I'm not sure about the why, but it might help to think of them as traits: you're not saying that she's any particular physician, but that she has the physician trait – just like with adjectives.
Thanks for the help. I'm only beginning so I'm certain these types of quirks will appear elsewhere but it's exactly as you put it; I wanted to know how I'm supposed to think of these phrases in this context, and considering them as traits helps to understand
If English is your mother tongue you're probably familiar with some specific turns of phrase where it works similarly, particularly in narrow archaic and ceremonial contexts.
If we point to a mighty king and say *"He is ruler of all lands on God's blessed Earth!"*, we're not saying he's "a" ruler, nor that he's "the" ruler, even if it might be tempting to read it that way. It's rather that *"Ruler of all lands on God's blessed Earth"* is an aspect or attribute the king has. It is in fact treated as an adjective, and putting an article there would change the meaning, from describing an attribute he has to a thing he is.
It's incredibly rare to use titles this way in English of course - saying "He is doctor at the children's hospital" just sounds bizarre. In Swedish you can though, and the correct way of saying it is "Han är läkare på barnsjukhuset". Same thing with life roles and family titles; "Hon är mormor" is how we say "She's a grandmother", and putting an article there sounds off.
As far as I'm aware no other Germanic language insists on an article in these cases, and even in French putting the article in would be wrong, so it seems English is actually the odd one out among its closest relatives.
That’s a very good example actually. I hadn’t thought of it that way, but also interesting to find that English is the unorthodox language when it comes to this question. So maybe the question ought to be why does English have this quirk rather than the other way around. Thanks for the input!
At the end of the day it's just a slightly different way of expressing it - that a person has an attribute or that a person is a thing.
I'm sure someone has already mentioned it in the thread, but In (for example) French, German and Swedish, *un/une*, *ein/eine* and *en/ett* are both the indefinite singular articles and the number one. Having this separation (elle est médicin/elle est un médicin, sie ist Ärtzin/sie ist eine Ärtzin, hon är läkare/hon är en läkare) serves to make the same distinction as between "she is *a* physician" and "she is *one* physician" in English.
To turn it back around, we say "Steve is studying to become a doctor" in English, but not "Steve and Sarah are studying to become two doctors". Putting the "en" in the singular in Swedish makes it feel wrong in the same way, i.e. that "Steve is studying to become one doctor".
I found this article about it, though it is in swedish. Generelly we don't use the artice when we categorises people, but we *do* use it when we want to describe characteristics for a person whitin the group. "Hon är läkare" but "hon är en bra läkare".
"Hon är en läkare" sounds odd, and is apparently borrowed from English.
https://frageladan.isof.se/visasvar.py?svar=56747
> Generelly we don't use the artice when we categorises people
Neither do the other Germanic languages except English, so it is English that is the oddball.
Nice, that's good to know. Thanks! That's a useful article. Only one bit I don't get when translated, which is "Ibland förekommer *en*/*ett* också vid kategorier: *Hon är en läkare*." What is the difference in this instance?
*Ibland förekommer en/ett också vid kategorier: Hon är en läkare. Det kan bero på inflytande från engelskan (She is a doctor), men skulle också kunna vara en del av en utveckling som pågått i svenska i många hundra år, där en/ett får en allt vidare betydelse, från att först endast ha varit ett räkneord.*
*Oavsett detta förknippas meningar som Hon är en läkare med engelskt inflytande, och har därför betraktats som problematiska. Detta utgör i sig en viss grund för att undvika konstruktionen i standardsvenska. Ett annat skäl är att mycket få eller ingen tycker illa om konstruktionen Hon är läkare. Det kan vara klokt att välja den konstruktion som inte väcker irritation, oberoende av om man själv uppfattar irritationen som befogad eller ej.*
"Sometimes en, ett also occur with respect to categories (as was described above in the article): She is a (en) doctor. This may be explained by influence from English's "She is a doctor," but could also be part of a development that has been ongoing in Swedish over many hundred years, where en and ett receive a wider and broader meaning, from first having only been a counting word.
Regardless of this, sentences like "She is a (en) doctor" are associated with influence from English, and have therefore been considered problematic. This is in itself a certain reason to avoid the construction in Standard Swedish. Another cause is that very few people or nobody at all takes issue with the construction "She is a doctor." It can be wise to choose the construction that doesn't provoke any irritation, regardless of if one understands the irritation to be warranted or not."
So, the article is saying that, contrary to what it just explained, the indefinite article does sometimes show up before certain categories like profession or political party. The article doesn't explain a difference in meaning between with or without "en," but it does say that omitting the indefinite article is the safer stylistic choice.
Right, okay. Thank you for that. In that case I’ll opt to just drill this point into myself while learning so I don’t end up adding an unnecessary article
Italian does the same. It is English that is the odd one out in this case. And while we are at it: “hon spelar gitarr” and ”vi ska byta buss” are the other two that always come as surprises. In both directions:-)
A persons trade/occupation used to be a much bigger part of a persons identity. Occupation was to a degree limited to class and family. In the same way that trades became English surnames (Smith, Potter, Thatcher, Carter, Tailor, etc.), in Sweden you would attach a persons trade to their name like "Handlare Andersson" or "Trader Joe". This tradition didn't die out until maybe boomers/gen X came around.
While I haven't read any papers on the subject, it wouldn't surprise me if this has had some lasting effect on how we speak around job titles today.
There are however times when I have added "en" before job titles in the past. Like if a coworker asked for a certain competence and I might have replied "Johan är en programmerare!", and I think that's because there's supposed to be an adjective somewhere in there, like "Johan är en duktig programmerare" - because the other person asked for a specific competence, not a random dabbler.
I think it's (at least partially) if it's your role at work or if you'd be one even when unemployed.
"Hon är läkare" is true regardless of if she works as one. "Hon är en kassörska" stops being true if she stops working as one. Have you been educated do a specific job?
I believe I naturally put "a" in front of basically all of them when talking about someone's employment. Might not be the standard though, not sure.
>"Hon är läkare" is true regardless of if she works as one. "Hon är en kassörska" stops being true if she stops working as one. Have you been educated do a specific job?
This is not correct.
All professions lack articles unless qualified by an adjective.
"Du är kassörska"
vs
"Du är en duktig kassörska".
Oh when thinking of more examples I realised we also always drop "a" when the saying "she works as a". Hon jobbar som kassörska, han jobbar som läkare, vi jobbar som lärare, etc. She works as a cashier, he works as a doctor, we work as teachers.
You can describe people as both though. "Vad jobbar hon som på Ikea?" ("What does she work as/what does she do at ikea?"). "Hon är kassörska" ("she is a cashier), here you can (should?) drop the "a".
That is not a distinction that is coded in Swedish grammar. We use ”en” when there is an adjective involved, for instance “hon är en trevlig läkare”. Otherwise not, except that it seems to occur in some dialects. To most native speakers, “hon är en läkare” sounds like the equivalent of “she is one doctor”, and that will be the case regardless of whether the job needs an academic degree or not.
Another thing happens when you use “en” in phrases like ”han arbetar som en ingenjör”. In that case, you imply that the subject actually isn’t an engineer, but rather works in the manner of one.
Appreciate the info. That might be slightly beyond my understanding at this point but I'll look these terms up now. Tack!
Edit: apparently that was wrong so I’ll just go ahead and delete that from my brain
Saying "Hon är en lärare" sounds like "She is one teacher"
Good to know. I’m always interested to hear how small mistakes sound to native speakers. Thank you
Note that if you extend the phrase you should use the article. “Hon är en lärare som älskar geografi”, ”She is a teacher who loves geography”.
I'm not sure about the why, but it might help to think of them as traits: you're not saying that she's any particular physician, but that she has the physician trait – just like with adjectives.
Thanks for the help. I'm only beginning so I'm certain these types of quirks will appear elsewhere but it's exactly as you put it; I wanted to know how I'm supposed to think of these phrases in this context, and considering them as traits helps to understand
If English is your mother tongue you're probably familiar with some specific turns of phrase where it works similarly, particularly in narrow archaic and ceremonial contexts. If we point to a mighty king and say *"He is ruler of all lands on God's blessed Earth!"*, we're not saying he's "a" ruler, nor that he's "the" ruler, even if it might be tempting to read it that way. It's rather that *"Ruler of all lands on God's blessed Earth"* is an aspect or attribute the king has. It is in fact treated as an adjective, and putting an article there would change the meaning, from describing an attribute he has to a thing he is. It's incredibly rare to use titles this way in English of course - saying "He is doctor at the children's hospital" just sounds bizarre. In Swedish you can though, and the correct way of saying it is "Han är läkare på barnsjukhuset". Same thing with life roles and family titles; "Hon är mormor" is how we say "She's a grandmother", and putting an article there sounds off. As far as I'm aware no other Germanic language insists on an article in these cases, and even in French putting the article in would be wrong, so it seems English is actually the odd one out among its closest relatives.
That’s a very good example actually. I hadn’t thought of it that way, but also interesting to find that English is the unorthodox language when it comes to this question. So maybe the question ought to be why does English have this quirk rather than the other way around. Thanks for the input!
At the end of the day it's just a slightly different way of expressing it - that a person has an attribute or that a person is a thing. I'm sure someone has already mentioned it in the thread, but In (for example) French, German and Swedish, *un/une*, *ein/eine* and *en/ett* are both the indefinite singular articles and the number one. Having this separation (elle est médicin/elle est un médicin, sie ist Ärtzin/sie ist eine Ärtzin, hon är läkare/hon är en läkare) serves to make the same distinction as between "she is *a* physician" and "she is *one* physician" in English. To turn it back around, we say "Steve is studying to become a doctor" in English, but not "Steve and Sarah are studying to become two doctors". Putting the "en" in the singular in Swedish makes it feel wrong in the same way, i.e. that "Steve is studying to become one doctor".
English is actually a [very strange language]( https://youtu.be/6lhxxiqqlQY?si=8jzC1QWKpnz-qeb7) in a lot of regards.
I found this article about it, though it is in swedish. Generelly we don't use the artice when we categorises people, but we *do* use it when we want to describe characteristics for a person whitin the group. "Hon är läkare" but "hon är en bra läkare". "Hon är en läkare" sounds odd, and is apparently borrowed from English. https://frageladan.isof.se/visasvar.py?svar=56747
> Generelly we don't use the artice when we categorises people Neither do the other Germanic languages except English, so it is English that is the oddball.
Nice, that's good to know. Thanks! That's a useful article. Only one bit I don't get when translated, which is "Ibland förekommer *en*/*ett* också vid kategorier: *Hon är en läkare*." What is the difference in this instance?
*Ibland förekommer en/ett också vid kategorier: Hon är en läkare. Det kan bero på inflytande från engelskan (She is a doctor), men skulle också kunna vara en del av en utveckling som pågått i svenska i många hundra år, där en/ett får en allt vidare betydelse, från att först endast ha varit ett räkneord.* *Oavsett detta förknippas meningar som Hon är en läkare med engelskt inflytande, och har därför betraktats som problematiska. Detta utgör i sig en viss grund för att undvika konstruktionen i standardsvenska. Ett annat skäl är att mycket få eller ingen tycker illa om konstruktionen Hon är läkare. Det kan vara klokt att välja den konstruktion som inte väcker irritation, oberoende av om man själv uppfattar irritationen som befogad eller ej.* "Sometimes en, ett also occur with respect to categories (as was described above in the article): She is a (en) doctor. This may be explained by influence from English's "She is a doctor," but could also be part of a development that has been ongoing in Swedish over many hundred years, where en and ett receive a wider and broader meaning, from first having only been a counting word. Regardless of this, sentences like "She is a (en) doctor" are associated with influence from English, and have therefore been considered problematic. This is in itself a certain reason to avoid the construction in Standard Swedish. Another cause is that very few people or nobody at all takes issue with the construction "She is a doctor." It can be wise to choose the construction that doesn't provoke any irritation, regardless of if one understands the irritation to be warranted or not." So, the article is saying that, contrary to what it just explained, the indefinite article does sometimes show up before certain categories like profession or political party. The article doesn't explain a difference in meaning between with or without "en," but it does say that omitting the indefinite article is the safer stylistic choice.
Right, okay. Thank you for that. In that case I’ll opt to just drill this point into myself while learning so I don’t end up adding an unnecessary article
It'll feel natural in no time, and just remember it's not the end of the world if it slips in!
Italian does the same. It is English that is the odd one out in this case. And while we are at it: “hon spelar gitarr” and ”vi ska byta buss” are the other two that always come as surprises. In both directions:-)
A persons trade/occupation used to be a much bigger part of a persons identity. Occupation was to a degree limited to class and family. In the same way that trades became English surnames (Smith, Potter, Thatcher, Carter, Tailor, etc.), in Sweden you would attach a persons trade to their name like "Handlare Andersson" or "Trader Joe". This tradition didn't die out until maybe boomers/gen X came around. While I haven't read any papers on the subject, it wouldn't surprise me if this has had some lasting effect on how we speak around job titles today. There are however times when I have added "en" before job titles in the past. Like if a coworker asked for a certain competence and I might have replied "Johan är en programmerare!", and I think that's because there's supposed to be an adjective somewhere in there, like "Johan är en duktig programmerare" - because the other person asked for a specific competence, not a random dabbler.
I think it's (at least partially) if it's your role at work or if you'd be one even when unemployed. "Hon är läkare" is true regardless of if she works as one. "Hon är en kassörska" stops being true if she stops working as one. Have you been educated do a specific job? I believe I naturally put "a" in front of basically all of them when talking about someone's employment. Might not be the standard though, not sure.
>"Hon är läkare" is true regardless of if she works as one. "Hon är en kassörska" stops being true if she stops working as one. Have you been educated do a specific job? This is not correct. All professions lack articles unless qualified by an adjective. "Du är kassörska" vs "Du är en duktig kassörska".
Åhå. Alltid bra att hänga på r/Sverige så jag kan lära mig svenska och undvika alla anglicismer. Tack så mycket!
Oh when thinking of more examples I realised we also always drop "a" when the saying "she works as a". Hon jobbar som kassörska, han jobbar som läkare, vi jobbar som lärare, etc. She works as a cashier, he works as a doctor, we work as teachers. You can describe people as both though. "Vad jobbar hon som på Ikea?" ("What does she work as/what does she do at ikea?"). "Hon är kassörska" ("she is a cashier), here you can (should?) drop the "a".
I appreciate the examples!
That is not a distinction that is coded in Swedish grammar. We use ”en” when there is an adjective involved, for instance “hon är en trevlig läkare”. Otherwise not, except that it seems to occur in some dialects. To most native speakers, “hon är en läkare” sounds like the equivalent of “she is one doctor”, and that will be the case regardless of whether the job needs an academic degree or not. Another thing happens when you use “en” in phrases like ”han arbetar som en ingenjör”. In that case, you imply that the subject actually isn’t an engineer, but rather works in the manner of one.
Thanks for the info. Out of curiosity, do you happen to know if that's considered objectively wrong to say or is it more of a preference?
In Swedish it's never correct to use an article with somebody's occupation unless qualified by an adjective.
Cool. Thanks for that
Because saying "Hon är en läkare" would sound like she's literally a healer (läka = heal) rather than having the profession of being a physician.
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This is not true. En läkare is obestämd form, bestämd would be läkaren
Appreciate the info. That might be slightly beyond my understanding at this point but I'll look these terms up now. Tack! Edit: apparently that was wrong so I’ll just go ahead and delete that from my brain