Home » Travel » Norway » Norwegian Word Play (Part I of II)

Norwegian Word Play (Part I of II)

© Valerie Borey

I’ve heard it said that you don’t really know a language until you get the jokes. This is particularly true with Norwegian, where so many of the jokes rely on clever word play and puns. I see no reason, however, why you can’t learn language through the study of word play. Not only are jokes a fun way to approach language learning, they’re also chock-full of cultural information and can make great conversation starters (so long as you watch who you’re talking to).

Read through some of the jokes below and see if you can figure out what the underlying rules are behind them. Test your comprehension afterwards by completing the exercises that follow.

Definite article
Like a lot of languages, Norwegian nouns have masculine, feminine, and neuter forms. Whereas English has only the word “the” to put in front of a noun, Norwegian has “en” (masculine), “ei” (feminine), and “et” (neuter). The joke below relies on the masculine article for comedic purposes.

Tidigt på morgonen arresterades Binladens familie i Danmark.
De som blev fångade var Mordern MarmeLaden broren Chokladen og systern Pinakoladen.
Polisen jagar fortfarande Binladens Kusin Saladen og hans farfar Baladen .

Bin Laden’s family was arrested early this morning in Denmark.
Those arrested included mother MarmeLaden [the marmalade], brother ChokLaden [the chocolate], and sister PinakoLaden [the pina colada].
Police are still looking for Bin Laden’s cousin SaLaden [the salad] and his grandfather Baladen [the balad].

Comprehension check:
For the following masculine nouns, how do you say:
The teacher...................lærer__
The nurse........ ..............sykepleier__
The minister..................prest__
The secretary..………...sekretær__

Ambiguous words
As with English, a lot of Norwegian jokes use double meanings to get their point across. Taking a look at these double meanings can be an interesting exercise in itself. Are these comparable to double meanings found in English?

Har du hørt om den svenske brannmannen som sluttet i jobben fordi han var redd for slanger?

Have you heard about the Swedish fireman who quit his job because he was afraid of hoses/snakes?

Vet du hvorfor svenskene ligger på stranden før de skal på fest?
Svar: Fordi de vil ha bølger i håret!

Do you know why Swedes lie on the beach before they go to a party?
Answer: Because they want waves in their hair!

En nygift svensk dame skulle prøve en kokebok hun nettop hadde kjøpt. Dagen etter kom hun tilbake til bokhandelen for å klage:
Det stod at man skulle helle smøret i panna og det hadde hun gjort, men da rant det bare ned i øynene...