for her) - Jag lagar mat till mannen, men inte henne
I cook for the man, but not she (she doesn't cook for the man) - Jag lagar mat till mannen, men inte hon
- 1881
I would say: 1) "Jag lagar mat till mannen, men inte TILL henne. The 2nd phrase sounds akward, I would probably say: 2) "JAG lagar hans mat, INTE HON" (or "för HON gör det inte")
I learned German first, and think the Swedes must do it more like the English than them because I put it after too cause that is how you would say it in German!
- 1881
Yes, Swedish wordorder is more like English, but not always. There are distinct rules in all the three languages, that differ.
Of course. :P I just meant in this case specifically. Swedish and German share the V2 and English and Swedish share the SVO word-order. Overall I think so far I'd say that English and Swedish negate more similarly than do the other two pairs.
- 1881
But = men (starts a subordinate phrase, saying something that is opposed to the main phrase) 'Utan' = without. E.g. I never leave home without my cellphone = Jag går aldrig hemifrån utan min mobiltelefon.
in this case could "Jag går aldrig hemifrån utan min mobiltelefon" be literally traslated as "I never go away from home without my cellphone" ? Is hemifrån something like a composite word?
- 1881
Yes, it sounds good. Hemifrån = Home+from (even though English is thinking it the other way around) = leaving home
I wrote mannen talar svenska men inte kvinnan and duolingo doesn't accept and put ej insted of inte ?
Why is pratar not correct is this instance? I though both pratar and talar translated as "to speak". Thanks.
- 1881
You would be understood of course, but it is a kind of 'false friend'; I believe English prefer 'speak' when it comes to knowledge of a language, Swedish prefer 'talar'. But when it comes to 'talk" (chatting), Swedish more often use 'pratar' or the colloquial 'snackar'. So I would say that 'talar' is a false friend of 'talk'
- 70
The English sentence sounds a little strange here. "but the woman doesn't" would be a better translation IMHO. The default here sounds like "the man does not speak the woman" which doesn't make much sense.
- 230
Det är inte en hund, utan en en kyckling. - It is not a dog, but a chicken.
Jag talar inte svenska utan franska. - I do not speak Swedish but French.
Jag ska inte spela baseboll utan springa. - I am not going to play baseball but run.
Negation first with inte, positive statement about what is instead with utan.
- 230
Det är en hund, inte en kyckling. - It is a dog, not a chicken.
Jag talar svenska, inte franska. - I speak Swedish, not French.
Jag ska spela baseboll, inte springa. - I am going to play baseball, not run.
Positive statement first, negation with inte.
