"Är Storbritannien stort?"
Translation:Is Great Britain big?
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It's in the name ;) Coincidentally, we really aren't a big country haha
Nah, Bretagne is not the little one.
It's the real one, the other is just a larger copy.
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Don't tell the Irish that, the gaelic for Wales translates into English as little britain.
Great Britain is named great to distinguish it from Brittany, whose inhabitants, emigrating from Britain, formed a Kingdom in Armorica. Brittany was (arguably) illegally annexed to France in the 16th century, but it still maintains national culture and language, which are related to the Celts of Great Britain. Sorry for the long comment but ja, Storbritannien är stort! ;)
I am not a native speaker, but I think all coutries are ett-words. You see, even the word "country" in Swedish is an ett-word ("ett land"). Maybe a native can confirm that?
Somehow all countries are ett words, yes. At least whenever you say things like Mitt Tyskland 'My Germany', they will reveal themselves as neuter. Other geographical names work the same way, like names of cities, even the ones that have common gender form such as Kapstaden, 'Cape Town', it will still be Mitt Kapstaden when someone writes a book about it. Obviously staden is common gender. But Kapstaden is not.
This goes for all countries and cities, but e.g. Östersjön, 'the Baltic sea' is common gender.
What puzzled me is why it's not "Stortbritannien." I got the sentence to translate into Swedish, and I figured if "stor" was right there in the name it must not be neuter, but I was wrong. :)
Well spotted. In compound words, the base form is used. So ett rött vin 'a red wine', but rödvin 'red wine'.
I did notice that about the wine and it was quite confusing! Thanks for clarifying!
I know Australia is quite far away from everyone else, making us easy to forget haha! But how would I say Australia, or Australian? It's great to say he is Greek/Spanish/French/etc. But I'd love to know how to say where I'm from.. If anyone could tell me that'd be much appreciated! thank you! :)
It's Australien, and Han är australiensare and for her, either australiensare or australiensiska. For things: En australiensisk bok 'An Australian book'. Ett australiensiskt vin 'An Australian wine'. There's also a word australisk. I'd probably say den australiska regeringen 'the Australian government'. I'm not sure how those words distribute, really, if anyone else has better insight, please enlighten us!
While we're thereabouts, for New Zealand, which we call Nya Zeeland, it's nyzeeländare/nyzeeländska and nyzeeländsk.
Not really relevant to the phrase, but didn't know where else to post this... haha! :/
Storbritannien is a geographical term rather than a political one, it refers to the name of the island that most of the UK sits on, not to a country. It's confusing for most Brits, let alone the rest of you all!
Nope, Storbritannien is both a political and a geographical term in Swedish, but what's confusing is that it is used to mean both Great Britain and the United kingdom.
The formal way of referring to the country is Förenade konungariket Storbritannien och Nordirland but it's usually shortened to Storbritannien even in formal texts. Colloquially we often call the whole lot just England, but the correct way of referring to the country in Swedish is actually Storbritannien.
Interesting to hear. What you described as your formal description is correct for the UK but not for GB. However, a vast number of Brits would fail to identify the difference it can easily be forgiven. The second part about referring to the UK as just England is a little sad to hear though (especially for a Welsh person).
Exactly, that's one reason we take care not to use it that way in the course. (we don't teach the word England in the course, only Storbritannien).
The reason that Storbritannien means both GB and UK in Swedish is that only experts use the term "Förenade kungariket". It's rarely used in the press and even more rarely, if ever, in the ordinary spoken language. It's also a confusing term since it isn't obvious which kingdom it refers to.
It is confusing though because Great Britain only refers to the mainland, not to any of the British Isles.
Okay, I have a question. I answered 'is great britain great' out of cheekiness and it got accepted. Now, in English we use 'great' mainly in the figurative sense, rarely the literal sense, and we use 'big/enormous/massive/humongous' to speak of physical ideas (cf. "it's a great business" vs "it's a big business").
So my question is, is 'stor' used to mean the figurative sense as well in Swedish? t.ex "det är en stor (= bra) idé!"?
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It isn't used for that your sentence there should be "Det är en bra idé", "Det är en jättebra idé" or "Det är en väldigt bra idé" You get a lingot for knowing how to spell Idé and t.ex in swedish :)
They don't use an article with (most) countries in English. So it's just Great Britain, not the Great Britain
Yes but "Is great Britain great" isn't accepted either. I thought is was going for a joke.
The sun never sets on counties that have a day celebrating the day they told the british empire to go away.
If this one accepts "Is Great Britain great?", why doesn't "Ryssland är väldigt stort" accept "Russia is very great"? :)
For all the political science nerds shouldn't "Is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland large" be accepted as well? It IS their official name. Also why would you refer to them as Great Britain and not the united kingdom?
We're not supposed to accept technically feasible translations people don't actually use, unless there is no other alternative.
As for an explanation of the name, please see Arnauti's replies above.