79. Reflexive Verbs

0:01SPEAKER_00:Hej sand! Välkomna till avsnitt 79 av Learn Swedish with Katrin. This week we're going to talk about reflexive verbs in Swedish. This is one of those grammar topics that can look a little confusing at first, but the idea is simple. The complicated part is to learn all the verbs that belong to this category. Let's start with two sentences Ya Twetar Bilan. I wash the car. Ya twetar me. I wash myself. In the first sentence I am doing something to the car, in the second sentence I am doing something to myself.

0:53SPEAKER_00:That is the basic idea of a reflexive verb. The person doing the action is also the person receiving the action. In Swedish, we use the following reflexive pronouns for this Yog May I myself Duourself Han say he himself she herself then the say it itself man say one you one self yourself we os we ourselves you yourselves dom say they themselves so if I do something to myself I use me if you do something to yourself and I am talking about it I use de to describe it with han hun den we use sei with vi we use os and with ni we use a ja twättar me I wash myself Du tvar de you was yourself Hon twättar se washes herself We tvetar os We wash ourselves Ni tvetar ear You wash yourselves dom tvetar se wash themselves And this is something you really need to pay attention to because a very common mistake is to learn a verb with se and then use se with everyone.

4:14SPEAKER_00:For example, you might have come across the expression at se to get married. In a vocabulary list or dictionary you will see at, but that does not mean that you always use se. The reflexive pronoun has to change depending on who you are talking about. Ya ska yifta me I'm going to get married. Du ska yfta de you're going to get married Han ska yfta se's going to get married Man can yifta se ishirkan You can get married in church I often hear Swedish learners say something like Ska ni yfta se are you going to get married or Dufor Vila Hellian You can rest this weekend But that is wrong The subjects are ni and do so the reflexive pronouns have to be ER and dei ska ni yfta eer dufor vila de hellen The same thing happens with other reflexive verbs if you learn at se to hurry you still have to change se depending on what you're saying yog musste me must chinda os Ni moste kunda er so try not to think of se as a fixed part that never changes when you see at schinda se or at yfta sei in a vocabulary list se is basically showing you that this is a reflexive verb.

6:40SPEAKER_00:When you actually use the verb you choose may de se os or depending on the subject It's just a nice bonus that a lot of the subjects actually use say as their reflexive pronoun. There are many Swedish verbs where the reflexive meaning is very easy to understand. You are literally doing something to yourself At tweta se to wash oneself at raka se to shave at clapo se to get dressed at göra sig i orning to get ready at göra sig illa to hurt oneself at gymma sig to hide for example Han rakar sig varje morron he shaves every morning ja klarpo me I'm getting dressed Barnen yumes bakom soffan The children are hiding behind the sofa here we can already see an important difference between Swedish and English.

8:26SPEAKER_00:English often doesn't use words like myself or yourself in these sentences. You normally say I'm getting dressed not I'm dressing myself but Swedish still uses the reflexive pronoun. The same thing happens with these verbs at seta se to sit down at legase to go to bed lie down at stella say up to stand up. In English we don't say I sit myself or he stands himself up, but in Swedish we do. Finally we have another group that is even more important to learn.

9:25SPEAKER_00:These are verbs where the reflexive pronoun might not feel logical at all if you translate directly into English so you're going to have to learn them all individually at sena se to feel at hinda se to hurry at bestemma sig to decide at bete sig to behave at koncentrera sig to concentrate at anstrenga sig to make an effort at vanja se to get used to at lera se to learn for these verbs I recommend learning the whole expression together. You will learn the verbs bestemma and concentrera on their own because they mean things on their own as well but in order to describe a person doing these things you need to use the reflexive version Ya me trut ida I feel tired today Hon bestämde sig for attraed to move Kan du bete Can you behave concentrera might I can't concentrate Vi måste anstränga oss lite mer we have to make a little more effort Man vanje snabbt You get used to it quickly notice again that se changes The vocabulary form is at concentrare se but I say ja can inte concentrera me the vocabulary form is at vanya se and I say man van ye because man and se go together.

12:23SPEAKER_00:There are also situations where the reflexive pronoun completely changes who we are talking about. This is a common mistake that honestly I would say the majority of native Swedes make two It's a pet peeves of mine. Let's look at han is he honom is him the reflexive pronoun is say we'll use the sentence atnogon ispiageln to see someone in the mirror There are three ways a Swede could say it using he as the pronoun, two of which are correct but mean different things and one is just wrong Han Sir Han ispiagen He sees he in the mirror Han Sir Honom ispiagen He sees him in the mirror Han Sir Ispiagin He looks at himself in the mirror Han is wrong Han Sir Han makes no sense but a lot of Swedes will say that anyway Don't do that.

14:07SPEAKER_00:Honom means another man he sees another man in the mirror se refers back to the subject so it means the same man. He looks at himself in the mirror This difference can create two sentences with very different meanings Hun lar henne svenska she teaches her Swedish Hunlar seven she learns Swedish in the first sentence there are two people one woman is teaching another woman Swedish at lara nogon nogot to teach someone something in the second sentence the woman herself is learning Swedish at larase to learn this is why you'll hear Swedes say that someone learned me something instead of someone having taught me something.

15:25SPEAKER_00:We use the same word for both learn and teach but learn also uses the reflexive pronoun. So the reflexive pronoun is not just a small extra word it can change the meaning of the whole sentence. The most important thing to remember from this episode is that reflexive verbs are usually written with sei when you learn them. At yfta se, at shenase, at chinda sei, at best, but se is just a placeholder that is meant to change depending on who is doing it.

16:11SPEAKER_00:To really get the hang of this I recommend studying the vocabulary lists and doing the exercises for the week. In order to unlock the study materials go to patreon.com forward slash slow Swedish and join the Learn Swedish tier for only$10 per month. Tack för att du har lyssnat den här veckan. Jag hoppas att du har lärt dig något nytt. Vi hörs nästa vecka. Då är det dags för quiz nummer fyra. Hej då!