User:Njardarlogar/Nynorsk vs Bokmål

This page is intended to show some of the main differences between Nynorsk and Bokmål.

Differences in bold font.

Number of genders

• Nynorsk: 3 grammatical genders are mandatory: feminine, masculine, neuter
• Bokmål: 2 grammatical genders are mandatory: masculine, neuter - feminine is optional
  • In practice, the feminine gender is considerably less used in Bokmål than in Nynorsk
  • There is also less difference between the masculine and feminine genders in Bokmål; see the grammar of nouns below

Masculine nouns

Nynorsk:

1. båt - båten - båtar - båtane

Bokmål:

1. båt - båten - båter - båtene

Feminine nouns

Nynorsk:

1. liste - lista - lister - listene
2. dronning - dronninga - dronningar - dronningane

Bokmål:

1. liste - lista - lister - listene
2. dronning - dronninga - dronninger - dronningene

Notice that Bokmål always uses the same suffix for both masculine and feminine nouns, while Nynorsk varies between two different suffixes.

The comparison of the vocabularies is complicated by the fact that a majority of words (roots) are allowed in both Bokmål and Nynorsk; while at the same time, the actual usage of the vocabulary can be quite different between the two. This list includes only two types of differences:

1. Different roots
2. Difference in word construction (e.g. different affixes)