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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| GuardianJY Groupie United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5691 days ago 74 posts - 72 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: German, Italian, Swedish, French | Message 1 of 8 24 May 2009 at 4:35am | IP Logged | ||
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I have a somewhat different question, it seems. I am looking into studying at U. Helsinki in Finland for my master's in Computer Science, but I don't speak Finnish or Swedish. Now, I'm only a sophomore so I have some time. I know that they offer most of their graduate studies in English, but I really dislike going to a country without speaking their language(s). I'm a huge fan of Swedish music (Basshunter, Yngwie Malmsteen, Opeth) and Finnish music (Nightwish, Children of Bodom, H.I.M.) and also of their cultures (If I go after undergraduate school, I can celebrate Finland's centennial!) My question is this: I currently study French at almost an intermediate level. I want to speak Finnish and Swedish for personal reasons as well as that I want to live there. How should I go about this? I've looked at the grammar structure of both languages and know a little about their pronunciation, so I'm not totally new to the languages. Should I study them all at the same time? (I have the time to do this) Should I study French first and get to a somewhat advanced level so I can use Assimil to learn the others? Thanks in advance.
Also, if anyone has any experience with U. Helsinki, please feel free to inform me. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| cordelia0507 Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5844 days ago 1473 posts - 2176 votes Speaks: Swedish* Studies: German, Russian | Message 2 of 8 24 May 2009 at 10:28am | IP Logged | ||
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I am Swedish. I don't want to say anything against Finnish, and there may be Finns here who have a different opinion.
But basically Finnish is quite possibly the hardest language in Europe to learn - at least in the top 3! You might be taking on more than you can handle, even if you are talented with language learning. Finnish has a completely different grammar than other European languages! I am studying Russian right now and my impression is that Russian is an easier language than Finnish. Taking on Finnish is as difficult as taking on a non-European language, practically. Your advantage would be that you are in the country, so you are immersed. Swedish is not very easy either. But at least it's a "Germanic" language and I think English just about passes as a Germanic language, so there is some similarity. Although there are many native Swedish speakers in Helsinki you'd probably not have that much exposure to Swedish compared with your exposure to Finnish. I am pretty sure the U. of Helsinki is mainly a Finnish language university although they'd probably have some courses taught in Swedish. Swedish as spoken in Finland is VERY beautiful, but not exactly the recommonded accent for a [EDIT: non-Nordic!] learner. Your learning material would be based on standard Swedish, so it would be a bit confusing when all the Swedish speakers around you are speaking in a different way. [EDIT: You'd be coming at it from a different angle than a Finnish person would - for a Finnish person it's normal to have the Finland-Swedish accent.] An SE/FI bilingual person from Finland could probably give much better advice, but I haven't noticed anyone on the forum. My advice is; pick ONE of the two based on what I explained above. Explain the situation to a native speaker of Finnish or Swedish and ask them to support you as you start learning. Edited by cordelia0507 on 24 May 2009 at 12:20pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Thatzright Diglot Senior Member Finland Joined 5678 days ago 202 posts - 311 votes Speaks: Finnish*, English Studies: French, Swedish, German, Russian | Message 3 of 8 24 May 2009 at 11:21am | IP Logged | ||
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Well, I mean, Swedish is a compulsory subject in Finnish schools today from the seventh grade up at least to ten months worth of studying in high school, so you'd definitely "benefit" more from learning Swedish as even most Finns SHOULD be able to speak it to some extent soon. It's not very hard, even though most Finns tend to think so, mostly exactly because it's compulsory and many people almost stamp this idea into their brain that they don't like because of that, and it's a shame. I don't exactly love learning it either but atleast I aknowledge that it's because I'm a little lazy :D
I'm by no means fluent in Swedish, but I'm certainly not a beginner either. I think basic fluency could be achieved in about a month or so if I checked out some basic grammar issues that I sometimes am not sure of and some absolutely must-know words. Basically, knowing English goes a long way in Swedish, most of the time the sentence structures work the exact same way, many words are alike in the two languages... certainly a lot of similiarities, obviously because both are Germanic languages. I obviously can't say anything about Finnish being hard, but I suppose it'd be for a foreign learner: I study French and like said above Swedish at the moment and I just wish there would be something, something quite similiar to my native languages in them, but nah. Only a few shabby words are loanwords from Swedish like "ett torn" becoming "torni" etc., but these certainly are quite rare. A lot of people interested in learning Finnish (I'm just glad there are men and women so brave) are scared off by the fact that we have, what was that, 15 tenses or cases or something? I checked the list out yesterday and in all my seventeen years of life I recall using seven or eight of them. That's a consolation, I'd think? The pronounciation aspect might be difficult seeing as most Finnish youth butcher the English language horribly as it sounds nothing like Finnish and they are not accustomed to speaking with a "flow" of words so to speak. Finnish can be spoken very monotonely. The spoken Finnish differs quite a lot in some aspect from it's written counterpart. It's basically spoken faster, words are shortened (surely this happens a lot in other languages too, but not really all that much in English). Just an example of this would be numbers: when something is counted fast or in a hurry, "yksi, kaksi, kolme, neljä, viisi" (one, two, three, four, five) will likely become "yy kaa koo nee vii" and so on. In Swedish, they'll most likely stay as ett, två, tre, fyra, fem no matter what the situation. Different dialects of the language exist around the country, nothing too different, but for example a word like "minä" (me) can be minä, mä, mää, mie, I've even heard mee. Obviously it's still not hard to understand what is being said, but this could be irritating to a foreign learner. All in all it won't be a piece of cake but, to invent my own saying, it won't be like swallowing a razorblade either :D The pronounciation could take some getting used to and the vocabulary is definitely a whole lot different from a lot of languages, but I say if you really wish to learn it, go for it. At least if you study Swedish and Finnish at the same time it's probably hard to get confused since they're so different. Good luck, whatever you decide to go with! Edited by Thatzright on 24 May 2009 at 11:28am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Uthnapistim Diglot Newbie Finland Joined 5700 days ago 19 posts - 25 votes Speaks: Finnish*, English Studies: German, Indonesian | Message 4 of 8 24 May 2009 at 1:03pm | IP Logged | ||
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As you are going to be residing in Helsinki, you should definitely give the highest priority to learning Finnish. It is certainly a respectable goal to learn Swedish at the same time, but Finnish might be a bit more difficult for you as a native English speaker, and it is way more important for living in Finland and getting immersed in the culture. Regardless of the official language policy, most people you meet will probably not be able to converse with you in Swedish.
I would also say that at least with Finnish, a lot of the rewards of learning it will come only at a fairly advanced stage (this might also apply to Swedish to some extent) so getting either one to as good a level as possible is better than getting both to a decent level. Therefore you should probably start with and expend the most effort to getting your Finnish to a good level. I don't think that studying Finnish at the same time will interfere much with getting your French to a fluent level, so my advice would be to start actively studying Finnish right away and maybe postpone Swedish until you are ready to move some of your focus away from French. Edited by Uthnapistim on 24 May 2009 at 1:03pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Tyr Senior Member Sweden Joined 5788 days ago 316 posts - 384 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Swedish | Message 5 of 8 24 May 2009 at 10:19pm | IP Logged | ||
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I'm in a somewhat similar situation, studying at Uppsaala University but with very lacking Swedish.
Its not so bad really not knowing the language, making friends with the natives becomes much harder but most universities these days have large communities of foreign students. Learning Finnish should certainly be the priority as said for Hellsinki. You'd be better off with English than Swedish if you don't know Finnish. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| patuco Diglot Moderator Gibraltar Joined 7021 days ago 3795 posts - 4268 votes Speaks: Spanish, English* Personal Language Map | Message 6 of 8 24 May 2009 at 11:12pm | IP Logged | ||
You've forgotten about Hencke. Edited by patuco on 24 May 2009 at 11:13pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 Hencke Tetraglot Moderator Spain Joined 6900 days ago 2340 posts - 2444 votes Speaks: Swedish*, Finnish, EnglishC2, Spanish Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 7 of 8 24 May 2009 at 11:53pm | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks patuco. Yes, there have been many good comments already, by cordelia and others, and I don't think I have very much to add.
I can't make the decision for you but I can have a go at sorting out what is in the scales at each end of the argument, and then you can decide for yourself how much weight the different elements have for you personally. For an English-speaker Swedish should be a relatively easy language - note the "relatively", because learning another language is a big task, even if it's one of the easier ones. Still, if you go for it you can expect to make a lot more progress, and reach a much higher level in Swedish than you would with Finnish with the same time and effort. In Helsinki you will certainly find plenty of people to communicate with in Swedish, but they won't be the majority. If you pick Swedish I imagine you might end up having more contacts and hanging around more in the swedish-speaking circles. Just be aware that, especially in the colloquial and slang registers, the swedish-speakers too, will pepper their language with varying amounts of Finnish vocabulary, or even mix in complete expressions and sentences in Finnish for extra emphasis here and there. And it is true that Finland-Swedish is somewhat different from the Sweden-Swedish material you'd be studying: similar to US and UK English. It would be like studying one and then be confronted with the other one. With Finnish you'd be taking on a much bigger challenge, but also a bigger adventure that is potentially more rewarding. It would be like stepping into a space-suit and start exploring life on a different planet. You can't hope to reach the same level as you would with Swedish with the same time and effort, but it would be more useful as you'd be able to use it with everyone. You would also be more completely immersed: you'd be hearing Finnish around you all the time, with just an occasional bit of Swedish now and again. Whichever you go for, you might have a hard time finding subjects with enough inclination to humour you and practice your Finnish or Swedish with. Most of them would be more eager to get to practice their English, and as they have had a head start since they were little, their English is likely to be way ahead of your Finnish or Swedish. Edited by Hencke on 25 May 2009 at 12:03am 1 person has voted this message useful |
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