Hello everyone,
It’s grammar time 
! One blog reader posted an interesting question about two tenses of the verb. He’s asking about the difference of using simple past tense and perfect tense in English and Swedish. Here’s the question:
I was wondering if you can address past tense vs. perfect tense in Swedish. It seems that the perfect tense is used much more often than in English.
For example, in Swedish people often say “Vad har hänt?” whereas in English it would typically be said “What happened?”
Another reader earlier posted this question about the –ing form in English and how to express it in Swedish:
Have you done the difference in Swedish and English when it comes to using the present participle. That was one of the hardest things to wrap my head around when I first started learning Swedish, because I would want to construct sentences with the present participle all the time, but you don’t usually do that in Swedish.
For example: “I am running”, “I am singing”, “I am doing it” would be “jag springer”, “jag sjunger”, “jag gör det.” Which is a different tense and something that is important for English speakers learning Swedish to understand.
First it might seem like these two questions aren’t at all related to each other but since I started working on the first one I realized that I was also getting closer to the answer of the second one.
I’m neither a native speaker of English nor very educated in English grammar so I’m playing it safe and choose stay away from making a comparison between the two languages here. What I will do in this article is to explain when to use perfect tense (perfekt) and past tense (preteritum) in Swedish language. All comments on the differences between English (British or American) and Swedish are more than welcome!
Tense and aspect
Most of us know that tense (tempus in Swedish) is a grammatical category that defines the time for an action, when something happens. When speaking, Swedish, English or any other language, we don’t only want to express when something happens but also if the action is temporary, repeated, completed or continuous. This is what we call the aspect of the verb. Aspect also represents time but has to do with the flow of the action compared to tense which locates the state in time.
The aspect of the verb is shown in different ways in different languages. In some languages there will be a certain ending on the verb and in other languages there are always two pairs of verb showing two different aspects. In French for example (this is one of few things I remember from French lessons in school) there are two forms of past – “passé simple” and “imparfait”. The first one is used when you talk about a completed action and the other one for a not completed action. If you look in an old Swedish grammar book you will find that “preteritum” is called “imperfekt”. There was a change of terms some years ago since “imperfect” isn’t a correct description – “preteritum” describes a completed action.
Perfect or past tense (perfekt or preteritum)
Speaking Swedish you should always use the perfect form to express a continuous action, continuous time or if we now have a result or continuation of the action that is interesting. Hopefully a few examples will show what I mean:
Göran har rökt i 15 år.
(”Göran has been smoking for 15 years.”)
This means that Göran has been smoking and still is, the action continues.
Göran har rökt 5 cigaretter idag.
(“Göran has smoked 15 cigarettes today.”)
In this case the action, smoking the cigarettes, is over but the time – today – continues, it is still today.
Har du tagit rökpaus ännu, Göran, eller vill du följa med ut och röka?
(“Have you taken a smoke break yet Göran, or do you want to come along for a smoke?”)
In this case you have to use perfect in Swedish since the action (har tagit paus) gives us a continuation or result (vill följa med och röka) that is interesting.
Here’s another example:
Jag har inte ätit så jag är hungrig.
(”I haven’t eaten so I’m hungry”)
We have a result (I’m hungry) of the action (haven’t eaten).
The past tense (preteritum) should be used when we’re talking about a completed action in the past, meaning that the action both started and finished in the past. Sometimes the exact time is mentioned and sometimes it’s not. Here are a few examples:
Jag såg en film igår.
(“I saw a movie yesterday.”)
Olle tvättade bilen förra veckan.
(“Olle washed his car last week.”)
Anna studerade vid universitetet i Lund.
(“Anna studied at the university in Lund.”)
Other ways of expressing continuous or completed action in Swedish
Except for using perfect instead of present tense or pluperfect instead of past tense there isn’t any grammatical ways to express the aspect of the verb in Swedish. To do so you have to you use the vocabulary. In some cases the “partikelverb” come in handy to more clearly express a completed action. Take a look at this:
äta
(eat)
äta upp
(finsish eating, finish the food)
dricka
(drink)
dricka upp
(finish the drink, empty the glass)
With the particle “upp” and “ur” we can get an aspect of the verb – we know that the action is completed.
When it comes to the English progressive aspect, the be – ing, it’s a little harder. It’s hard to clearly express the progressive aspect as clearly in the Swedish language. That’s probably why it’s a common mistake a Swedish speaking person will make when speaking English. Most of the time we would simply use the present tense in Swedish and don’t show any difference between the continuous and not continuous aspect. You will have to understand the aspect sense from the context. However you could use “håller på att” or some other paraphrase.
Vad gör Janne?
Han jobbar i trädgården.
(“He works in the garden./He is working in the garden.”)
Vad gör Janne?
Han är ute och jobbar i trädgården.
(“He’s out in the garden working.”)
Vad håller Janne på med?
Han håller på och jobbar i trädgården.
(“What is Janne up to? He’s working in the garden.”)
Thank you everyone for reading an have fun learning Swedish!
Tags: perfekt, preteritum, verb
Thanks.
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Det var så lite
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Thank you, its a question I have been looking for. Does anyone know when you say I read a good book. Is it_ Jag har läst en bra bok or Jag läste en bra bok.
Thanks!
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Hej Erika,
Thank you for your comment. I’d say it depends – if you wish to express a completed action that happened at a certain point of time, then use “läste”, “-Vad gjorde du igår? -Jag läste en bok.”. If you wish to express that your action has a interesting result for or connection with the present time, use “har läst”. “-Jag har läst en bra bok. -Jaha, vad handlar den om?”.
Sara
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Hi! Thanks for a great blog!
I’ve recommended your blog in the LJ community learn_swedish.
/Moa
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Hej Moa!
Thanks, I made a quick visit to the community (hadn’t heard of it before). It looks great
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Yet another good post Swedish teacher!
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Hello,
Great blog, it helps very much
I have a question:
When adding AR and when ER at the present tense?
I found something but it doesn’t answers to all my questions
When adding the ER, the stem of the verb is ending in consonant
Komm+er—Kommer
But, tala+r—–Talar
The infinitive of first verb si also komma and tala. I read something that in the first conjugation A is a part of the steam. I don;t quite understand it. If we take A from the ending we have just consonants.
Please, make a clearer distinction
When adding ER and when adding AR in the present?
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Hey Sara, aka the lady with all the answers to all my questions on swedish……
I hope you’re well and had a lovely påsk…
I’ve been practising using bisats in various word order and am enjoying the challenge, but I have a new question… how do you know when an adverb is a sentence adverbial? For example, ganska is an adverb, but it still goes after the verb, even when used in a bisats (according to my sas teacher)..
eg, jag vet att hon är ganska lång.
But kanske changes order in a bisats…
eg, Jag vet att hon kanske kommer.
how do you know which adverb changes order and which stays put? I hope my question makes sense..
Waiting for your wisdom… And thank you as always!
S
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Hej S,
Thank you for all your kind words about this blog! My påsk was great and I’ve been quite busy the past month with new students. I’ll try to be more busy with blogging also
It’s a good question you have, I’ll write a post about is asap.
Sara
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Thanks so much, can’t wait to read the post
I have my nationella prov for sas grund coming up in a couple of weeks, and can feel the stress kicking in… Plötsligt börjar många frågar snurra runt i huvudet!
S
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I think something is wrong here…..
Many days and no answer…..
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Hej Alex,
I’m sorry for taking so long to answer your question. I’ve been busy with taxes and new students lately
I’ll try my best to sort out the confusion about the verbs for you.
Almost all verbs have “att” and -a ending in the infinitive form (att tala, att baka, att läsa, att ringa, att dricka, att skriva), verbs in the third conjugation, for example “att bo”, don’t.
In Swedish, the infinitive form is not the root/stem of the verb, the imperative form is. To create present or past tense of the verb you start with the imperative form and add an ending. For verbs in group 1 it looks like this:
Infinitive: att tala, att baka
Imperative: tala!, baka!
Note that both infinitive and imperative end with “a”.
Present tense: talar, bakar
Add -r to the imperative form to create present tense.
Group 2 (also called -er verbs):
Infinitive: att läsa, att ringa
Imperative: läs! ring!
You can see here that the imperative form (aka the root) in this group is different, it ends with consonant.
Present: läser, ringer
We add -er to the root/imperative to create present tense.
Group 4:
Infinitive: att dricka, att skriva
Imperative: drick!, skriv!
Present: dricker, skriver
Also in this group we add -er to the root to create present tense.
I hope it’s more clear now
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Thank you, thank you very much! Is very clear! I didn’t knew that the stem of the verb in Swedish is not the infinitive! As it is in many languages. You made it clearer than ever. It worth the time:))
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Hello and sorry that I disturb…again:))
I have some issues, mainly with THE VERB!
You said that the stem of the verb is the imperative form! BUT, knowing only the infinitive, can we form the imperative, and the imperative being the stem, the past and so on? Please can you tell me another way of making the difference between the categories of the verb? For example if I know just “att tala” how can I determine the conjugation, present, past and imperative?
I know that the request is a long one but I will be the happiest man in the world if you help me distinguish this aspect!
Mainly the first and the second group, I don’t know how to distinguish when i see the verbs at the infinitive, and from the infinitive I don’t know a specific rule how to form the imperative, despite of some grammar rules that I have
Best regards,
Alex
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Hi Alex,
Unfortunately there isn’t any good way to distinguish what conjugation a verb belongs to. It’s like with “en” and “ett”, you more or less have to just memorize it.
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I understand….I have to memorize them
Ok, thank you for your answer and for your time
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You’re welcome Alex! Keep asking
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hello….
I love this language!!…I am learning it
I want to know when I must use I and På
especifically in which cases??
THANKS!!!!!
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Hej Marcelo! I wrote a post about “i” and “på” a long time a go. Have fun learning Swedish and welcome back with more questions.
Sara
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Here are the posts:
http://www.thelocal.se/blogs/theswedishteacher/2010/03/20/when-to-use-pa/
http://www.thelocal.se/blogs/theswedishteacher/2010/04/06/what-about-i/
Sara
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