Breakdown of Vem är kvinnan som regisserar filmen?
vara
to be
vem
who
kvinnan
the woman
filmen
the film
som
who / which / that (relative pronoun)
regissera
to direct
Questions & Answers about Vem är kvinnan som regisserar filmen?
Why is som used in the middle of the sentence instead of vem for "who"?
Even though the sentence starts with the question word Vem (Who), you can't use it again to connect the sentence parts. Vem is strictly used for asking questions. When you use "who", "which", or "that" to describe a noun (like the woman), you must use the relative pronoun som.
In the phrase som regisserar filmen, what is the subject?
The word som is the subject! It stands in for kvinnan (the woman) to avoid repeating it. Because som is acting as the subject of this clause, the verb regisserar comes directly after it.
The English translation says "is directing", so why isn't there a word for "is" before regisserar?
Swedish doesn't have an "is doing" (continuous) tense. The single present-tense verb regisserar translates to both "directs" and "is directing". Adding är (is) before it, like som är regisserar, would be grammatically incorrect in Swedish.
As a quick refresher, why do the words kvinnan and filmen end like that?
Those endings are the definite articles, which mean "the". In Swedish, "the" is attached to the end of the noun rather than being a separate word in front. So, kvinna (woman) becomes kvinnan (the woman), and film (film) becomes filmen (the film).
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