Reflexive Pronouns
When the subject and the object of a sentence are the same person or thing, we use a reflexive pronoun. In English, these are words like "myself", "yourself", or "themselves".
In Swedish, the first and second person forms reuse the regular object pronouns (mig, dig, oss, er). However, for the third person (both singular and plural), Swedish uses a special reflexive pronoun: sig.
| Subject | Reflexive Pronoun | Meaning |
|---|
| jag | mig | myself |
| du | dig | yourself |
| han / hon / den / det | sig | himself / herself / itself |
| vi | oss | ourselves |
| ni | er | yourselves |
| de | sig | themselves |
(Note: Just like *mig and dig, sig is almost always pronounced "sej" in spoken Swedish.)*
Reflexive Verbs
Many common verbs in Swedish are inherently reflexive. While English might just use a regular verb (like "I hurry" or "she learns"), Swedish requires you to literally say "I hurry myself" and "she learns herself".
Notice how the reflexive pronoun changes to match the subject:
Reflexive verbs are especially common for daily routines and movements. For example, sätta sig (to sit down), klä på sig (to get dressed), and lägga sig (to go to bed).
Finally, when talking about how you feel physically or emotionally, use the reflexive verb känna sig.
