Hlusta

Hlusta is an Icelandic verb meaning to listen. It denotes the act of giving attention to sound or speech, or to hear something with intention. It is commonly used with the preposition á to indicate what is being listened to, for example, hlusta á tónlist (to listen to music) or hlusta á einhvern (to listen to someone). It can also be used in a figurative sense, meaning to heed what someone says or to pay attention to advice.

In the present indicative, the forms are: ég hlusta, þú hlustar, hann/hún hlustar, við hlustum, þið hlustið, þeir/þær hlusta. The simple past is formed with hlustaði for all persons: ég hlustaði, þú hlustaðir, hann hlustaði, við hlustuðum, þið hlustuðuð, þeir hlustuðu. The perfect tense is formed with hafa and the past participle: ég hef hlustað, þú hefur hlustað, hann hefur hlustað, við höfum hlustað, þið hafið hlustað, þeir hafa hlustað. The imperative forms are hlustaðu (singular) and hlustið (plural). The present participle is hlustandi, and the past participle is hlustaður (masculine), hlustuð (feminine/plural inflection varies with gender and number in contexts).

Common usage patterns include hlusta á something, where á governs the object being listened to (eg, ég hlusta á lög, I listen to songs). The phrase hlusta til can appear in some dialects, but hlusta á is the standard construction. In everyday speech, hlusta is a frequent verb in media, conversation, and instruction, often replaced by more specialized terms when describing careful or critical listening.

Etymology traces hlusta to Old Norse hlusta, with cognates in other Germanic languages, and it shares a distant relation with the English verb listen. The core sense of attending to sound connects across the family of related words in Scandinavian languages.