As Swedish is a Germanic language, the syntax shows similarities to both English and German. Like English, Swedish has a subject–verb–object basic word order, but like German it utilizes verb-second word order in main clauses, for instance after adverbs and adverbial phrases, and dependent clauses.
Swedish is a Scandinavian language like Danish and Norwegian, and is also very similar to English and German. The Swedish alphabet is like the English one, but it has three extra letters – å, ä, and ö. Swedes love to use English words.
The vast majority of Swedish people know English because it is taught in schools from a young age. In addition, English is widely used in the business world and in popular culture, so Swedes are exposed to the language on a daily basis. As a result, they develop a high level of proficiency in English.
Other explanations offered for the “success” of English include the fact that the Nordic countries have relatively small and uniform populations which makes the teaching and learning of English easier, as well as the fact that most citizens are speakers of a Germanic language as their first language, which are in the ...
Swedish and Norwegian are very closely related, with many words being almost identical, or at least understandable. However, there are also many words that look or sound the same in both languages but have different meanings – these are known as false friends.
Swedish is an Indo-European language belonging to the North Germanic branch of the Germanic languages. In the established classification, it belongs to the East Scandinavian languages, together with Danish, separating it from the West Scandinavian languages, consisting of Faroese, Icelandic, and Norwegian.
Although more than 80 percent of people in Sweden do speak English, you might still come across people who don't, so it's best to learn some basic Swedish phrases for common niceties.
According to a report by the European Commission, over 90% of Swedes speak English as a second language, and Sweden ranks very highly in the English Proficiency Index worldwide – updated annually. The Swedish people get 7th place in the rankings, considered “very high proficiency.”
Norwegians are the clear winners when it comes to understanding their neighbors. There are three main reasons for this. First, Norwegian is quite simply the “middle child” — it's written like Danish, but sounds like Swedish. Second, Norwegians are used to hearing Swedish and Danish in public media.
Swedes have the best non-native English skills in the world, according to the eighth edition of the EF English Proficiency Index. Sweden's Scandinavian siblings Norway and Denmark also place in the top five. Of course, anyone who's visited Sweden, Norway or Denmark won't be surprised by the findings.
Sweden is a parliamentary monarchy and a country that has free and fair elections with a strong multiparty system. In Sweden, an individual has a good level of freedom in terms of civil liberties and political rights, which are legally guaranteed and respected in practice as the rule of law prevails.
If you move to Stockholm, the country's capital city, you will have little trouble getting around in English. The city is very cosmopolitan and home to some of the world's largest companies, such as Spotify.
Swedish Has a Lot of Cognates and Loanwords
Since English and Swedish have the same roots, a lot of the vocabulary is the same or similar. So, you already know a lot of Swedish vocabulary. This makes learning Swedish a lot easier.
Across multiple sources, Mandarin Chinese is the number one language listed as the most challenging to learn. The Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center puts Mandarin in Category IV, which is the list of the most difficult languages to learn for English speakers.
There are three separate dialects of the language, and it's only spoken at the southern fringes of the North Sea in the Netherlands and Germany. However, the closest major language to English, is Dutch.
Hello – Hej! Good morning/day/evening/night – God morgon! / Goddag! / God kväll! / God natt! Goodbye – Hej då! Thank you (very much) – Tack (så mycket)!
Mutual intelligibility
Generally, speakers of the three largest Scandinavian languages (Danish, Norwegian and Swedish) can read each other's languages without great difficulty. The primary obstacles to mutual comprehension are differences in pronunciation.
Norwegian is closer to English than either Danish or Swedish. In fact, it's often described as the easiest of the three languages to learn.
It is believed that there are around 230 million native speakers in the United States, making it the largest English-speaking country, while the United Kingdom has approximately 60 million native speakers.
Modern English, sometimes described as the first global lingua franca, is also regarded as the first world language. English is the world's most widely used language in newspaper publishing, book publishing, international telecommunications, scientific publishing, international trade, mass entertainment, and diplomacy.
Official and Minority Languages
The official language in Sweden is Swedish. In some parts of northern Sweden, Sami and Tornedal Finnish (Meänkieli) are spoken. There are five official minority languages: Sami and Tornedal Finnish (autochthonous languages) and Finnish, Romany and Yiddish (non-territorial languages).
Swedes keep to themselves
Swedish people are generally polite, friendly, and well mannered. However, talking to strangers in Sweden is not something that one does. Swedes try avoiding social interactions with strangers almost at all costs meaning that moving here can feel quite isolating.
1. Chinese — 1.3 Billion Native Speakers. Numbers vary widely — Ethnologue puts the number of native speakers at 1.3 billion native speakers, roughly 900 million of whom speak Mandarin — but there's no doubt it's the most spoken language in the world.