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Why learn Danish over other language? | ||
Tags: Danish | Reasons for study | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| Masked Avenger Triglot Senior Member Antarctica Joined 6126 days ago 145 posts - 151 votes  Speaks: English, French*, Danish Studies: Finnish, Latin | Message 17 of 59 02 December 2008 at 8:46am | IP Logged | ||
You aren't a Mormon missionary, are you? There are so many of them in Denmark, always coming straight from America (and sometimes Canada). It's like Hamlet's kingdom is Mecca to them. And they insist on speaking Danish, even with foreigners like themselves who speak better English. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| SlickAs Tetraglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5869 days ago 185 posts - 287 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, French, Swedish Studies: Thai, Vietnamese | Message 18 of 59 02 December 2008 at 8:00pm | IP Logged | ||
What is with the Danish bashing? It really is not a useless language. You learn it for the people. If you are single, and in the mood to make friends and lovers, then Danish is an excellent language to learn. The small population is frankly irrelevent. Some single people like to go to huge rave style parties with 2000 people becase "there is going to be 1000 girls there". This despite the fact you can only possibly meet about 30 in a night (30 people in 4 hours is to speak to a new person every 8 minutes for the night ... hard work). So realisticly, a small relaxed place that has 30 attractive people you want to speak to and want to speak back to you is just as good (better). In truth all you really need is one attractive stranger to spend your evening with. A trip to Copenhagen will have you meet exactly the same amount of people as a trip of the same duration to Berlin. The additional population means nothing since you dont have time to meet every single person anyway. However if you go to Copenhagen with Danish you will meet more people and have a HIGHER-QUALITY interaction (because your Danish is intreguing to them) than if you go to Berlin with German where they will just shrug their shoulders. If someone reading who is considering learning Danish is the sort that just sits in your basement in Milwakee, WI and learns languages in isolation, perhaps to read literature or something without the desire to ever leave your home then I can understand why you would not learn Danish. But if you travel, Danes are also good travellers and they will be there. That does not matter if it is holidays to the European or Asian Beaches, cultural travel to the Egyptian Pyramids, business travel to international conventions, or development travel to set up a maternity clinic in Cambodia. Scandinavians are responsible world citizens, and I remember in Malawi, the people recognising the flags of Norway, Denmark and Sweden and believing them to be large super-power countries because of the amount of aid that arrives there with these flags on the boxes. Now when you are in one of these places where people who travel congregate, you will find there are more Danes than Russians or Italians or Spaniards. Speaking many languages allows you to hang-out with more groups of people. So who do you want to hang out with? Uni-lingual English speakers will hang out with the Anglophones (Americans, Canaidans, English, Scottish, Irish, Australians, New Zealanders, South Africans) and sure they are fun. Dutch and Scandinavians will largely join in with this crowd, but also have their own groups where they speak their own languages and will separate themselves off if it is getting too rough with swearing, drunken arguments, etc or they are just not enjoying themselves. Germans will form their own German speaking group and interact with the Anglos but perfer their own company. French their French speaking group, their English is not as good but you will be more than welcome if you speak French. The Spanish can be good fun in that they like to sing and dance when they drink but there are not many of them around. Now, if you speak Danish, you will get to hang out with the Danes. You will want to, as you speak their language and want to practice, and they will embrace you. Personally, I find the Danes very attractive and gentle. You will form friendships and have lovers that you would never have had if you didn't speak Danish. So you can learn German and hang out with that German group of people if you like. And you will probably make friends and lovers from amongst that group of people. That's your thing. My choice would be much more to hang with the Danish guys and pretty Danish girls and make my friends and lovers there. If that is not a reason to learn the language, I dont know what is. Edited by SlickAs on 02 December 2008 at 8:17pm 15 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Masked Avenger Triglot Senior Member Antarctica Joined 6126 days ago 145 posts - 151 votes Speaks: English, French*, Danish Studies: Finnish, Latin | Message 19 of 59 02 December 2008 at 8:19pm | IP Logged | ||
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Danish bashing? I live in Denmark! If it were really unbearable over there, I would have packed my bags long ago. We're just having a casual but frank discusion based on personal experiences and the general opinions in this forum.
I have no problem with what you argued afterwards though. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| SlickAs Tetraglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5869 days ago 185 posts - 287 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, French, Swedish Studies: Thai, Vietnamese | Message 20 of 59 02 December 2008 at 8:39pm | IP Logged | ||
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Masked Avenger Triglot Senior Member Antarctica Joined 6126 days ago 145 posts - 151 votes Speaks: English, French*, Danish Studies: Finnish, Latin | Message 21 of 59 02 December 2008 at 8:50pm | IP Logged | ||
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That mormon assumption was a long shot.
Though generally speaking, I suspect many Mormons choose Danish because of Danish ancestry in their family line (which is reportedly high among American Mormons). Next time I bump into one of those missionaries, I should ask. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| SlickAs Tetraglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5869 days ago 185 posts - 287 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, French, Swedish Studies: Thai, Vietnamese | Message 22 of 59 03 December 2008 at 5:40am | IP Logged | ||
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I have had a drink tonight.
In those multi-lingual places (like the Greek Isles for example), you have the opportunity to socialise with all the people with whom you speak a language. Those people who speak English (including Danes) like to meet people of many nationalities. And you like to meet them. But speaking Danish takes you to a whole new level of friendship. I, myself, have to ask why anyone learns German. If you think they are weird in Greece or Spain, try going to Thailand! (Although there are many nice Germans, they disgrace themselves. They are their own breed of molesters in Thailand, even the Germans will agree). Danish or German in Thailand? Are you kidding? What would you prefer to speak? Believe me, the things the Germans do would make you ashamed to have anything to do with them. "I speak Danish". To me, a Scandinavian language is the language to learn. It is not difficult. Really very very easy for an English speaker. And with your language you are choosing whose values you belive in. Who you want to hang with. The people you love. And you speak to them in their language that implicitly includes the way they split the world up. I must make a warning for people wanting to undertake it: Learning a language where the people of the target language are bi-lingual in your language (English) is a challenge. Because the moment the conversation becomes difficult they will want you to "say it in English". The moment you agree to that, you have lost Danish. You have to insist. If you continue speaking to them in their language they will relent and speak back to you. Some take 2 minutes to understand that it is "Danish only", some take 10, but they will agree and speak to you in their language. You just need to insist. Edited by SlickAs on 03 December 2008 at 7:05am 6 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Rameau Triglot Senior Member Germany Joined 6099 days ago 149 posts - 258 votes 4 sounds Speaks: English*, GermanC1, Danish Studies: Swedish, French, Icelandic | Message 23 of 59 03 December 2008 at 6:24am | IP Logged | ||
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Err...I like both German and Danish...
But no, Masked Avenger, I'm not a Mormon missionary; the language simply grabbed my interest. I can't exactly explain why; it's just something that sort of happened (though it probably helps that I've always found Denmark itself sort of interesting). In the US, Spanish is without a doubt the most useful language (after English of course), but I've never really had a strong urge learn it, even if at times I've sort of felt as though I ought to do so for practical reasons. There was just never that spark of interest there. Why? Again, who knows. I don't think it's something one can exactly consciously control. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Rikyu-san Diglot Senior Member Denmark Joined 5520 days ago 213 posts - 413 votes Speaks: Danish*, English Studies: German, French | Message 24 of 59 07 October 2009 at 11:08pm | IP Logged | ||
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So you want some reasons for learning Danish?
a) the Danes are considered to be the "happiest" people on Earth. I put "happiest" in quotation marks because the surveys that show this actually measure "life satisfaction". And we are the most satisfied, with high levels of subjective well-being. b) our language gets you in touch with our culture. In our culture, trust plays an important role. In the Viking Age, Danes could trade with people living an incredible distance away, deliver the goods first, receive payment later. And we are talking about a process that takes months. Imagine the level of trust that has to be there in order for commerce to be carried out this way. Buy a book on Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk and you pay upon dispatch. In Denmark, you buy, say, vitamins in an online health food store, and you pay for the goods AFTER you have received them. Same thing - this is an ancient tradition. c) even though many Danes today are (un)blissfully aware of the "why" of many of our cultural practices, like Christmas or the incomparable "hygge", you can still experience the real deal. If you learn the language and immerse yourself in our culture, you will learn how to have a good time, that is, you will learn how to "hygge". Norwegians know how to do that, too. "Hygge" is essentially a deep spiritual practice of cultivation and mindfulness, with Vedic roots of inner realisation. This is why it is well-nigh impossible for Danes to explain "why" we do as we do (eating, drinking, lighting candles, enjoying voluntary social intercourse without any trace of coercion or social pressure involved (if that was the case, as all Danes know, it would stop being "hygge"!)). So any Dane can do this thing called "hygge" even though they can't explain why we do as we do. I know that American exchange students at the University of Copenhagen at the Danish Institute for Studies Abroad are absolutely crazy with this thing called hygge. They absolutely love it, wants more of it, and want to teach their friends and families when they get home what it is and how they do it. It is that contagious. And very "hyggeligt". d) you might also learn why China is called "The Middle Kingdom". Today we are like mice riding on the elephant's back but our ancestral history can provide a convincing clue! (Consider, for starters, what dragon ships are doing in the Viking mythos. We learned this from the Chinese thousands of years ago! e) I heard about a year ago that Danish has a more extensive vocabulary than English. So if you are a vocab afficionado, you are really in for some vocab gargling here. f) If you follow the trace of our Viking forefathers around the world, sure enough, the level of happiness is generally higher. It is as if we once had a happiness formula. If you immerse yourself in the authentic Danish culture, you might be able to apply this happiness formula in your own life. :-) Edited by Rikyu-san on 08 October 2009 at 11:15am 9 persons have voted this message useful |
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