# Norwegian: heller [confusion]



## sjiraff

Hi everyone hope you all enjoyed your summer,

As the title says I'm a bit confused over how I should say "heller" in some cases, 

I was trying to think of the best way to simply say "Ours doesn't either" (it could be about anything)

My first thought of trying to put the sentence together in the best way would be something like:

_"Det gjør ikke vårt heller"_ (assuming it's an -et gendered word) - 

- but I'm wondering if this is right? I just followed the pattern of things such as "Det gjør ikke jeg heller" or "det gjør heller ikke jeg!"  ( i know you can also just say "ikke jeg heller" too)

The reason i ask is because I always google things in " " when I'm unsure and if it returns zero hits I start to doubt!

Thanks


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## Ben Jamin

sjiraff said:


> Hi everyone hope you all enjoyed your summer,
> 
> As the title says I'm a bit confused over how I should say "heller" in some cases,
> 
> I was trying to think of the best way to simply say "Ours doesn't either" (it could be about anything)
> 
> My first thought of trying to put the sentence together in the best way would be something like:
> 
> _"Det gjør ikke vårt heller"_ (assuming it's an -et gendered word) -
> 
> - but I'm wondering if this is right? I just followed the pattern of things such as "Det gjør ikke jeg heller" or "det gjør heller ikke jeg!"  ( i know you can also just say "ikke jeg heller" too)
> 
> The reason i ask is because I always google things in " " when I'm unsure and if it returns zero hits I start to doubt!
> 
> Thanks



The pattern of "Det gjør ikke jeg heller" works with both pronouns and nouns, and your sentence with "vårt" is correct.


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## sjiraff

Ben Jamin said:


> The pattern of "Det gjør ikke jeg heller" works with both pronouns and nouns, and your sentence with "vårt" is correct.



Really? Is it also ok to say that, "ikke vårt heller" works, but would mean "ours doesn't either" and maybe "det gjør ikke vårt heller" means more, "ours doesn't do that either"?

I know it's not the best measure to use google hits as a reference, but I was a bit surprised to find no Norwegian in the history of the internet has ever said "ours doesn't either"

Thanks!


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## Ben Jamin

sjiraff said:


> Really? Is it also ok to say that, "ikke vårt heller" works, but would mean "ours doesn't either" and maybe "det gjør ikke vårt heller" means more, "ours doesn't do that either"?
> 
> I know it's not the best measure to use google hits as a reference, but I was a bit surprised to find no Norwegian in the history of the internet has ever said "ours doesn't either"
> 
> Thanks!


I am not sure why you feel confused. As you wrote, lack of finds at Google does not mean that an expression is incorrect. I would add that it can mean that it is a colloquial expression used mostly in spoken dialogues, and not in writing. Norwegian is also a language spoken by 5 million people, so the amount of quotations at the net is much smaller than in the case of "big" languages.
I also find it somewhat difficult to answer your question about the exact equivalency between the Norwegian and English expressions, because language is not mathematics, but I think that your hypothesis is roughly correct.


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## sjiraff

Ben Jamin said:


> I am not sure why you feel confused. As you wrote, lack of finds at Google does not mean that an expression is incorrect. I would add that it can mean that it is a colloquial expression used mostly in spoken dialogues, and not in writing. Norwegian is also a language spoken by 5 million people, so the amount of quotations at the net is much smaller than in the case of "big" languages.
> I also find it somewhat difficult to answer your question about the exact equivalency between the Norwegian and English expressions, because language is not mathematics, but I think that your hypothesis is roughly correct.



Yeah, you're right it's not the best thing to go on...but I don't know, I guess I expected that to be said at least once.

I'm a bit relieved it's ok now to be honest, but you mentioned it's more colloquial than written? Are there any other/better ways of saying this you would consider better for writing which are less colloquial maybe?

Thanks!


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## Ben Jamin

sjiraff said:


> Yeah, you're right it's not the best thing to go on...but I don't know, I guess I expected that to be said at least once.
> 
> I'm a bit relieved it's ok now to be honest, but you mentioned it's more colloquial than written? Are there any other/better ways of saying this you would consider better for writing which are less colloquial maybe?
> 
> Thanks!


In writing, and especially in formal writing in Norwegian there is a tendency to write all the words that might be seen as redundant in colloquial language or by foreigners.
Also in colloquial language there are many words that might be deemed as redundant by foreigners (like "barnedåp" instead of just "dåp", even if "barnedåp" is the most likely event to happen in ordinary life).

So back to your question, a typical Norwegian exchange of sentences would be rather:
- Vårt hus har ikke vært pusset opp siden 1980. 
- Det har ikke *vårt hus* heller.
rather than "Det har ikke *vårt *heller."


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## sjiraff

Ben Jamin said:


> In writing, and especially in formal writing in Norwegian there is a tendency to write all the words that might be seen as redundant in colloquial language or by foreigners.
> Also in colloquial language there are many words that might be deemed as redundant by foreigners (like "barnedåp" instead of just "dåp", even if "barnedåp" is the most likely event to happen in ordinary life).
> 
> So back to your question, a typical Norwegian exchange of sentences would be rather:
> - Vårt hus har ikke vært pusset opp siden 1980.
> - Det har ikke *vårt hus* heller.
> rather than "Det har ikke *vårt *heller."



Ahh I see what you're saying now, that makes sense. A bit different to how it works in English, so a bit hard to judge to begin with.

Thanks


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## Sepia

@lack of finds at Google does not mean that an expression is incorrect.

Bingo. And vice versa. It even shocks me how some people consider "Google Translator" an authority - on anything.


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## Ben Jamin

Sepia said:


> @lack of finds at Google does not mean that an expression is incorrect.
> 
> Bingo. And vice versa. It even shocks me how some people consider "Google Translator" an authority - on anything.


I have learned that Google translator is based on machine scavenging of translations of texts into other languages and storing them in a database. Nobody quality assures the translations, and single words with many meanings are randomly used, for instance as "departed" can mean "deceased" you can find a translation like "the train deceased from the station".
This said, I must admit that if you use Google Translator for languages that have a large corpus of stored data, and are of non inflected type (English, Scandinavian) then up to 70% of the translation may be correct. Some human translated texts don't achieve that quality.


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## sjiraff

Sepia said:


> @lack of finds at Google does not mean that an expression is incorrect.
> 
> Bingo. And vice versa. It even shocks me how some people consider "Google Translator" an authority - on anything.



Yep, I almost never use google translate unless I have no other choice. 

But I mean, I think the zero-hits justified some doubt since I expected something like "ours didn't either" to be said at least once, and I tried many different variations. It's all part of the detective work you have to do sometimes when trying to work out the best ways of saying things/figuring out a word or expression.


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## raumar

sjiraff said:


> Is it also ok to say that, "ikke vårt heller" works



I'm not sure if this part of your question has been answered - but if not, the answer is yes. If you search for "ikke vårt heller", you will get some hits -- but many more for "ikke mitt heller". Many of these hits are from blogs etc, which confirms that this is a more colloquial version.



Ben Jamin said:


> So back to your question, a typical Norwegian exchange of sentences would be rather:
> - Vårt hus har ikke vært pusset opp siden 1980.
> - Det har ikke *vårt hus* heller.
> rather than "Det har ikke *vårt *heller."



You asked Ben for the less colloquial version, and got it, but this is probably what most people actually would say: 
- Huset vårt har ikke vært pusset opp siden 1980. 
- Ikke vårt heller.


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## sjiraff

raumar said:


> I'm not sure if this part of your question has been answered - but if not, the answer is yes. If you search for "ikke vårt heller", you will get some hits -- but many more for "ikke mitt heller". Many of these hits are from blogs etc, which confirms that this is a more colloquial version.
> 
> 
> 
> You asked Ben for the less colloquial version, and got it, but this is probably what most people actually would say:
> - Huset vårt har ikke vært pusset opp siden 1980.
> - Ikke vårt heller.



Thanks, I wasn't sure to express both of these in the way I intended it to mean in English. I suppose it's a difference  between Norwegian and English, where we would have to say "Neither has ours" or "Ours has not either" as opposed to something like "ours neither".

Thanks!


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