Which Language should I choose? (Advice Center) Language Learning Forum

Which Language should I choose?
Tags: Law \| Norwegian \| Swedish \| Choosing a Language \| Russian
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20 messages over 3 pages: 1 2 3 Next >>

eyðimörk
Triglot
Senior Member
France
goo.gl/aT4FY7
Joined 4090 days ago
490 posts - 1158 votes

Speaks: Swedish*, English, French
Studies: Breton, Italian

Message 9 of 20

02 December 2013 at 5:30pm | IP Logged

Sarnek wrote:

eyðimörk wrote:

JiriT wrote:

I do not recommend Swedish or Norwegian as a second
foreign language. These languages have few speakers. And Norwegians has two standard
forms. Such languages may be good for professional translators and interpreters with a
combination with a more used language.

I cannot under any circumstances recommend to anyone choosing to learn
Swedish simply because they want to work in translation. The international market is
extremely saturated. There is no lack of people who speak native, or near-native, level
Swedish and English, who are happy to supplement their income without paying taxes,
driving translator fees into the ground.

Working with certified documents and immigration locally is a little bit different, of
course, but even then several Swedish government agencies will provide you with
official documents in English. Even if you are immigrating somewhere where English
documents are not accepted, a Swedish immigrant will probably have their approved
"international" document translated instead of the Swedish original. You would be
surprised how rarely documents need translating, though. My American life insurance
company was happy with my own uncertified English translation of my medical records. My
French bank was happy with my own shoddy French translation of my marriage certificate,
and some French scribbles and highlighter pen on my Swedish tax documents.

What about translating Swedish to other languages (apart from English, that is)?

eyðimörk wrote:

Even if you are immigrating somewhere where English
documents are not accepted, a Swedish immigrant will probably have their approved
"international" document translated instead of the Swedish original.

Naturally, there might be some market for translating, say, Swedish crime fiction into German, or the once-in-15-years-international-hit-film into an array of languages, but I doubt you'll get a large percentage of your income that way. The same goes for translating foreign media into Swedish (although chances are you will have a hard time getting those job without being a native Swede). Especially enough to warrant studying the language purely because you are going to be a translator.

If you look at the big international freelancing market, aside from English, Swedish is primarily (occasionally!) translated into Danish, Norwegian and Finnish. More often it is translated into English, and the English is then used as a base for all other translators. Actually, on the freelancing market it's surprisingly common for Swedish companies to have their product and documentation created entirely English, and then have it translated back into Swedish while they get all of their other international translations done.

If someone is truly passionate about being a Swedish translator, then they can probably make an okay living doing that if they get the right connections (e.g. being the recommended translator by an embassy), or if they are willing to supplement. I would never make it out to be easy though, or a language to pick if you want to make money.
2 persons have voted this message useful

Serpent
Octoglot
Senior Member
Russian Federation
serpent-849.livejour
Joined 6588 days ago
9753 posts - 15779 votes

4 sounds
Speaks: Russian*, English, Finnish^C1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese
Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish

Message 10 of 20

02 December 2013 at 10:06pm | IP Logged

eyðimörk wrote:

If you look at the big international freelancing market, aside from English, Swedish is primarily (occasionally!) translated into Danish, Norwegian and Finnish. More often it is translated into English, and the English is then used as a base for all other translators. Actually, on the freelancing market it's surprisingly common for Swedish companies to have their product and documentation created entirely English, and then have it translated back into Swedish while they get all of their other international translations done.

I wonder if it's actually the other way round? Ie that English, Finnish and the Scandinavian languages have the highest number of translators working to/from Swedish, and then because Swedish-Polish is not available, Polish is translated via English?

I may be wrong but I'm under the impression that in Russia (at least the North West and the capital) the Nordic languages are very useful for translators, although mostly in the areas of tourism, various goods and logistics. I don't see why it would be different in Poland, especially as it is closer geographically (idk about culturally), and both countries are in EU/Schengen (the latter also applies to Norway).

The member Gosiak is learning Norwegian, btw. DM her maybe?

Also, is it yourself who thinks that career opportunities are very important, or are other people (parents, teachers) discouraging you from learning "useless" languages? You can always have encouragement here on this forum ♥ Defying everyone and starting to learn Finnish at the age of 15 was one of the best things I did in my life. Languages can bring happiness, friendships, the pleasure of good reading and many other things. There's a lot of overlap with the benefits of having money, languages are like a currency of their own. If you want to learn a Scandinavian language, go for it and don't let anyone discourage you. It may not make you richer, but if that's what you want, it'll make you happier and indirectly even help you stay healthy.
2 persons have voted this message useful

Serpent
Octoglot
Senior Member
Russian Federation
serpent-849.livejour
Joined 6588 days ago
9753 posts - 15779 votes

Message 11 of 20

02 December 2013 at 10:29pm | IP Logged

Also...

mfest wrote:

Yes, your guessing is right ;) I've heard some swedish conversations,some norwegian conversations,and im my opinion norwegian is much more similar to German... on the other hand swedish sounds more nice for me. So, I've decided to learn this language.

The similarity level is not actually so different. The pronunciation is maybe indeed more similar, but it's just the very beginning. Once you know how to write the words, Swedish should be the same level of guessable (or not guessable). That said if you don't know much German, it will help more in general than with specific words.
Also, get to know the languages a bit more closely, especially the culture/media.

Edited by Serpent on 02 December 2013 at 10:54pm
1 person has voted this message useful

Nuuskamuikkunen
Triglot
Newbie
Finland
Joined 4307 days ago
21 posts - 43 votes
Speaks: Finnish*, Polish, English

Message 12 of 20

02 December 2013 at 10:41pm | IP Logged

I agree with all Serpent said.

From a career point of view I don't see any advantage of studying Russian over Swedish, on the contrary. Swedish is quite popular in Poland now, but there are certainly less speakers than opportunities. Compare with Russian which is studied in every school.

The only real problem is that... Nowela hasn't translated the Assimil Swedish textbook yet.

3 persons have voted this message useful

Serpent
Octoglot
Senior Member
Russian Federation
serpent-849.livejour
Joined 6588 days ago
9753 posts - 15779 votes

Message 13 of 20

02 December 2013 at 10:52pm | IP Logged

Great to see you here ;)
Yeees the Assimil thing is my problem too. I've tried the German-based Assimil Norwegian...
1 person has voted this message useful

Марк
Senior Member
Russian Federation
Joined 5047 days ago
2096 posts - 2972 votes

Speaks: Russian*

Message 14 of 20

04 December 2013 at 8:33pm | IP Logged

Nuuskamuikkunen wrote:

I agree with all Serpent said.

From a career point of view I don't see any advantage of studying Russian over Swedish,
on the contrary. Swedish is quite popular in Poland now, but there are certainly less
speakers than opportunities. Compare with Russian which is studied in every school.

The only real problem is that... Nowela hasn't translated the Assimil Swedish textbook
yet.

Is Russian really studied in every school?
And how is it studied?
1 person has voted this message useful

mfest
Diglot
Newbie
Poland
Joined 4016 days ago
5 posts - 5 votes
Speaks: Polish*, English

Message 15 of 20

05 December 2013 at 10:17am | IP Logged

When I'm reading news called "Want earn + 6000 PLN(approximately 1500 euro) ? (In Poland
quite good salary) Learn chinese or scandinavian languages!". I can't understand this
trend. I'm often hear that
scandinavian people are speaking in English fluent and it's meaningless to learn their
languages if you want to live in Poland and work here in a Big Company. It's true?

Russian language open doors to a large market on east, so probably it's better option for
a man like me who want to work in international company as a lawyer or somebody in this
kind of branch.

Edited by mfest on 05 December 2013 at 10:17am
1 person has voted this message useful

Solfrid Cristin
Heptaglot
Winner TAC 2011 & 2012
Senior Member
Norway
Joined 5325 days ago
4143 posts - 8864 votes

Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian
Studies: Russian

Message 16 of 20

05 December 2013 at 11:38am | IP Logged

Well, you might want to consider some of the following aspects:

- Poles are the biggest immigrant group in Norway. Very few of them speak Norwegian or even English, so
there is a big demand for people who are bilingual. I cannot say whether there are much use for lawyers who
speak Polish at the moment, but I assume there will be.
- Wages are considerably higher in Norway than in Sweden.
- Norway has a 3.5 % unemployment, where Sweden has a 8.5 % unemployment. The only reason why it is
not higher, is that Swedes are the second largest immigrant group in Norway.
- From a linguistic point of view, it does not matter which one you learn, since they are very similar. If you go
for a blue collar job, Swedish works just fine also in Norway. If you go for a white collar job, you will have
more long term opportunities if you go straight for Norwegian.

2 persons have voted this message useful

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