Interrogative pronouns introduce a question of some kind. As the following
table shows, these pronouns usually inflec for gender and number; possible
genitive forms are also indicated:
| Common gend. | Gen. | Neuter gend. | Gen. | Plural | Gen. | Meaning | |
| vem | -s | ?? | vilka | -s | who, whose | ||
| ?? | vad | vad, vilka | what | ||||
| vilken | -s | vilket | -s | vilka | -s | which | |
| vad för en | vad för ett | vad för (ena) | what kind of | ||||
| vad för någon | vad för något | vad för några | |||||
| vad för sorts | vad för sorts | vad för sorts | |||||
| vad för slags | vad för slags | vad för slags | |||||
| hur(u)dan | hur(u)dant | hur(u)danna | |||||
| vilkendera | -s | vilketdera | -s | ?? | which (of two) |
The interrogative pronoun is the head of a noun phrase, usually its only member. This noun phrase, which is called wh-phrase, can have the same functions as other noun phrases: it may be subject, object, predicative complement, object of adjective or preposition, or possessive attribute. The wh-phrase must be placed in clause initial position, unless there are more than one wh-phrase in the clause, as in vem köpte vad ‘who bought what’. In the examples below various types of interrogative pronouns are illustrated in different functions:
(1) a. Vem har bakat tårtan? Vems skor är detta?
who has baked cake.the whose shoes are that
b. Vad har hänt?
what has happened
c. Vilket är ditt hus? Vilkas kläder hängde du där?
which is your house whose clothes hung you there
d. Vilket hus är ditt?
which house is yours
e. Vad för en bil har han? Vad har han för en bil?
what kind of car has he
f. Vad för något tyg ska du ha? Vad ska du ha för något tyg?
what kind of cloth shall you have
g. Vad för sorts djur är du rädd för? Vad är du rädd för för sorts djur?
what kind of animal are you afraid of
h. Vad för slags människa är han? Vad är han för sorts människa?
what kind of man is he
i. Hurdanna skor har du?
what kind of shoes have you
j. Vilketdera förslaget är mest praktiskt?
which of the suggestions is most practical
In the table and the exampels in (1), expressions of the type vad för en/någon/sorts/slags ‘what kind of’ are modifying a noun (cf. (1e) vad för en bil har du etc.). As indicated, there is an alternative word order with only the interrogative pronoun in first position. The vad-för-en types can also be used absolutely, without the noun: vad för en har han, vad för sorts har han, vad för slags har han etc. ‘what does he have’. Similarly with hurdan: hurdan vill du ha? ‘what kind do you want’. When vad för något is used in this way, there is not necessarily an implied noun, as in vad för något gör du? ‘what are you doing’. In cases like this, något is often replaced by någonting ‘something’. There is also a corresponding local expression with någonstans ‘somewhere’: var för någonstans bor han? ‘where does he live’.
Interrogative pronouns may be modified by the degree adverbials exakt ‘exactly’ and ungefär ‘roughly’:
(2) a. Exakt vilka böcker talar du om?
exact which books talk you of
Exact which books do you talk about?
b. Ungefär vad för slags blommor menar du?
about what kind of flowers mean you
What kind of flowers do you mean, approxemately?
The quantitative pronouns inform about share or quantity. Syntactic-semantically, they are divided in the following seven groups:
Totality pronouns: The pronouns of this group have the property to indicate that the utterance is about the referent or the set of referents in its totality without exclusion; some pronouns refer to individuative referents: alla hundarna ‘all dogs.the’, båda fiskarna ‘both fishes.the’. Other pronouns refer to a dividuative referent: all mjölken ‘all milk.the’, and a third group refers to one single individual referent: hela huset ‘whole house.the’.
Distributive pronouns: The pronouns in this group refer distributively to all individuals that is referred to by the noun phrase, emphasizing that the utterance is about all the referents of a cerain kind, taken one by one: han joggade varje dag ‘he jogged every day’, var och en fick en mugg soppa ‘each person got a pot of soup’, pojkarna fick ett äpple var ‘boys.the got an apple each’.
Generalizing pronouns: The pronouns of this group pick out an arbitrarily chosen individual from a set of individuals that is referred to by the noun phrase. Many Swedish pronouns of this class consist of more than one word: han kan lura vem som helst av oss ‘he may cheat any of us’, jag äter vad som helst ‘I will eat anything’. In this group belongs also the pronoun man ‘one/you, litt. man’: man kan aldrig vara för säker 'one/you can never be too sure’.
Multitude pronouns: The pronouns of this group indicate quantities of various magnitude, like många ‘many’ and få ‘few’. There are comparative forms of these pronouns, e.g. mycket ? mera ? mest ‘much ? more ? most’.
The indefinite article: This group consists of a single pronoun, the indefinite article en ? ett: en häst ‘a horse’, ett träd ‘a tree’. The indefinite article is identical to the numeral for 1: en/ett, which like the article inflects for gender.
Indefinite pronouns: The pronouns of this group have a very bleaching quantitative meaning: they cannot be compared, and they cannot be modified by degree adverbials. Like the indefinite article they cannot be used in definite noun phrases. In this group we find pronouns like somliga ‘some’, några ‘some, any’, as in somliga går med trasiga skor ‘some are-walking with broken shoes’, det är några tjurar i hagen ‘there are some bulls in grove.the’.
Negating pronouns: The pronouns of this group indicate that the utterance does not hold of referents of the type described by the noun phrase containing the negating pronoun. Pronouns of this type cannot occur in definite noun phrases: det var inga tjurar i hagen ‘there were no bulls in grove.the’, han hade ingenting sett ‘he had seen nothing’. As this example shows, the negating pronoun ingenting, used as an object, is placed in front of the non-finite verb. This is not true of the other negating pronouns, thus *Han hade ingen sett. 'he had noone seen'. The pronoun ingen cannot be placed after the non-finite verb either: Han hade sett ingen. 'he had seen noone'. To express this meaning, Swedish must use negation + a non-negating pronoun: Han hade inte sett någon 'he had not seen anybody'.
3.3.3.1. Totality pronouns
The totality pronouns are usually used as modifiers in noun phrases,
alla
pojkarna ‘all boys.the’, båda flickorna ‘both girls.the,
although there are some with a nominal function, alltsammans
var borta ‘the whole lot was gone’. When used in adjectival function,
a totality pronoun is inflected for gender and number, as shown in the
following table.
| Adjectival function | all ‘all’ | samtliga ‘all’ | båda, bägge ‘both’ | hel ‘whole’ |
| Common gender | all | samtlig | ?? | hel |
| Neuter gender | allt | ?? | ?? | helt |
| Plural | alla | samtliga | båda, bägge | hela |
Like adjectives, adjectivally used totality pronouns may occur together with a noun, as in (1), or independent, as in (2). There is no independent use of hel ‘whole’. Alla and båda/bägge combine with plural nouns, hela with a singular noun. Note furthermore that there is a definite/indefinite distinction with hel: en hel familj ‘a whole family’, hela familjen ‘whole.DEF family.the’. There is no corresponding alternation with alla: all mjölk ‘all milk’ / all mjölken ‘all milk.the’.
(1) Alla pojkarna hade kommit. Båda pojkarna hade kommit. Hela familjen had kommit.
all boys.the had come both boys.the had come whole family.the had come
(2) Alla hade kommit. Båda hade kommit.
all had come both had come
Syntactically, totality pronouns are placed either before or after the possessor: alla mina pengar ‘all my money’, mina alla pengar ‘my all money’, samtliga mina böcker ‘all my books’, mina samtliga böcker ‘my all books’, båda mina bilar ‘both my cars’, mina båda bilar ‘my both cars’, hela min värld ‘whole.DEF my world’, min hela värld ‘my whole.DEF world’.
Nominal function: Totality pronouns with a nominal function are formed with all- or båda-/bägge- as the initial part: allting ‘everything’, alltihop ‘the whole lot’, alltsamman(s) ‘the whole lot’; bådadera, bäggedera ‘both’.
(3) Han förlorade alltsammans. Allihopa försvann runt hörnet. Allting blev mörkt.
he lost everything all of them disappeared around corner.the everything got dark
3.3.3.2. Distributive pronouns
Distributive pronouns are always grammatically singular. The distributive pronouns in Swedish are var, varje ‘every, each’, varenda ‘every single’, var och en ‘each’, var sin ‘each’.
The pronouns var and varje are synonymous, but used differently.
Varje
is indeclinable, whereas var has the form vart in neuter.
Used attributively, varje is more commonly used, but
var is
preferred before an ordinal number:
(1) a. Jag reser till Boston varje år. Jag reser dit vart år.
I go to Boston every year I go there every year
b. Han reser till Boston vart tredje år.
he goes to Boston every third year
When used without a following noun, var usually means ‘each’ in the sence ‘per person’. Varje can only be used after a preposition.
(2) Vi betalade 50 kronor var. Han tog tre kilo i varje.
we paid 50 crowns each he took three kilos in each
The pronouns varenda ‘every single’ and var och en ‘each’ are more emphatic than var. Both inflect for gender, with the neuter forms vartenda and vart och ett. Var och en is only used independently, whereas varenda must be followed by a noun without a suffixed article:
(3) Var och en betalade för sig. Varenda sak kostade en förmögenhet.
each person paid for himself every single thing cost a fortune
Regular distribution of something is expressed by the idiomatic var sin, with the neuter singular vart sitt and the plural var sina:
(4) De köpte var sin glass. De köpte var sitt hus. De köpte var sina två tidningar.
they bought an icecream each they bought a house each they bought two newspapers each
There is no distributive particle in Swedish, like German je, and there is therefore no convenient way to express numerically equal distribution. Swedish sometimes uses varje ‘each’ in such instances, even though it otherwise is found only before singular nouns: bilen förbrukar en liter bensin för varje 5 mil ‘car.the uses 1 litre of petrol every 50 km’.
3.3.3.3. Generalizing pronouns
There are two groups of generalizing pronouns: one consisting of the pronoun man ‘one/you, litt. man’, and the other containing a number of lexicalized sequences of words formed by an interrogative pronoun + som helst: vilken som helst ‘anyone, ‘anything’, vad som helst ‘anything’.
Man ‘one’ has the object form en, and the possessive ens:
(1) a. Man föredrar blondiner, eller hur? Man måste göra sin plikt.
One/you prefer blonds, don’t you? One must do one’s duty.
b. Ens egna barn betyder i alla fall mest för en.
one’s own kids mean most for one
Interrogative + som helst
A) Used independently:
vem som helst ‘anyone, anybody (you like etc.)’
vad som helst ‘anything (at all)’
när som helst ‘at any time’, whenever (you like)’
var/vart som helst ‘anywhere, wherever (you like)’
ingenting som helst ’nothing what(so)ever’
B) Used both attributively or independently:
vilken/vilket/vilka som helst ‘any, any one (at all)’
ingen/inget/inga som helst ‘none at all, none what (so)ever’
hurdana som helst ‘any kind at all’
(2) a. Vem som helst kan ha gjort det. Han är här när som helst. .
anyone may have done it he is here at any time
b. Han läser vilka böcker (om Nixon) som helst.
he reads any one books about Nixon at all
Instead of the word order illustrated in (2b), the noun can be placed after helst:
(3) Han läser vilka som helst böcker (om Nixon).
he reads any one books about Nixon
3.3.3.4. Multitude pronouns
The multitude pronouns indicate large or small quantities. The form
used depends on the nature of the quantity, being number or distributive
amount.
| Number | Dividuative amount | |
| Large quantity | många ‘many’ | mycket ‘much’ |
| Small quantity | få ‘few’ | lite(t) ‘little’, föga ‘(very) little’ |
(1) a. Han har många böcker. Han har få böcker.
he has many books he has few books
b. Han drack mycket vin. Han drack lite vin.
he drank much wine he drank little wine
In (1a) is illustrated the use of multitude pronouns in indefinite noun phrases. They may also be used in definite noun phrases, as in (2); notice the change of form in the case of mycket ? myckna, and observe that lite, föga is avoided in definite noun phrases.
(2) a. De många böckerna låg på golvet. De få böckerna låg på bordet.
the many books.the were on floor.the the few books.the were on table.the
b. Det myckna drickandet gjorde honom irriterad.
the much drinking made him irritated
The multitude pronouns have comparative and superlative forms:
| Positive | Comparative | Superlative |
| många ‘many’ | fler, flera | flest |
| få ‘few’ | färre | ?? |
| mycket ‘much’ | mer, mera | mest |
| litet, föga ‘little’ | mindre | minst |
The attributive use of multitude pronouns is illustrated above. Multitude pronouns also have nominal uses:
(3) a. Det finns många som ogillar honom. Få har sett denna fågel.
there are many who dislike him few has seen this bird
b. Mycket kunde vara annorlunda. Hon förstod ganska lite. Det mesta är bra här.
much could be different she understood very little the most is good here
3.3.3.5. The indefinite article
The indefinite article in Swedish is en in common gender and ett in neuter gender. The article has the same form as the word for number one: en, två, tre ...’one, two, three...’.
(1) Han har köpt en ny bil. Han har köpt ett nytt hus.
he has bought a new car he has bought a new house
Usually the indefinite article occurs together with a noun. It may, however, be used absolutely: when unstressed, it is interpreted as the indefinite article, when stressed as the numeral ‘one’:
(2) Jag gillade särskilt en av SÅNGERNA.
I liked especially a/one of songs.the
3.3.3.6. Indefinite pronouns
The most commonly used indefinite pronoun in Swedish is någon ‘some, any’, which inflects for gender and number, någon, något, några. It can be used attributively or independently, as in (1):
(1) Några gäster har inte kommit än. Några är alltid sena. Jag ser inte några glas här.
some guests have not come yet some are always late I see not any glass here
There is no polarity effect with the indefinite pronoun någon in Swedish as there is for the corresponding English pronoun, thus some and any in John bought some books / John didn’t buy any books both translate into Swedish några (plural): John köpte några böcker / John köpte inte några böcker.
Other indefinite pronouns are åtskillig/åtskilligt/åtskilliga ’a great deal (of)’, somlig/somligt/ somliga ‘some (people)’, en (hel) del ‘some, quite a lot’, ett par ‘a couple of’, en och annan/ett och annat ‘some’, viss ‘some, a certain degree of’.
(2) a. Han nämnde åtskilliga andra skäl Åtskilliga av dem. Nu är man åtskilligt starkare.
he mentioned a great deal other reasons a great deal of them now is one a great deal stronger
b. Somligt arbete är underbetalt. Somliga har tröttnat på stressen.
some jobs are underpayed some people have get-tired on stress.the
c. Han köpte en hel del sprit. En del kvinnor protesterade. Det ligger en hel del i detta.
he bought quite a lot of liquor quite a lot of women objected there is quite a lot in this
d. En och annan roman läser han också. En och annan klarade testet.
one and other novel reads he also one and other passed test.the
He also reads some novels. At least some persons passed the test.
e. Jag vill tala med en viss person. Vissa av hans frågor kunde jag inte besvara.
I want to-talk with a certain person some of his questions could I not answer
Någon
The general meaning of the indefinite pronoun någon is "more than nothing". In a noun phrasse with specific reference it has a more pregnant meaning of quantity:
(3) Han sprang några kilometer. Han hängde några tavlor på sitt kontor.
he ran some kilometers he hung some paintings in his office
When the noun phrase has non-specific reference, the quantitative meaning is less strong:
(4) Har du några tändstickor? Han kände inte längre någon glädje.
have you any matches he knew not longer any joy
Någon may be modified by ytterligare ‘further, additional’, ännu ‘still’, till ‘’more’, åt gången ‘at a time’, i sänder ‘at a time’:
(5) Har du ytterligare något åt mig?
have you additional something for me
Do you have something additional for me?
Någonting ‘something, anything’ is nominal in nature, någondera ‘one ... or the other, one or other’ is adjectival in nature, and någonsin ‘ever’ is adverbial in nature. Någonsin can only be used in polarity contexts, i.e. after the negation, in conditional clauses or in questions.
(6) Någonting är sönder. Jag gillar inte någondera av dem. Han reste inte någonsin till Rom.
something is broken I like not anyone of them he went not ever to Rome
In a noun phrase with non-specific meaning, någon is often interchangable with the indefinite article:
(7) Har du frågat någon (Å en) advokat? Om du köper någon (Å en) glass vill jag smaka.
have you asked some ( a) lawyer if you buy any a icecream want I taste
3.3.3.7. Negating pronouns
The negating pronoun ingen ‘none’ is adjectival in nature and is inflected in gender and number:
ingen, inget, inga. The nominal variant is ingenting ‘nothing’, and the adjectival variant is ingendera/ingetdera ‘neither (of them)’.
The negating pronoun cannot be further to the right in the clause than the negation:
(1) Han hade ingenting sett. Cf. Han hade inte sett något.
he had nothing seen he had not seen anything
Ingen cannot be placed before the infinite verb: *Han hade ingen/inget/inga sett. This pronoun thus has another placement than ingenting, see (1). When the verb is in second position, though, there is no difference in the use of ingen compared with ingenting:
(2) Han såg ingen/inget/inga/ingenting.
he saw none nothing
A relational pronoun characterizes something by relating it to another referent. All relational pronouns are adjectival in nature. There are four main types of relational pronouns:
Comparative pronouns: The pronouns in this group compares the referent with another referent with respect to identity or nature. Syntactically these pronouns are characterized by being able to take a comparative subjunction phrase or comparative subordinate clause: han har samma bil som hon ’he has same car as she’, flickorna har likadana skor ‘girls.the have just the same shoes’.
Ordinative pronouns: The pronouns in this group order the referent in a series of identical referents: hans första marathon var en plåga ‘his first marathon was a torment’, hennes nästa bok blir troligen också en succe ‘her next book will probably also be a success’.
Perspective pronouns: The pronouns in this group characterize a referent by indicating its orientation in the physical room in relation to some other referent, or the speaker: den bortre linjen ‘the farthest line.the’, han valde den mellersta lådan ‘he chose the middle box’.
Focusing pronouns:The pronouns in this group are focalizing the referent, indicating that it is just this referent and not someone else that is referred to: konungen själv ville deltaga ‘king.the himself wanted to-participate’, mitt eget lilla projekt ‘my own little project’.
3.3.4.1. Comparative pronouns
Comparative pronouns indicate a comparison with respect to identity or property: annan ‘other’, samma ‘same’, likadan ‘alike, of the same kind’. They may take a comparative phrase or clause as its complement:
(1) a. Han har samma skor som sin bror.
he has same shoes as his brother
b. Jag gav Eva och Anna likadana pennor.
I gave Eva and Anna the same kind of pencils
Samma is inflected as an adjective in definite form, and it may indicate a masculine head noun with the ending -e: samme man ‘same man’ ? samma kvinna ‘same woman’. Samma may take modifiers indicating the degree of exactness. When samma is used attributively, the comparative clause appears as the complement of the head noun:
(2) a. Han har precis samma näsa som sin far.
he has just same nose as his father
b. Samma dag som du kom for han till Paris.
same day as you came went he to Paris
In nominal function samma appears as densamma. The first part of this word inflects for gender and number like the pronoun den: densamma, detsamma, desamma. This form can also take genitive ?s (only in formal writing):
(3) a. Din solbränna är densamma som när jag träffade dig i fjol.
your tan is the-same as when I met you last year
b. Hon kysste stadsministern i densammes tjänsterum.
she kissed prime-minister.the in that person’s office
The pronouns sådan ‘such’ and likadan ‘alike, of the same kind’ inflect for gender and number: sådan, sådant, sådana, likadan, likadant, likadana. Sådan is often followed by här ‘here’ and där ‘there’:
(4) Du köper sådana här byxor för att irritera mig.
you buy such here trousers for to annoy me
When sådan and likadan are used attributively, the comparative clause appears as the complement of the head noun:
(5) Han har sådana / likadana skor som jag har.
he has such of.the-same-kind shoes as I have
Sådant (neuter singular) can be used in nominal function, and likadant in an adverbial function as manner adverbial:
(6) Sådant är obehagligt. Han ritar precis likadant som sin bror.
such is unpleasant he draws just alike as his brother
The pronoun annan ‘other’ indicates that there is a difference
with respect to identity. It is inflected for definiteness, gender and
number. The same holds for övrig, a comparative pronoun with
more or less the same meaning as annan, but preferrably used in
formal written style:
| Indef. com. gender sg | Indef. neutrum sg. | Indef. plural | Definit form | Definite masc. |
| annan, övrig | annat, övrigt | andra, övriga | andra, övriga | andre ?? |
The examples below illustrate the adjectival and nominal function of annan.
(7) a. Jag vill ha en annan bok.
I want to-have another book
b. Annat var inte att vänta.
other was not to wait
Anything else was not to be expected
3.3.4.2. Ordinative pronouns
An ordinative pronoun, like första ‘fist’, sista last’, förra ¨previous’, senaste ‘last’ and nästa ‘next’, indicates that a referent is uniquely identified as taking a particular position in an ordered set. The ordinate pronoun första is identical to the ordinate numeral for 1, i.e. första ‘first’. Hence ordinative pronouns are found in definite noun phrases. Ordinative pronous are mainly used as attributives, placed after the definite attribute and before other descriptive attributes. They are placed either before or after quantity attributes. An ordinative pronoun may also occur after an adjective attribute
(1) a. de sista uttröttade resenärerna mina första ihoptjänade pengar
the last exhausted travellers my first earned money
b. de tre senaste romanerna de senaste tre romanerna
the three latest novels the latest three novels
c. ett misslyckat sista försök
an unsuccessful last attempt
3.3.4.3. Perspective pronouns
Perspective pronouns, like norra ‘the north (part of)’, södra ‘the south’ etc., vänstra ‘the left’ etc., bortre, bortersta ‘the farthest away of’, främre ‘the foremost of’, övre ‘the upper‘, nedre ‘farthest down’, indicate the physical position of a referent in relation to something else, often the speaker. Like the ordinative pronouns the perspective ones uniquely determine the referent, and they are mostly found in definite noun phrases. Also rätt ‘right’ and fel ‘wrong’ belong to this group, but they differ from the other ones in not necessary being in a definite form. Rätt has the definite form rätta ‘the right one’; there is no corresponding form of fel, instead the adjective felaktiga is used in its definite form.
(1) a. Den södra sidan är varmast. Den vänstre mannen är min bror.
the south side is warmest the leftmost man.the is my brother
b. Han är den främste av alla. Han är närmast.
he is the foremost of all he is the closest one
c. Hittade du rätt nyckel? Hittade du den rätta nycken? (more or less synonymous)
found you right key found you the right key
To the group of perspective pronouns belongs also the pronoun ena (optional ene as masc.) ‘the one’, which indicates a referent in a given pair of referents. A definite noun phrase with ena may be paraphrased with an indefinite noun phrase where the pair is indicated as a partitive attribute:
(2) den ena av flickorna = en av de två flickorna
the one of girls.the one of the two girls.the
3.3.4.4.Focusing pronouns
The focusing pronouns, själv ‘self’, egen ‘own’, enda ‘only’, blotta ‘mere’, relates the referent denoted to other possible referents of the same kind. It is contrastive in nature and related to focusing sentence adverbials like endast, bara ‘only, but’.
Själv and egen are inflected like an adjective for
definiteness, gender and number. Själva and enda may
optionally have the masculine forms själve, ende.
| Indef. com. gender sg | Indef. neutrum sg. | Indef. plural | Definit form | Definite masc. |
| själv | självt | själva | själva | själve |
| egen | eget | egna | egna | ?? |
The possessive egen can be seen as the possessive form of själv.
(1) de böcker jag själv har skrivit = mina egna böcker
the books I self have written my own books
(2) Själve kungen kom på besök. Du måste tänka på dig själv. Gör det själva!
the self king.the came on visit you must think of you self do it yourselves
The king himself paid a visit. You must think of your own demands.
(3) hans eget lilla hus min enda egna bok Öppna eget!
his own little house my only own book open own
the only book of my own Start your own business!
(4) min enda egna bok Han var den ende svensken. de enda tre orden de tre enda orden
my only own book he was the only Swede the only three words the three only words
the only book of my own