More adventures with learning Norwegian
Jun. 7th, 2019 09:26 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
yuuagoGood god, lie vs lay is confusing enough in English, how the heck am I supposed to keep it straight in Norwegian?!
It doesn't help that the words look very similar. xD But after poking at it for a while, I think I've got it sorted for Norwegian (maybe?!)
å legge - The act of placing something down or putting something in a resting position somewhere. Jeg legger bøkene på hyllen. I lay the books on the shelf.
å ligge - Something that objects do in a resting position by themselves. Klærne ligger på gulvet. The clothes lie on the floor.
In English, the difference is the same, so lay is the act of putting something in a resting position, while lie is what an object does in a resting position by itself. (The chicken lays an egg in the nest. The egg lies in the nest.)
Longer explanation on that for English here.
So, that's... relatively straightforward, though it's always been a challenge to remember which is which in English, and I don't think it will get much easier for me in either language. xD But who knows.
Another thing I have difficulty keeping straight when it comes to words relating to placement is stå and when to use it instead of ligge.
In English, we'd just say "the rug is on the floor" and "the chair is on the rug". But Norwegian uses ligge or stå for this - things lie or stand in place; they don't just exist in space like in English. Which makes for a neat bit of object personification, actually; I kind of like it. But it's a bit tricky to figure out which one to use.
So far it seems like you'd use stå for vertical things and ligge for anything else. So it's easy when it's something like a rug or a chair. Obviously the rug lies on the floor and the chair stands on the rug:
Matten ligger på gulvet.
Stolen står på matten.
But with other things, sometimes I'm not sure which it should be. Obviously en bok ligger på bordet - a book lies on the table. But when placed on shelves, books are usually upright, so does en bok står på hyllen - a book stands on the shelf? When a cup is on a table, does it stand there or does it lie there?
Also, apparently one would use å ligge for buildings: Biblioteken ligger i sentrum; the library lies downtown. Which is a little surprising to me, because my instinct would be to say that a building stands (though either of these phrases would sound kind of formal and old-fashioned in English), so I'd reach for å stå instead of å ligge. So I guess I'm just going to have to remember that one.
...9 in the morning is too early in the day for studying Norwegian. Or any kind of studying, for that matter. At least if one has only had one cup of coffee.
It doesn't help that the words look very similar. xD But after poking at it for a while, I think I've got it sorted for Norwegian (maybe?!)
å legge - The act of placing something down or putting something in a resting position somewhere. Jeg legger bøkene på hyllen. I lay the books on the shelf.
å ligge - Something that objects do in a resting position by themselves. Klærne ligger på gulvet. The clothes lie on the floor.
In English, the difference is the same, so lay is the act of putting something in a resting position, while lie is what an object does in a resting position by itself. (The chicken lays an egg in the nest. The egg lies in the nest.)
Longer explanation on that for English here.
So, that's... relatively straightforward, though it's always been a challenge to remember which is which in English, and I don't think it will get much easier for me in either language. xD But who knows.
Another thing I have difficulty keeping straight when it comes to words relating to placement is stå and when to use it instead of ligge.
In English, we'd just say "the rug is on the floor" and "the chair is on the rug". But Norwegian uses ligge or stå for this - things lie or stand in place; they don't just exist in space like in English. Which makes for a neat bit of object personification, actually; I kind of like it. But it's a bit tricky to figure out which one to use.
So far it seems like you'd use stå for vertical things and ligge for anything else. So it's easy when it's something like a rug or a chair. Obviously the rug lies on the floor and the chair stands on the rug:
Matten ligger på gulvet.
Stolen står på matten.
But with other things, sometimes I'm not sure which it should be. Obviously en bok ligger på bordet - a book lies on the table. But when placed on shelves, books are usually upright, so does en bok står på hyllen - a book stands on the shelf? When a cup is on a table, does it stand there or does it lie there?
Also, apparently one would use å ligge for buildings: Biblioteken ligger i sentrum; the library lies downtown. Which is a little surprising to me, because my instinct would be to say that a building stands (though either of these phrases would sound kind of formal and old-fashioned in English), so I'd reach for å stå instead of å ligge. So I guess I'm just going to have to remember that one.
...9 in the morning is too early in the day for studying Norwegian. Or any kind of studying, for that matter. At least if one has only had one cup of coffee.
Yuu. Fic writer & book lover. M/Canada.
no subject
Date: 2019-06-08 04:57 pm (UTC)...but I don't know if I have any good answers for you. I'll try, but I might not be 100% correct.
So, first of all, I'd say "boka står i hylla", so "i" and not "på". "På hylla" sounds like something is on top of the shelf, so you might say "på" if it's just one shelf (above a fireplace etc), or if you mean on top of a bookcase etc. If you mean "on the shelf" in a bookcase, you'd definitely say "i hylla" instead.
As for the library, it's neuter, so it's "biblioteket". Also, I think of "å ligge" in this context as directly comparable to the English phrase "to be situated in", and I never thought of the fact that it's the same word as the verb "å ligge".
no subject
Date: 2019-06-08 11:01 pm (UTC)Ah! With "På hylla" I was indeed thinking of one shelf (like above a fireplace, or a single shelf attached to a wall) So it's useful to know that for bookcases it's i hylla.
Thanks for catching that. xD I have a lot of trouble keeping the gender of things straight. It's interesting how it doesn't register as the same word. I guess it's because it doesn't necessarily mean the same thing.
no subject
Date: 2019-06-09 08:02 pm (UTC)I think your interpretation of ligge vs legge is spot on. One is intransitive (ligge), the other transitive (legge). In fact, it's the same difference as sitte (sit, intransitive) vs sette (transitive, meaning uhm ..set? place?)
On the ligge vs stå, welll I can see how it can get confusing but I think you've gotten the gist of it. Usually vertical vs horizontal is a good rule of thumb. As for the more gray zones: Glasset, skålen og tallerkenen står på bordet (all dishes I can think of), but bestikket ligger på bordet. The only way a glass can ligge is when it's fallen over horizontally.
When you use legge, the object will ligge not stå.
But when you use sette, the object will certainly not sitte or ligge, but stå.
Hope that helps :)
Una
no subject
Date: 2019-06-09 08:15 pm (UTC)U
no subject
Date: 2019-06-10 03:49 am (UTC)Thanks for the details! It makes sense that a glass would only ligge if it's been knocked over.
Norwegian is really interesting, because there are a lot of things in it that feel very much like English, except the English equivalents are very old-fashioned, very dialect-y/regional, or only used in literary language. I find it fascinating. <3
Regarding sitte - can sitte ever be used to describe the way objects are positioned? Or is it only used for things that actually can sit (like people and animals), and objects have to stand?
no subject
Date: 2019-06-10 01:03 pm (UTC)Rambling on about the subject:
Det står i boken (It's in the book)
Det står på plakaten
And then some idioms that I have some trouble translating since I don't actually know the English equivalent but I've tried:
Vinden står på fra vest (strong wind from a given direction)
Stå på! (Not directly translatable I think but Keep at it, come on, or imperative of persevere comes close)
Stå på krava(kravene</> but dialect): Demand what's right/ crave your rights?
Stå opp - rise (like out of bed in the morning)
That's enough for now, now I really should go and fix my flat tire and generally clean my bike but I'm lazy and don't want to.
But I must or I will have a super stressed morning tomorrow so, ugh.
Una
no subject
Date: 2019-06-10 02:29 pm (UTC)Una
no subject
Date: 2019-06-11 12:08 am (UTC)& Thanks for those details earlier. :)