A small Insignificant Country.
- Thread starter George J
- Start date
PsB
Citizen of Nowhere™
Yes, I used to joke they exported mostly women (my wife is Finnish) and rally drivers, but that was pre-Nokia. The other amazing thing is the quantity of top notch classical music conductors they produce. Berglund, Segerstam, Salonen, Lintu, Oramo, Storgards, Vänskä, Kamu, Saraste, Mälkki, Franck, Rouvali, Stasevska, to name the main ones, plus the latest young prodigy Klaus Mäkelä. Nearly all of them trained by the extraordinary Jorma Panula.
George J
Herefordshire member
Dear Jon,
Bokmal and Nynorsk constitute one official language with slightly different spellings and other subtle differences.
Bokmal sort of evolved from the existing Norwegian language under the influence of four centuries Danish rule. Nynorsk is a systemised development of the various Norwegian dialects that remained common even under Danish rule.
The two official languages are Bokmal/Nynorsk for one, and Sami, which is the language of the Laps, for the other. Being traditionally and culturally nomadic the Sami roam freely across Norway and Sweden herding the deer. Their ancient culture is under as much threat from the modernisation of the world as is the Inuit in North America and Greenland.
I don't think there is any conflict between Sami and what most non-Norwegians would call Norwegian, but there is a bit of a struggle between Bokmal and Nynorsk. Island names often end on -oy, such as the one my grandparent lived on in retirement in the Oslo Fjord called Jeloy. There is a move to standardise to the ending being -oya, such as Utoya which is famous for a horrible reason. I don't think it is really in the nature of Norwegians to make too much of it. Standardisation of the language has been going on for a very long time. The double a, as in Bjaarland, is now possible to spell two ways with the modern equivalent, å, by no means being universally used, and in names [like Bjaarland] certainly not used.
The regional differences in speaking Norwegian are much smaller than say between Geordy and London, or Liverpool and Bristol in England ...
Strangely Danish can be very hard for Norwegians to understand, because the words may be similar [even spelled exactly the same] and the sentence structure frequently the same, but the pronunciation is quite different.
The Danish language [even more than the Norwegians] has frequent silent endings to words [like French also], but the vowel sounds are almost as different as could be! Plus Danes love to elide words and that never helps!
I have three Norwegian films on DVD. Headhunters [J Nesbo] and the series called Saboteurs [made by the NRK in 2015] which is about the Heavy Water history. And the really wonderful King's Choice about the 1940 invasion and the conduct of King Haakon, who briefly defied his own democratically elected cabinet and Parliament to resist capitulation by threatening to abdicate not only for himself, but his whole house, thus causing the cabinet to not enter negotiations for a capitulation. I have one Swedish film. Wild Strawberries, ... one of Bergman's famous films. Also a Danish one called 9th. April, about the invasion and swift capitulation of Denmark in 1940. That is a very sad film. Strange to say I often realise I have watched them without the subtitles! I follow it well enough with what I understand, which is odd, because my conversational Norwegian is very limited, and Swedish and Danish is non-existent.
I'll look out for O Horten. If it is the Horten I am thinking about, this is the town on the other side of the Oslo Fjord from Jeloy.
Best wishes from George
Bokmal and Nynorsk constitute one official language with slightly different spellings and other subtle differences.
Bokmal sort of evolved from the existing Norwegian language under the influence of four centuries Danish rule. Nynorsk is a systemised development of the various Norwegian dialects that remained common even under Danish rule.
The two official languages are Bokmal/Nynorsk for one, and Sami, which is the language of the Laps, for the other. Being traditionally and culturally nomadic the Sami roam freely across Norway and Sweden herding the deer. Their ancient culture is under as much threat from the modernisation of the world as is the Inuit in North America and Greenland.
I don't think there is any conflict between Sami and what most non-Norwegians would call Norwegian, but there is a bit of a struggle between Bokmal and Nynorsk. Island names often end on -oy, such as the one my grandparent lived on in retirement in the Oslo Fjord called Jeloy. There is a move to standardise to the ending being -oya, such as Utoya which is famous for a horrible reason. I don't think it is really in the nature of Norwegians to make too much of it. Standardisation of the language has been going on for a very long time. The double a, as in Bjaarland, is now possible to spell two ways with the modern equivalent, å, by no means being universally used, and in names [like Bjaarland] certainly not used.
The regional differences in speaking Norwegian are much smaller than say between Geordy and London, or Liverpool and Bristol in England ...
Strangely Danish can be very hard for Norwegians to understand, because the words may be similar [even spelled exactly the same] and the sentence structure frequently the same, but the pronunciation is quite different.
The Danish language [even more than the Norwegians] has frequent silent endings to words [like French also], but the vowel sounds are almost as different as could be! Plus Danes love to elide words and that never helps!
I have three Norwegian films on DVD. Headhunters [J Nesbo] and the series called Saboteurs [made by the NRK in 2015] which is about the Heavy Water history. And the really wonderful King's Choice about the 1940 invasion and the conduct of King Haakon, who briefly defied his own democratically elected cabinet and Parliament to resist capitulation by threatening to abdicate not only for himself, but his whole house, thus causing the cabinet to not enter negotiations for a capitulation. I have one Swedish film. Wild Strawberries, ... one of Bergman's famous films. Also a Danish one called 9th. April, about the invasion and swift capitulation of Denmark in 1940. That is a very sad film. Strange to say I often realise I have watched them without the subtitles! I follow it well enough with what I understand, which is odd, because my conversational Norwegian is very limited, and Swedish and Danish is non-existent.
I'll look out for O Horten. If it is the Horten I am thinking about, this is the town on the other side of the Oslo Fjord from Jeloy.
Best wishes from George
George J
Herefordshire member
I had to look that up. Fermented fish is absolutely horrible! When the seas round about are teaming with fresh fish it amazes me that processed fish persists!
Best wishes from George
Hi George,
Thanks for the detailed reply - the language aspect always fascinates me. Having learnt Danish at evening classes, and seen a lot of Danish drama, I can attest that it sounds very different to Swedish and Norwegian.
That’s why I find it amazing that Danes and Swedes, and also Norwegians, can generally understand each other. There is the saying “Norwegian is Danish spoken with a Swedish accent”, but for me, not being a Scandinavian native, if I try to follow what’s being said when a Dane and a Swede are talking to each other, while I might be able to pick up bits of what the Dane is saying, when the Swede speaks I have no clue what’s being said at all.
Thanks for the detailed reply - the language aspect always fascinates me. Having learnt Danish at evening classes, and seen a lot of Danish drama, I can attest that it sounds very different to Swedish and Norwegian.
That’s why I find it amazing that Danes and Swedes, and also Norwegians, can generally understand each other. There is the saying “Norwegian is Danish spoken with a Swedish accent”, but for me, not being a Scandinavian native, if I try to follow what’s being said when a Dane and a Swede are talking to each other, while I might be able to pick up bits of what the Dane is saying, when the Swede speaks I have no clue what’s being said at all.
George J
Herefordshire member
Dear Jon,
Swedish is less similar to Norwegian than Danish. Many different words, but the vowel sound are similar, and mostly Norwegians and Swedes can easily converse. In the border region everyone gets both languages!
My mother was a linguist at school and was able to write and speak well in French, German, Spanish, English, Danish, and Swedish, beside her native Norwegian. After she left the family home in 1970 she went to work for HP Bulmer, the Hereford Cider makers, in the Pectin Department. Bulmers were the largest producers of pectin [Certo is a domestic variant used for setting jam] in the world. Most of it was exported, and so she was a great asset in communicating with people from all over the world with her language skills.
When I was born the first words I spoke were Norwegian - even in Herefordshire - but my father absolutely banned it, because he was upset that he did not understand the lingo! Thus I could have had a tremendous start as growing up bi-lingual. As it is my understanding is very far in my subconscious, and no doubt that three months without English in Norway I would soon get good at it. My Norwegian accent is such that I am taken for Norwegian till I run out of words!
Best wishes from George
PS: In French at school as a ten year old we had to translate into French a few simple phrases. One of them was, "Come here." I still remember that would be, "Venez ici." But I wrote down, "Kom ici!" A nice bit of involuntary Norwegian creeping in even years later! I got quite a ticking off for that. Some comment like it wasn't German!
Swedish is less similar to Norwegian than Danish. Many different words, but the vowel sound are similar, and mostly Norwegians and Swedes can easily converse. In the border region everyone gets both languages!
My mother was a linguist at school and was able to write and speak well in French, German, Spanish, English, Danish, and Swedish, beside her native Norwegian. After she left the family home in 1970 she went to work for HP Bulmer, the Hereford Cider makers, in the Pectin Department. Bulmers were the largest producers of pectin [Certo is a domestic variant used for setting jam] in the world. Most of it was exported, and so she was a great asset in communicating with people from all over the world with her language skills.
When I was born the first words I spoke were Norwegian - even in Herefordshire - but my father absolutely banned it, because he was upset that he did not understand the lingo! Thus I could have had a tremendous start as growing up bi-lingual. As it is my understanding is very far in my subconscious, and no doubt that three months without English in Norway I would soon get good at it. My Norwegian accent is such that I am taken for Norwegian till I run out of words!
Best wishes from George
PS: In French at school as a ten year old we had to translate into French a few simple phrases. One of them was, "Come here." I still remember that would be, "Venez ici." But I wrote down, "Kom ici!" A nice bit of involuntary Norwegian creeping in even years later! I got quite a ticking off for that. Some comment like it wasn't German!