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- "Hon talar till och med svens…
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You could think of it as "up to and including" which translates more directly to those three words.
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For those who speak Dutch, "till och med" can be easily remembered when linked to "tot en met" which means "up to and including" as well.
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Thanks, but as a Dutchy I am surprised by how this phrase has this particular meaning and to see how it is constructed in a full sentence. I need a while to get this in my head.
You can use it here, Hon talar även svenska, but I think it's a lot less common this way.
Does this mean "Even she speaks Swedish" as well as meaning "She even speaks Swedish"?
The difference is whether you emphasize that "even she speaks Swedish" or that "she even speaks Swedish".
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Does*t the Swedish example sentence "Hon talar till och med svenska." mean "She speaks even Swedish."? The emphasis is on the fact that she speaks additionally or surprisingly (?) the language of Swedish !?
She even speaks Swedish. This is to mean that she not only speaks or writes English, for example, but also she speaks Swedish?
I translated into "She speaks even Swedish." I must be correct. This is to assume that she speaks not only English, French, German or any other languages, but she can also (even) speak Swedish?
I thought if something preceded the subject you had to invert the subject and verb... eg.. till och med talar hon svenska. Is that not true, or is it optional here. Many thanks for helping us here!
- 1051
The general rule is to have the verb in the second place (except in questions and subclauses). The sentence Till och med hon talar svenska is an exception. There are a few adverbs that can be used to make up the first place in the sentence together with the subject. In this case, 'till och med hon' becomes one unit and that unit is very strongly stressed.
Till och med talar hon svenska is not a good Swedish sentence.
Okay, that explains it. It's only with subclauses that I have to worry about the subject verb inversion -- I'm used to it in English with questions. Thanks again, Arnauti.
So it's more about till och med hon being a phrase and it's not some sort of exception? And when adverbs can combine with the subject to create a phrase like this, together they occupy position 1 in a sentence? (I'm not sure if my question is very clear. If it doesn't make sense I'd be happy to try and rephrase it)
- 1051
Yes, it's no exception – till och med hon is a phrase, and you can see it from the fact that you could replace it with one word, like hon or vem and still get the same structure. Position 1 can be very long.
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It seems to me like "till" and "med" here are acting as prepositions (forming an adverb as Germanic languages like to do) and therefore need to stay attached to the noun or pronoun. I could be so, so wrong, though. Just guessing.
- 1051
Yes, till och med is an adverb. Nothing can come between the parts of it. It's not quite true that adverbs need to be attached to any specific word, it's more that there are only a few slots in a sentence where they can go.
Similar question: "She even speaks Swedish" or "She speaks even Swedish"? i. e. stressing the language or the act of speaking (instead of, writing or understanding). How would I notice the difference in a swedish sentence?
- 1051
They don't really use talk + language in English, so you should say speaks instead.
Edit: some native speakers do use talk with languages, but if you're not a native speaker, it will sound like a mistake coming from you.
One might say, ''Let's talk in Swedish so the chidren(English or American) can't understand'' Speak would work just as fine. Having had exchange students through the years, it could be endearing to hear slight mistakes, but it reveals that ''we are not from around here''. It can cause more trouble when the meaning is not understood. We had a Thai exchange student that was in a family that did not work out. They said to here, ''We hate to see you go.'' The Thai girl heard, ''hate'' and thought they hated her... When I left Sweden from a visit a short time ago, security asked me ''What language?'' I said, ''Jag förstår bara lite svenska'' Wha she heard was ''Jag förstår bara svenska''. Yes, she was young enough that she thought I was oldd enough not to know English.
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The verb suggested by MariaDeLau might be wrong, but I'm rather confused with what is emphasized here. In English it's straightforward: "even" comes before the word it stresses. So we have 3 options here:
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"Even she speaks Swedish." Means, of all people, we would not expext HER to speak Swedish, but (surprise!) she actually does.
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"She even speaks Swedish." We thought she can only read it (or any other skill, like writing or comprehension), but, wow, she can speak as well!
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"She speaks even Swedish." We knew she speaks several languages, but we would never expect her to also speak Swedish, and she actually does!
Option 1 was already nicely explained by Arnauti in the discussion above. But according to the Tips and Notes for this Unit, advebs come after the verb, but before any other word. So, how to make difference between options 2 and 3?
Why in this case the translation "she is even speaking swedish" is not correct? Is it because the -ing form in this specific context is not really appropriate? thanks!
In order to get you closer to that dream I have to point out that the correct phrase is "jag vill tala..." not "jag vill ha talar...". You use "jag vill ha" (literally "I want to have") when you are talking about wanting an object but when you want to do something it is "jag vill" followed by the infinitive of the verb.
I have same question as asked by a user earlier here...what is the difference between ens and till och med...please help.
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When I thinking in Dutch, I would translate this as:"Ze spreekt tot ons in het Zweeds"/"She is talking Swedisch to us" When I tanslate it to Swedisch it would be "hon talar även svenska"/"ze spreekt zelfs Zweeds"?
Till is for och is and med is with but you don't translate till och med as for and with?
um I could be wrong but a friend of mine who speaks Swedish told me that the verb "talar" means "telling", and "pratar" would fit here better. Is he correct about this?
No, not really. The difference between tala and prata is quite comparable to the difference between speak and talk respectively. Speak/tala is preferred with language skills.
To express tell, you'd use berätta or the phrasal verb tala om (stress on the om!).
I have seen questions with "till och med" in them for well over half the questions in this lesson. I have barely seen any of the other words. This is a problem
