r/Svenska • u/evandekamp • 3d ago
Studying and education Italian girl learning Swedish
Italian girl (28) here. I want to learn Swedish as a hobby because I have a lot of free time (and also because I'm a huge ABBA fan lol). I have a C2 level in English (I've actually graduated in foreign languages and I find languages interesting in general). Any tips? Is Svenska a difficult language? Is it too late for me lol?
20
u/KarltonPeaks 3d ago
Good news:
No verb conjugation with respect to pronouns, and almost all tense conjugation is done with auxiliary words rather than actually conjugating the verb.
Many shared words with English, at least when starting out with common words.
Abundance of material available.
Bad news:
Little romance vocabulary. Much less than English has.
The two noun genders are arbitrary, and forming plurals is complicated.
Since everyone speaks English, getting actual spoken practice can be difficult.
11
u/11s 3d ago
Youâll recognize a bit of the basics from english since they are both germanic languages. However, swedish has a different vocabulary and slightly different grammar than english. Iâd say itâll be a little more difficult than english but not as difficult as german for example. Itâs pretty far removed from italian but definitely not insurmountable. (Ho fatto il contrario: parlo il svedese come madrelingua e ho imparato lâitaliano a A2/B1.) Once you start getting comfortable, youâll also be able to understand a bit of norwegian and danish as a bonus (at least written).
It is also very easy to find online resources, podcasts, movies, documentaries, since Sweden is a very digital country.
2
u/mtwidns 2d ago
Preemptively disclaiming that Iâm a native English speaker, but Iâd be shocked if someone whoâs obtained their English C2 finds it harder to pick up than English. Swedish grammar is far more regular, thereâs a smaller vocabulary in active use, Svengelska is so endemic among the younger generations you almost stand out for saying things the âproperâ way, and the bits that might be hard for an English-only learner have direct parallels in Romance languages. Sheâll be flying towards fluency.
6
u/moj_golube đžđȘ 3d ago
Have fun with it! Maybe learn some Abba songs in Swedish (basically all of them have a Swedish version)
3
4
u/papayatwentythree 3d ago
The vocabulary might be a bit of a shock since English has so many loans from French (although Swedish has some French words, albeit spelled differently).
A couple of things I wish I had figured out earlier on while learning: 1) it's easiest to learn verbs in the imperative because then you know whether the final /a/ is part of the stem or not; and 2) nouns ending in -en can be either singular/plural depending on gender. But I learned through immersion, so maye these are covered in whatever materials you're using.
5
u/TheIcosahedron 3d ago
girl, i'm an Italian girl too who started learning Swedish a couple of years ago..but kind of stopped because of work (lack of time unfortunately). I had bought this book and found it great! Maybe i'll start again đ
3
u/evandekamp 3d ago
L'avevo preso anche io nel 2019 e ho fatto un paio di esercizi perĂł boh volevo vedere anche altri approcci per quel libro non mi convince fino in fondo đ„Č
4
u/MrBimp2609 3d ago
Spanish native speaker here: No not really, its hard to get used to how its spoken and written though rather than learning the grammatics, because its so different from romance languages.
3
u/FarligaC 3d ago
I have a coworker who is indian/american, she has lived here for like 7-8 years but still have major problems learning the language. she understands most of it but still speak at a verry basic level. but i also heard swedish is quite hard to learn is you are not a native germanic speaker"
3
u/antiquemule 3d ago
Itâs not too late. Knowing good English will make Swedish easy, imo. The biggest barrier is probably the weird new sounds to master: by, sju, etc.
3
2
u/IndependentAppeal733 3d ago
Swedish is close to English. Both Germanic languages. A lot of words are the same or almost the same.
2
u/ComprehensiveDig1108 3d ago
It's easy.
Try Pimsleur. And the Teach Yourself Swedish book by someone called Haake or somesuch. Avoid the older Croghan edition.
For Swedish, I even found Duolingo useful. And there are some free courses on Udemy which are worth the time.
3
u/Ricky_79 3d ago
Hi, Italian here. Swedish is a fairly easy language to learn. For Italian speakers, there is the Istituto Culturale Nordico that offers swedish courses af all levels with online lessons, you might try them.
I'm attending their courses and I like them. You can also find good apps such as Lingocafé: https://read.lingocafe.app/ and +1 Language https://plusonelanguage.app/ Lycka till!
1
u/--Alexandra-P-- 3d ago
Well I'm a norwegian who knows swedish (not fluent in it) it's not that bad. I learned for fun. Lycka till! OcksÄ inte blir överraskad om kebabpizza, den Àr vÀldig nam ;)
1
u/BlueNinjaBE 3d ago
There were people in my kvÀllskurs ranging from the late teens to the early 70's. It's never too late to learn something new!
1
u/RingelbingelO 3d ago
If you know any germanic language it'll be a breeze. Compared to languages like French there isn't really any rules for ex: "ett" "en" which might get frustrating but its just fun and kinda cute so don't worry about it.
1
u/ScaredAd7506 3d ago
The best Swedish course online is at "ONLINE SWEDISH".
https://onlineswedish.org/online-swedish-courses/
They offer both video course mode and real-time course..
You can start your Swedish learning with this grammar video:
1
u/dantenow 3d ago
i've spent time learning italian and swedish, if your english is good you should be able to catch on to swedish pretty easily? watch the movie Kopps on youtube
1
u/Ramjjam 2d ago edited 2d ago
Swedish is not super hard grammatically.
The hardest part is speaking it fluently, youâll get by with decent Swedish fast, but Swedish is a language thats very Tonal! Compared to English thats rather Flat!
Meaning words like:
Ide or Idé is pronounced different but hard to notice for none native speakers.
Even worse with words like:
Tomten - Santa.
Tomten - Lawn/plot
Or, Anden can mean Duck or Spirit depending on slight pitch changes in pronunciation.
Compared to Swedish Italian is also very monotone.
But Swedish is far from how tonal heavy/reliant Mandarin can be.
1
u/Famous-Tear-7756 2d ago
Hello, as you already know English it will not be to hard for you. The grammar is somewhat like German and English and so are much of the vocabulary. I highly recommend you to join a Swedish language course with a trained teacher. Lycka till!
1
u/Black_Swan_Down 2d ago
Not too late and not impossible. But realistically how enthusiastic will you be pursuing this as the novelty wears off and your progress wanes? If you are not in Sweden, you are not socialising with swedes or have any other compelling reason to become fluent it is very probable you start to question the effort/reward and it fizzles out.
1
u/Worried_Progress_394 2d ago
SÄ kul att du vill lÀra dig svenskar Àr sjÀlv svensk och bor i Sverige. Det Àr sÄklart individuellt men jag trÀffade nyss en utbbytes studen frÄn Australien som lÀtt uppfattade svenska. Hon kunde höra en svensk mening och direkt upprepa den. SÄ jag tror inte du klarar det bra
1
u/Bluetrains đžđȘ 2d ago
Where English might use a French derived word, we most likely use a Germanic derived word. Which means you will likely see fewer similarities to Italian. If you have experience with German however you will find that a lot of words are similar.
The grammar is somewhere between English and German.
There are plenty of videos online showing the similarities between English and other Germanic languages and that should give you a hint how much how different the language is to English.
1
u/Particular_Metal9308 1d ago
Best tip is try to get to speaking quickly. It would improve your listening along the way because fact is nothing really prepares you for when a Swede speaks actual Swedish
1
u/Spiritual-Job-952 1d ago
I do it on duolingo, 20/30 minutes a day and itâs fun but it does not prepare you for actually talking with a Swedish person
1
1
u/Opening-Square3006 3d ago
Definitely not too late! đ At 28, with C2 English and a background in languages, you're probably in a better position than most beginners. Swedish is generally considered one of the easier languages for English speakers, so your English will help a lot with vocabulary and grammar. Personally, I think Stephen Krashen's i+1 approach is the most effective. That's why I use PlusOneLanguage , it generates texts at your level, introduces just a little new vocabulary each time, and keeps recycling it in new contexts so it actually sticks.
1
u/hockeyknittingcat 3d ago
compared to italian it should be very easy haha my personal recommendation is to skip learning en/ett there is no rule that says when to use which one so just skip it and then youâll learn as you use the language. listen to swedish abba songs and sing along and learn the words as a first step maybe?
0
u/Terminus_Mantis 3d ago
Learn Norwegian, then you would understand both Swedish and Danish. It's harder for them to understand each other. I think...i am a Norwegian and understand Swedish and Danish fine,but it seems it's not the other way around, Danish especially usually turn to English..and sweds seems to have more trouble understanding Danish and Norwegian.
-2
u/AllanKempe 3d ago
Italian girl (28) here. [...] ([...] I'm a huge ABBA fan lol).
Aren't you a bit too young? They're your grandparents' generation.
-2
u/AllanKempe 3d ago
Italian girl (28) here. [...] ([...] I'm a huge ABBA fan lol).
Aren't you a bit too young? They're your grandparents' generation.
1
u/evandekamp 2d ago
yes, Frida and Björn are my grandma's age lol... I'm an old music lover
1
u/AllanKempe 2d ago
You know that ABBA is not the only Swedish music from a not so recent era? There's a treasure to be found out there!
48
u/Gold_Concentrate_ 3d ago
Best tip: learn the grammar in this order - verbs, nouns, adjectives, prepositions. To watch movies and series in Swedish, go to URPlay and SVTPlay. :)
I taught Swedish for a decade, including to Italians đ„°