Breakdown of Jag är hungrig, men jag vill inte äta.
jag
I
vara
to be
inte
not
vilja
to want to
äta
to eat
hungrig
hungry
men
but
Questions & Answers about Jag är hungrig, men jag vill inte äta.
How does men affect the word order in the second half of the sentence?
It doesn't! Men (but) is a coordinating conjunction. This means it simply links two complete, independent sentences together (Jag är hungrig and jag vill inte äta) without changing the word order in either of them.
Why is inte placed after vill? In English we say 'do not want'.
In a standard Swedish sentence, the negative word inte (not) always goes immediately after the first verb. Since vill (want) is the first verb in the second part of the sentence, it must be written as vill inte.
Why is there no word for 'to' before äta?
The verb vill (want) belongs to a group called modal verbs. In Swedish, you never use the word att (to) after a modal verb. You just put the next verb directly in its infinitive (dictionary) form, which gives us vill ... äta rather than 'vill att äta'.
Would hungrig change if a woman were saying this sentence instead of a man?
No, it stays exactly the same. In Swedish, adjectives don't change based on masculine or feminine gender. Because jag (I) refers to a person, it is treated as a standard 'en-word', so you use the basic form hungrig. It would only change to hungriga if the subject were plural, like vi är hungriga (we are hungry).
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