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- "Det är ert barn."
127 Comments
380
I found that sometimes it's silent and sometimes it's not. Does that depend on subsequent letters? Is there a rule to follow?
Unless you're speaking one of the very few dialects where you might hear the T, pronouncing it is hypercorrection.
57
Do swedish people really talk like the automated voice in this sentence? I had to click sköldpaddan to hear that is't four seperate words and not just 2...
Follow up question - Is "Ni" (and subsequently er/ert/era) reserved for talking to a group, or can it also be used when speaking formally one-on-one (as is the case in many other languages)? I've read that "Ni" has fallen out of usage as a formal pronoun, not sure if that was accurate or not? Thanks.
It's only for plural, not politeness (and never has been historically).
I wrote a bit about how Swedish expresses politeness here: https://www.duolingo.com/comment/5591933
1453
Not quite, -t stands for singular ett gender.
ett barn, ert barn 'a child, your child'
en hund, er hund 'a dog, your child'
I think we are on the same page. You are merely adding that it is not all-inclusive for singular cases, correct? If so, I was aware, but failed to add that.
What I was trying to get at is this: if "t" is used, it is NOT used in a plural case. Yes?
EDITED TO ADD:
In the cases of "ett agg" and "ett brev" for examples, is there a suggestion that gender is applied?
1453
We usually pronounce it very weakly, basically we normally just say 'det är' as 'dee' (Swedish pronunciation, not English!) with a slightly prolonged e-sound.
1453
This is your child would be either Det här är ditt/ert barn or Detta är ditt/ert barn. There is no difference in meaning between den här/det här and denna/detta, but when used with a noun, they function differently grammatically: we say det här barnet but detta barn.
1453
If you stress det in Swedish, it usually gets the same meaning as det där. Also, we use det där less in Swedish than you use that in English. So in this course, det and det där are allowed for that, and det här and detta are allowed for this.
One thing I've found that really helps me with this is to try to learn the word in the definite form, rather than in the indefinite form. For example: flicka (girl) - I learn it as 'flickan' (the girl) ... or ... hus (house) - I learn it as 'huset' (the house)
That helps me to get the gender and endings thoroughly attached to the word.
1453
You can say Hon är ditt barn or Han är ditt barn, but that's not what the sentence means – det does not refer to the child, it's a placeholder pronoun. See this thread for a longer explanation: https://www.duolingo.com/comment/9708920
For a short fix, consider what you'd say if there was a knock on the door. You can't see the person and someone asks you who you think it is. You wouldn't say 'She's your child' but you could say 'It's your child'. (more likely of course, It's your daughter, but still not She's your daughter)
Although barn is an ett word, we actually normally don't use det as a pronoun about children. So no, it doesn't work like that.
1453
'ditt' for something that belongs to one person, 'ert' if it belongs to more than one person
Think of "ditt" as being used in a conversation with one parent and "ert" as being used in a conversation with both parents. In English we only have one "you", but most European languages have a singular you (for talking to one person) and a plural you (when talking to an audience of multiple people).
This has been discussed a bit already in this conversation chain - please read other comments in the future, you might find your answer there.
1292
"Ert" might be used because the owners of the child are more than one (you maybe talk to a couple and ask them if the child is theirs). It could also be that you use the polite and slightly old fashion "ni" instead of the normal "du" when you talk to a single person. But if you are talking to a single person, you can use "ditt".
Just to expand on this great explanation - child is singular, but the possessive pronoun matches the ownership of the people whose kid (s) you're talking about. Regardless if it is kid or kids, you would use some form of "er" if you're talking directly to the parents/guardians, just like in English (for instance, if you're talking about HIS kid, you wouldn't use the pronoun "their").
1292
Ditt: singular, one owner. Ert: plural, more than one owner. Or one owner towards whom you are very polite.