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- Topic: Swedish >
- "Sju sjuka sjuksköterskor"
45 Comments
1857
Sju sjuka... I think I'm done with learning Swedish. It was nice to meet you, guys. Bye.
- 1857
As a Biologist, I've had to learn how to say very difficult words, but I guess this is my limit... And to think that I also wanted to learn Finnish! haha
Had you started to learn Finnish you would have been introduced to "ääliö älä lyö, ööliä läikkyy - don't hit me, you nitwit, you'll spill the beer"
- 376
Worth noting though that ‘ööliä’ is taken from the lyrics of a song and isn't really proper Finnish for beer; as far as I know, not really even in any slang use. You could say any of the following to really make it proper Finnish:
- ‘Ääliö, älä lyö [mua/sitä], öljy läikkyy’ = Idiot, don't hit [me/her/him/thatª], you'll spill the oil. This would actually rhyme, but changes the meaning.
- ‘Ääliö, älä lyö [mua/sitä], olut läikkyy’ = Idiot, don't hit [me/her/him/thatª], you'll spill the beer. This would preserve the meaning, but the word olut has a slightly formal clang; kalja would be more colloquial.
a) In both cases the sentence is missing an object pronoun, but in practice it could implicitly understood to be either mua (spoken Finnish object form for me) or sitä (spoken Finnish object form for her or him, both spoken and formal object form for that).
- 215
Sju sjösjuka sjömän sjöng på skeppet Shangai, samtidigt som sju sjukt sköna sjuksköterskor skötte dem.
- 1361
That's the oldfashioned word for it. It's accepted, but it's not what the job is called today.
- 1361
Sjuksköterska is also a feminine word, but it's used for both men and women. (except in Finland, where they are both sjukskötare instead).
- 495
What makes it feminine if its used for both men and women?
EDIT: Thanks ion1122. I am well aware of grammatical gender and the fact that contemporary Swedish doesn't have one called "feminine" -- hence my question. What I wasn't aware of was the fact that the -erska morpheme appears in other words with an exclusively female sense. Now I understand why people were saying this word is feminine even though it is neither grammatically nor semantically so in modern Swedish, only etymologically. Thanks for clearing that up.
- 204
OnsenMushr, to say that a word is "feminine" can mean different things.
1. Some words have a grammatical gender called "feminine" regardless of whether they in fact refer to men, women, or things. For example, in German the word Universität, which means university, is said to be "feminine". Like German, Swedish used to have masculine, feminine, and neuter grammatical genders, but modern Swedish has instead only two genders, called "common" and "neuter".
2. Some vocabulary items refer specifically to men or to women. Often these are occupations. For example, English has actor vs. actress. The items that refer to women are said to be "feminine". Swedish has, for example:
actor = skådespelare (pl. skådespelare)
actress = skådespelerska (pl. skådespelerskor)
Like the Swedish word for "actress", the Swedish word "sjuksköterska" has the "feminine" ending -erska. But although traditionally "feminine", nowadays the word is used to refer to male as well as female nurses.
Sköterska is sometimes used as a synonym for sjuksköterska. It is used for male and female nurses. Skötare is only found at mental institutions and are orderlies or assistant nurses. I believe that it is also genderless in this context.
There's an even worse tongue twister that goes "sju sjösjuka sjömän sköttes av sju sjuksköteskor på sjukhusskeppet i Shanghai" :)
Seven seasick seamen attended by seven nurses on the hospital ship in Shanghai?
Close! "Seven seasick seamen was attended by seven nurses on the hospital ship in Shanghai" ;)
- 1119
And what about sju skönsjungande sjuksköterskor skötte sjuttiosju sjösjuka sjömän på skeppet "Shanghai"?
You don't hear it more like hfwoo hfwooka hfwookhfateskor ? :) Sh doesn't sound close at all to me.
/ɧʉː/ /ɧʉ:ka/ /ˈɧʉːkˌɧøːtɛrskor/
- 376
Here in Finland the local Swedish speakers say just ʃ (sh), which is much easier to pronounce, and in my opinion also to understand. But those speaking riksvenskan (Swedish Swedish) call it moominsvenskan.
- 1742
Can someone help me break apart sjuksköterskor so I can understand the pieces? Sjuk is clearly sick. Sköterskor is... shots? Shot givers?
- sjuk = sick, as you say
- sköta = care or nurse (as in the verbs), plus a whole range of similar meanings
- -erska = female agent suffix, like "-ess" in English
- 770
I hope for their sake that there will never be seven sick nurses in need of care and depending on me to get help.
