Learn about nouns' gender
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| Hi everybody! |
| Anette here. Welcome to Ask a Teacher, where I’ll answer some of your most common Norwegian questions. |
| The question for this lesson is...How do I know which gender a noun is? |
| A lot of people aren’t sure how to tell which gender a noun is. Unfortunately, there are no rules to learn what gender the noun is without the article. So, many people learn the nouns and articles together. |
| Norwegian nouns are divided into three genders; masculine, feminine, and neuter. Let’s go over each gender. |
| First up, masculine nouns. Masculine nouns have the article en which means “a” or “an.” Let's take the noun gutt meaning “boy,” for example. En gutt, meaning “a boy” is a singular indefinite noun. To make it a singular definite noun, you add the suffix -en to gutt. Then, you get gutten, meaning “the boy.” For the plural indefinite noun, you add -er and you get gutter, meaning “boys.” Finally, for the plural definite noun, you add -ene and get guttene meaning “the boys.” |
| Let’s look at another example. Using the same order-- |
| En bil - bilen - biler - bilene. |
| “A car - the car - cars - the cars.” |
| Next, feminine nouns. Here, you use the article ei meaning “a” or “an” for feminine nouns. Let’s use the word dør meaning “door,” as an example. For the singular indefinite form, you add the article ei. So, ei dør means “a door.” For the singular definite form, you add the suffix -a after dør. Then, you get døra, meaning “the door.” In the plural indefinite form, you add -er and get dører meaning “doors.” Finally, in the plural definite form, you add -ene and get dørene meaning “the doors.” Not so bad, right? It’s very similar to the conjugation of masculine nouns. |
| Here’s one more example-- |
| Ei bok- boka - bøker - bøkene. |
| “A book - the book - books - the books.” |
| Last, we have neuter nouns. Neuter nouns have the article et. Let's take the noun hus meaning “house.” In the singular indefinite form you just add et and get et hus meaning “a house.” In the singular definite form you add the suffix -et and get huset meaning “the house.” In the plural indefinite form you generally don’t need a suffix, but remember, some neuter nouns need the suffix -er. Hus doesn’t, so you just say hus meaning “houses.” Finally, in the plural definite form you add the suffix -ene and get husene meaning “the houses.” |
| Let’s do an example where you need the -er suffix-- |
| Et vindu - vinduet - vinduer -vinduene |
| “A window - the window - windows - the windows.” |
| How was this lesson? Don’t worry if you don’t get it right away. Remember, practice makes perfect! And you can learn more about nouns at NorwegianClass101.com! |
| Do you have any more questions? Leave them in the comments below and I’ll try to answer them! |
| Hade. Vi sees snart! |
| “Bye. See you soon!” |
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