Nouns: Singular and plural form

Selma is finally going to tidy up her room. There's quite a lot of stuff where it shouldn't be. Ett udda par strumpor. Två nästan nya fotbollar. En hel massa böcker.

Ett par för små skor. En påse äpplen. Några viktiga papper. Två trasiga smartphones. While Selma is tidying, we'll look closer at these words here.

The first thing you might notice, is that there are several of each item. The words are written in plural form. We can spell them out in singular form as well. En strumpa - flera strumpor En fotboll - Flera fotbollar En bok - flera böcker En sko - flera skor Ett äpple - flera äpplen Ett papper - Flera papper En smartphone - Flera smartphones In the Swedish language, we form plural by adding a suffix at the end of the noun. And in a few cases, the word changes a bit more than its ending too.

And some words, get no suffix at all. So, how do you know when to use which suffix? Is there any pattern to follow here? Well, sort of. There a few rules.

But none of them are water tight. We can sort the nouns into six groups, based on how the plural is formed. Or actually, it's seven groups. If you want to use fancy grammar talk, you can call these groups declensions. The first group, or first declension, consists of the nouns that form plural with the suffix O-R.

Here are some nouns from the first group: En strumpa - flera strumpor En pappa - flera pappor En pizza - flera pizzor En känsla - flera känslor En ros - flera rosor Here, in the first group, you'll find mostly words of the n-gender, ending with an a. In the next group, you'll find nouns that form plural with the suffix A-R. This is what they sound like: En fotboll - flera fotbollar En båt - flera båtar En potatis - flera potatisar En pojke - flera pojkar En sjö - flera sjöar Here are mostly words of the n-gender ending with a consonant or with an E. And a few other words. The third group consists of nouns that form plural with the suffix E-R.

En bok - flera böcker En sport - flera sporter En dator - flera datorer En tand - flera tänder Ett kafé - flera kaféer Here you'll find many n-gender words ending with a consonant. And also a few t-gender words ending in a stressed vowel. Let's move on: in the fourth group are the nouns that get only an R as a suffix when in plural form. En sko - flera skor En tå - flera tår En bakelse - flera bakelser En hustru - flera hustrur En aktie - flera aktier Here too are mostly words in n-gender, but these end with vowels. So far we have found almost entirely words of the n-gender.

Where have all the words of the t-gender gone? Well, quite a few of them are found in the fifth group, the one that gets its plural form with the suffix N. Ett äpple - flera äpplen Ett möte - flera möten Ett bränsle - flera bränslen Ett bi - flera bin Ett öra - flera öron These are the t-gender words that end in a non-stressed vowel. T-gender words ending with a consonant are mostly found in the sixth group, and they don't get any suffix at all: Ett papper - flera papper Ett lejon - flera lejon Ett ägg - flera ägg Ett mikroskop - flera mikroskop En musiker - flera musiker There you have them: the six groups of nouns, the six declensions. Now, can you fit all nouns into these six groups?

No. When we borrow words from other languages, they don't always fit into any of the groups. Sometimes, we use English plural for instance: En smartphone, flera smartphones En dumpling, flera dumplings Or latin: Ett faktum - flera fakta Ett visum - flera visa Sometimes you find words that we have borrowed in its plural form, but we use it as singular in Swedish. En keps, flera kepsar. En gnocchi, flera...

gnocchisar? En muffins - flera... öh, muffins... ar? There you have them, seven groups to sort your nouns into. And look!

It seems like Selma has organised all the nouns in her room, too.