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Which Scandinavian language to study?

 Language Learning Forum : Skandinavisk & Nordisk Post Reply
169 messages over 22 pages: << Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ... 11 ... 21 22 Next >>
Ygangerg
Pentaglot
Senior Member
United States
Joined 5321 days ago

100 posts - 140 votes 
Speaks: English*, Spanish, Arabic (Written), Mandarin, French
Studies: German

 
 Message 81 of 169
22 January 2011 at 3:31pm | IP Logged 
I second Egill's question about learning Icelandic first. I've started Icelandic, but as I'm only a couple months in I feel I need to assess: should I learn another Scandinavian language first? Or even German? I plan to learn several Germanic languages, including Scandinavian ones, so what is the wisest order for someone with no Germanic background (besides good ol' English...)??
1 person has voted this message useful



Maypal
Pentaglot
Newbie
Russian Federation
Joined 5064 days ago

32 posts - 40 votes
Speaks: Russian*, Icelandic, English, Danish, Faroese
Studies: Greenlandic, Scottish Gaelic

 
 Message 82 of 169
07 February 2011 at 9:44pm | IP Logged 
To Egill and Ygangerg - Icelandic is the first Germanic language I've tried to learn
and it certainly did help me when I proceeded to the other languages, especially
Faroese of course. As for German and Swedish/Danish I learned afterwards, the
connection was more distant, although still present. I would divide Icelandic and
Swedish/Norwegian/Danish into 2 separate groups that are quite reminiscent of each
other, but should be learned on their own, speaking frankly. Faroese I'd place
somewhere inbetween, its grammar is very close to that of Icelandic, but the
vocabulary, still having much common with Icelandic, has a lot of words that are rather
to be found in Danish and Norwegian.

There's also an interconnection with German, because there's many (Low-)German words in
SE/DK/NO (and Faroese as well). Strangely enough, I would say that Faroese is the best
option, because it gives you a bit of Icelandic, Danish, Norwegian and German at the
same time.

But you should not be spending too much time into considering which Germanic language
is the best to facilitate for you the mastering of all the other ones. Each language is
to be learned on its own and will enrich you in its individual way.

Edited by Maypal on 07 February 2011 at 9:47pm

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louisjanus
Newbie
United States
NorwegianLanguage.inRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 5622 days ago

11 posts - 19 votes
Speaks: English*

 
 Message 83 of 169
23 February 2011 at 9:33pm | IP Logged 
Norwegian is a great language to learn for (at least) these reasons

1. Fascinating historical development, including development of nynorsk.
2. Dialects are encouraged and rich
3. Great literature, much of which is not translated
4. Nobel peace prize is given out from Norway
5. primary source material in many fields like equality, social justice, human rights etc etc
6. a relatively easy in to Swedish (Swedish SOUNDS like Norwegian) and Danish (Danish LOOKS like
Norwegian)
7. It sets you apart from the masses who have studied other languages (so our graduates tell us when
they are out on the job market)

Of course I don't know how you define 'good languages to learn'

Decide what your motivations are, your access to resources, your goals (since many Norwegian are
almost perfect in English, travel isn't all that important).

My website with lots of resources for learners of Norwegian is listed below.
Source(s):
http://NorwegianLanguage,info
2 persons have voted this message useful



Aquila123
Tetraglot
Senior Member
Norway
mydeltapi.com
Joined 5309 days ago

201 posts - 262 votes 
Speaks: Norwegian*, English, Italian, Spanish
Studies: Finnish, Russian

 
 Message 84 of 169
16 April 2011 at 12:14am | IP Logged 
My simple advise is as such:

FLIP A COIN!!!
1 person has voted this message useful



Cavesa
Triglot
Senior Member
Czech Republic
Joined 5012 days ago

3277 posts - 6779 votes 
Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1
Studies: Spanish, German, Italian

 
 Message 85 of 169
16 April 2011 at 3:42pm | IP Logged 
This is just a theory, because I have lots to do with my school and the languages I am already studying, but I have thought about this. These languages have fascinated me since... approximately since I came to this forum. :-)

So, if I ever find the time to learn a skandinavian language, I will be put to hard choice. :-) Norwegian looks really great, as you say it's closer to both Danish and Swedish than those two to each other. But there are more available textbooks for Swedish around, which matters to me a lot when beginning with a language. And both Norwegian and Swedish sound great.

I haven't thought of learning Danish much, not sure why.

Btw this is a great thread, even though I couldn't understand half of it, because of my lack of knowledge of the language. :-)
1 person has voted this message useful



KimG
Diglot
Groupie
Norway
Joined 4980 days ago

88 posts - 104 votes 
Speaks: Norwegian*, English
Studies: Portuguese, Swahili

 
 Message 86 of 169
21 April 2011 at 11:51am | IP Logged 
Would you be able to practice speaking any of the languages where you live?
Personally, I think it's simpler to understand Swedes and Danes for us Norwegians, since we are more open to dialects, an speaker of any 3 languages can as easy figure out the differences and speak freely to other scandinavian speakers. I'd think, it's just we Norwegians encourage dialects a bit more than in Sweden and Denmark, giving us a bit training.
1 person has voted this message useful





jeff_lindqvist
Diglot
Moderator
SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 6912 days ago

4250 posts - 5711 votes 
Speaks: Swedish*, English
Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French
Personal Language Map

 
 Message 87 of 169
21 April 2011 at 1:11pm | IP Logged 
KimG wrote:
(...)for us Norwegians, since we are more open to dialects/.../I'd think, it's just we Norwegians encourage dialects a bit more than in Sweden and Denmark, giving us a bit training.


More open to dialects? I can't see how Sweden is any exception, regarding the number of dialects/accent, actors/artists/other media persons, and the likelihood of meeting just any dialect in any working place in any town in Sweden.
1 person has voted this message useful



nicolai
Diglot
Newbie
Denmark
Joined 4945 days ago

13 posts - 13 votes
Speaks: Danish*, English
Studies: Swedish, Norwegian, Finnish

 
 Message 88 of 169
19 May 2011 at 11:13pm | IP Logged 
KimG wrote:
Personally, I think it's simpler to understand Swedes and Danes for us Norwegians, since we are more open to dialects, an speaker of any 3 languages can as easy figure out the differences and speak freely to other scandinavian speakers. I'd think, it's just we Norwegians encourage dialects a bit more than in Sweden and Denmark, giving us a bit training.

Yeah, it must definitely be the openness. I personally find the dialectal variation in Denmark to somewhat huge; -almost- as varied as in Norway. The difference is probably that Denmark is considerably smaller, thus causing people to adapt to Copenhagen Danish/rigsdansk due to television/radio influence.

Edited by nicolai on 19 May 2011 at 11:15pm



1 person has voted this message useful



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