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Questions & Answers about Eleven läser en bok.
Why does the translation say 'is reading' when Swedish just says läser?
Swedish does not have a separate tense for ongoing actions like the English '-ing' form. The present tense läser covers both 'reads' and 'is reading', and you just use the context to tell which one makes sense.
I thought the word for student was student. Why does this sentence use eleven?
In Swedish, an elev is a pupil in primary, secondary, or high school. The word student is generally reserved for someone studying at a university, or for the specific event of graduating from high school.
I have heard people use läser to mean 'studying'. Is that what it means in this sentence?
Not in this case. While läser is frequently used to mean 'studying' a specific academic subject (like jag läser matematik for 'I am studying math'), when the object is a physical reading material like en bok, it simply means 'reading'.