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- Topic: Swedish >
- "A beer"
"A beer"
Translation:En öl
20 Comments
Is it true that "öl" has the common gender when meaning eg "a glass of beer" but the neuter gender when referring to a type or a brand? I translated "a beer" as "en öl" and was marked as correct, but I wonder whether "ett öl" would be correct as well.
Which always throws me off while learning german. I want it to mean beer!
My response was "ett öl" and was marked correct, but it lists "en öl" as another correct solution. I'm now not sure whether en or ett is correct for this word since apparently both solutions are accepted? Anyone know which is correct or, if both are, which is to be used when? Perhaps it is a mistake in the program?
Both are, but they mean different things. En öl is a unit of beer (glass, pint, cup, bushel) while ett öl is a kind of beer (Heineken, Guinness, dark/light beer, lager etc).
Do we really say "ett öl"? I don't think I've heard it, but since I don't drink beer I might have missed this little detail... "en ölsort" or "ett ölmärke", but the language might've evolved to shorten it to "ett öl" without me noticing...
1103
No it is not, way different sounds. (/ə/ vs /ø/). Afaik, English does not have this sound.
It is only pronounced that way in some accents (mainly on the west coast and around Norrköping). The usual Swedish 'ö'-sound is not as open as the 'ea' in English "earth".
But if you can't figure out how to pronounce it the 'ea' in "earth" is an ok aproximation which will be understood without any problem.
- 1279
This must also be linked to the English word Ale. Is there another word in Swedish for beer, one closer to the beer form found in other languages? (For example bier, beer, Biere, birra etc).
- 1333
Not an old one afaik, but there's a slang word bira, formed from the German Bier, first known from 1910.
