Svealand Swedish (in Swedish: Sveamål) is one of the major grouping of Swedish dialects, clearly distinguished from Finland-Swedish and the Swedish spoken in Southern Sweden.
A major characteristic of Svealand Swedish is the coalescence of the phoneme /r/ with following dental and alveolar consonants — also over word-boundaries — that transforms them into retroflex consonants that in some cases reduces the distinction between words (as for instance bod — bord, i.e. "shed" — "table"). This feature is also found in Oslo Norwegian and in some dialects of Scottish Gaelic.
- r + d → [[voiced retroflex plosive|]]
- r + l → ɭ
- r + n → ɳ
- r + s → ʂ
- r + t → ʈ
One high-status variety of Swedish, that of the capital region of Stockholm–Uppsala, sometimes ambigously designated as Rikssvenska, belongs to Svealand Swedish.
Last updated: 10-21-2005 03:08:16