“Som” sentences
The “som” clauses are used to describe or give additional information about something. Look at this example:
- Martin har en hund som heter Bobby. – Martin has a dog that is called Bobby.
The “som” part gives us additional information about the dog – his name.
Luckily, in Norwegian, there is only one word for “which”, “that” and “who” in such sentences – “som”.
Here are more examples for you:
- Jeg har en sønn. Han studerer i Tyskland. – Jeg har en sønn som studerer i Tyskland.
- I have a son. He is studying in Germany. – I have a son who is studying in Germany.
- Andreas har en bror. Broren er gift. – Andreas har en bror som er gift.
- Andreas has a brother. The brother is married. – Andreas has a brother who is married.
We can also use two simple sentences “Martin har en hund. Hunden heter Bobby.” – “Martin has a dog. The dog’s name is Bobby”, but they sound very choppy and we don’t really speak like that. That’s why we use dependent clauses – to add more information, avoid repetition, and give a better flow to our speech.
When can we omit “som”?
Compare these sentences:
- Andreas har en bror. Broren er gift. – Andreas har en bror som er gift.
- Du har kjøpt en kjole. Jeg liker kjolen. – Jeg liker kjolen som du har kjøpt.
In the first sentence “som” substitutes the subject (“broren”)
- Andreas har en bror. Broren er gift. – Andreas har en bror som er gift.
In the second sentence “som” substitutes the object:
- Du har kjøpt en kjole. Jeg liker kjolen. – Jeg liker kjolen som du har kjøpt.
When “som” replaces the object, we can omit it (similarly to English). If we omit “som” in the following sentence, it will still be perfectly clear.
- Jeg liker kjolen (
som) du har kjøpt. – Jeg liker kjolen du har kjøpt. - I like the dress (
that) you have bought. – I like the dress you have bought.
However, we can’t omit “som” when it replaces a subject.
Andreas har en bror er gift.(literally, “Andreas has a brother is married”)
We need «som» here, otherwise, the sentence will not make sense:
- Andreas har en bror som er gift. – Andreas has a brother who is married.
If you are unsure, it is always a good idea to use “som”. Otherwise, ask yourself if the sentence will make sense if you remove “som”.
Hi, I have 2 questions about Oppgave 1:
1. Why do we change “en mann” to “mannen” in “Dette er mannen som vil kjøpe huset vårt” , but we don’t change the noun to definite form in sentences like “jeg har en katt som heter Blacky” or “jeg liker en gutt som går på norskkurs”?
2. Toget kommer 8.30. Toget er forsinket.
Can we say “Toget som er forsinket kommer 8:30 (the train that is delayed will arrive at 8:30)” instead?
1. In the first one, you do not use ‘en’ in front of ‘mannen’, but you do with ‘en katt’ and ‘en gutt’.
2. Yes, you could combine the information like that:)
Thank you for the answers.
Could you please provide more examples where the noun has to change to definite form? I still don’t quite understand when we should use the definite form 🙁
In the question:
Jeg kjenner en mann. Han liker å spise vafler med bacon.
The answer is:
Jeg kjenner en mann som liker å spise vafler med bacon.
But is it correct to also say:
Jeg kjenner mannen som liker å spise vafler med bacon.
Agreeing with Riva’s comment, I think there might be a problem with this exercise? It seems to have to do with cases where there is nothing to be selected because ‘som’ is required … Apologies if I’m wrong in this, but even after viewing the solution I’m not seeing how to make the correct choices.
Did you type a dot at the end of the sentence?
You should not, because there is a dot outside the box.
No – it’s not that because it’s in Oppgave 2 (I was not clear about that when I made my comment). I’m not 100% sure but it seemed difficult to find a way to get the correct answer even after I had looked at the solution …
On #6 in the first exercise, interesting switch from the indefinite to the definite
…. makes sense b/c ‘som’ creates a ‘definite’ situation from an indefined one, interesting nonetheless!
I Oppgave 1, jeg skrive riktig svar men det viser feil.
Did you type a dot at the end of the sentence?
You should not, because there is a dot outside the box.