Den åttonde juni börjar vår semester.

In Swedish, full dates are often expressed with den + ordinal number + month:

• den åttonde juni = the eighth of June

The den is the common-gender definite article, and you can think of it as relating to an understood word like dagen (the day).

You will also see shorter forms, especially in writing:

• 8 juni
• den 8 juni

But den åttonde juni is a very normal full form.

Because Swedish uses an ordinal number for dates, not a cardinal number.

• åtta = eight
• åttonde = eighth

So:

• den åttonde juni = the eighth of June

This is similar to the difference between June eight and June eighth in English, except Swedish normally uses the ordinal form in this kind of date expression.

Swedish usually does not need a preposition before dates in this kind of sentence.

So English:

• On the eighth of June, our vacation begins

becomes Swedish:

• Den åttonde juni börjar vår semester

That date phrase already functions naturally as a time expression, so no extra word like på is needed here.

This is because Swedish follows the V2 rule in main clauses: the finite verb usually comes in the second position.

Here, the sentence begins with a time expression:

• Den åttonde juni = first position

So the finite verb must come next:

• börjar = second position

Then comes the subject:

• vår semester

So:

• Den åttonde juni börjar vår semester.

If you start with the subject instead, you get:

• Vår semester börjar den åttonde juni.

Both are correct. The difference is mainly what comes first for emphasis or structure.

After a possessive word like min, din, vår, hans, deras, Swedish normally uses the indefinite form of the noun.

So you say:

• min bok = my book
• vårt hus = our house
• vår semester = our vacation

Not:

• min boken
• vårt huset
• vår semestern

The possessive already makes the noun definite in meaning, so Swedish does not usually add the separate definite ending as well.

No — this is a very important false friend.

In Swedish, semester usually means:

• vacation
• holiday from work
• especially annual leave

It does not normally mean an academic term in the English sense.

For a school or university term, Swedish usually uses:

• termin

So:

• vår semester = our vacation
• höstterminen = the autumn term

Because in Swedish, the names of months and days of the week are normally written with lowercase letters.

So Swedish writes:

• juni
• måndag
• fredag

not:

• Juni
• Måndag
• Fredag

They are only capitalized if they begin a sentence.

Yes, absolutely.

These two sentences both work:

• Den åttonde juni börjar vår semester.
• Vår semester börjar den åttonde juni.

They mean essentially the same thing. The difference is mainly in focus:

• Den åttonde juni... puts the date first, so it feels slightly more time-focused.
• Vår semester... puts the vacation first, so it feels more subject-focused.

Both are natural Swedish.

Here it means our.

The word vår can mean two different things:

• vår = our
• vår = spring

In this sentence, it is clearly the possessive our, because it comes directly before a noun:

• vår semester = our vacation

If vår meant spring, it would be a noun itself, not a possessive before semester.

A rough guide is BUR-yar, but that is only approximate.

A few things to notice:

• ö is not the same as English u or o
• j in Swedish is often pronounced like English y
• the ending -ar is common in present tense verbs

So börjar sounds roughly like:

• BUR-yar

but with a distinctly Swedish ö sound.

If you are learning pronunciation, the trickiest sounds in this sentence are probably:

• å in åttonde
• ö in börjar

Yes.

The verb is börja = to begin / to start
Its present tense form is börjar = begins / starts

So in this sentence:

• börjar = begins

This is a very common Swedish pattern:

• infinitive: börja
• present: börjar

For example:

• Jag börjar nu. = I’m starting now.
• Skolan börjar imorgon. = School starts tomorrow.