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monolingualism in Scandinavia | ||
Tags: Scandinavia | Monolingual | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| decamillisjacob Newbie Canada Joined 4733 days ago 38 posts - 63 votes  | Message 1 of 19 27 June 2012 at 6:51am | IP Logged | ||
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I just posted a micro-question within another form about this, but thought I may as well start a thread:
North Americans (and possibly Brits and any other Anglophone) seemingly fall for the notion that one can blissfully live in a Scandinavian country entirely through the medium of English. I first think that it's disgracefully inconsiderate, and two... it begs the question, is there a significant rate of monolingualism among Scandinavians themselves, particularily younger ones? That is, is it possible to find a 25 year-old or even a 40 year-old Dane or Swede or Icelander who cannot function in English? My point being... if English is as wide spread as Scandinavian and Anglophone-perception makes it out to be, it's not encouraging when it comes to non-Scandinavians making any attempt in learning the local lingo to communicate on a more long term basis. I speak on behalf of a country where monolingualism in English is high on the grounds that "the world speaks our language anyways, why bother?." What are your thoughts on the subject? Note: this same notion could also be applied to the Netherlands and I'm sure a number of other European countries... Edited by decamillisjacob on 27 June 2012 at 7:46pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6704 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 2 of 19 27 June 2012 at 10:08am | IP Logged | ||
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I rarely speak to other Danes in English (and only the presence of monolingual Finns could make me do it to other Scandinavians), but I think it would be very hard for a person living here NOT to pick up a fair amount of English - Danish TV stations send programs in English all the time, and most of the music people listen to is in English. Besides there are telltale signs that English skills are fairly common - for instance I often hear tourists speaking to shop assistants in English, and they normally get an answer in decent English. However there are variations in the level of our skills, and it should also be noted that there are people - mostly elderly - who grew up in a time where the media weren't as skewed towards English.
I know that there are some for surveys concerning foreign language skills in the EU, and I made a search for some those surveys on the internet. But before I got far down the list I found an interesting though short (and machine translated, urgh!) article named Er nordmænd bedst i engelsk som fremmedsprog?, and it suggests that Norwegians have a tendency to exaggerate their English skills - and I can recognize that from my Danish compatriots. Apparently they think that they are the top of the world English-wise after leaving school, and they don't realize that to keep your level you need to continue learning (cfr. the red queen in Alice in Wonderland: "Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place.") Edited by Iversen on 28 June 2012 at 8:48am 8 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| beano Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4623 days ago 1049 posts - 2152 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Russian, Serbian, Hungarian | Message 3 of 19 27 June 2012 at 1:33pm | IP Logged | ||
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Why equate monolingualism in Scandanavia with a lack of English skills? There must be areas in Denmark where German is a far more useful language to know. Ditto Finland and Russian.
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| Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6704 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 4 of 19 27 June 2012 at 2:18pm | IP Logged | ||
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Actually, no. There are areas in Denmark where knowledge of German is widespread (Southern Jutland, tourist areas along the West Coast) and others where Swedish is seen as a dialect of Danish, spoken by people acrosse the bridge (Copenhagen). Similarly there may be areas in Norway and Finland where Russian isn't a town in Siberia*. But the influence from the media beats everything, and they are half Anglophone here.
* reference to a common idiomatic expression, used about things that are virtually unknown and very far away Edited by Iversen on 27 June 2012 at 2:20pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| beano Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4623 days ago 1049 posts - 2152 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Russian, Serbian, Hungarian | Message 5 of 19 27 June 2012 at 2:45pm | IP Logged | ||
There will be few Scandanavians who don't speak ANY English, due to overwhelming presence of the language in the education system and popular media, but I'm sure there are plenty who are not comfortable using the language for extended conversation. It wouldn't be a problem to find an English-speaking doctor or lawyer, but I doubt if the proficiency is as high among those who do manual labour and semi-skilled jobs. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Ogrim Heptaglot Senior Member France Joined 4640 days ago 991 posts - 1896 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English, Spanish, French, Romansh, German, Italian Studies: Russian, Catalan, Latin, Greek, Romanian | Message 6 of 19 27 June 2012 at 3:28pm | IP Logged | ||
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In Norway, most "younger" people (under 45) will be able to have a conversation in English, but you will find that many of the elder generations will have very limited knowledge of the language or feel uncomfortable using it. As a general rule, I guess one can say that really young people (in their 20s) will have better skills because they started to learn the language at a very young age and are heavily influenced by Anglo-American culture.
As Iversen rightly points out in a previous post, Norwegians often tend to overestimate their English skills, and I would say a minority is able to speak fluent English about any subject (lets say C1 or C2 level.) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Pisces Bilingual Pentaglot Senior Member Finland Joined 4623 days ago 143 posts - 284 votes Speaks: English*, Finnish*, French, SwedishC1, Esperanto Studies: German, Spanish, Russian | Message 7 of 19 27 June 2012 at 5:00pm | IP Logged | ||
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I agree with the other comments. The Swedes also exaggerate how well they know English. I think all Scandinavians do, maybe the Finns less than the others, since Finnish isn't related to English. There are plenty of people who aren't comfortable communicating in English, but if you're an English speaker, you won't see these people, since there are enough people who are comfortable with English.
Two cultural observations: 1. Particularly in Sweden, being modern and 'up to date' and 'trendy' is a very important public value in Scandinavia, that is, semi-officially. English is part of this. So officially, people are pro-English and they like to give the impression that they all know English. 2. On the other hand, Scandinavians are fairly closed. It's not that easy to get to know them, and what people say when they are speaking English may be very different from what they say in their own languages. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| csjc Tetraglot Newbie IcelandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5601 days ago 20 posts - 36 votes Speaks: English*, Icelandic, Modern Hebrew, Dutch Studies: Norwegian, French, Japanese | Message 8 of 19 28 June 2012 at 1:07am | IP Logged | ||
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In Iceland, there are plenty of people over the age of 50 that aren't very functional in English. I've never come
across an Icelander under the age of 25 that couldn't get by in English, and I know many who speak exceptionally well. English is ubiquitous as it is in the rest of Scandinavia, not even taking into account that both the UK and US are oft- visited by Icelanders due to their relative proximity. In my personal experience, I find Norwegians to be the best in English. Followed by Swedes, Danes, Icelanders, and then Finns. As Pisces mentioned, knowledge of English is seen to be essential. Despite this, many Scandinavians I know overestimate their English skills quite a bit. I do think that the overall level of English is significantly higher than in the rest of non-Anglophone Europe. As for an Anglophone assuming they could live in these countries without ever learning the language - I know that it is possible. There are many immigrants to Iceland who are non-native English speakers but still never bother to learn Icelandic. I can't imagine that being a comfortable way to live though - your social life would be more limited, you wouldn't be able to follow current events well, things like doing your taxes and going to the doctor could be a huge hassle. Edited by csjc on 28 June 2012 at 1:11am 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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