Breakdown of Svangur ferðamaður borðar hvað sem er.
svangur
hungry
borða
to eat
ferðamaðurinn
the tourist
hvað sem er
anything / whatever
Questions & Answers about Svangur ferðamaður borðar hvað sem er.
Why do we use hvað sem er here instead of hver sem er?
We use hvað sem er (anything) because the tourist is eating food, which is inanimate. If the sentence meant the tourist would eat 'anyone' (a person), you would use hver sem er. The rule of thumb is to use hvað for things and hver for people.
Hvað sem er is the object of the verb borðar. Does this free-choice phrase decline if a verb requires a different case?
Yes, the first word of the phrase declines! The verb borða takes the accusative case. The accusative of hvað happens to be hvað, so it doesn't look different here. However, if a verb required the dative case, the phrase would change to hverju sem er, and for the genitive, hvers sem er.
Why is the adjective svangur used here instead of the weak form svangi?
Svangur is the strong form of the adjective. We use the strong declension because the noun it describes is indefinite ('a hungry tourist'). If the sentence were about 'the hungry tourist', you would need the weak form along with the definite article: svangi ferðamaðurinn.
Does the suffix -maður in ferðamaður decline exactly like the standalone word maður?
Exactly. Any compound noun ending in -maður declines just like the word maður does on its own. So if the tourist were the object of the sentence, the accusative would be ferðamann, the dative would be ferðamanni, and the genitive would be ferðamanns.
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