Languages of Sweden
Encyclopedia
Swedish
is the official language of Sweden
and is spoken by the vast majority of the nine million inhabitants of the country. It is a North Germanic language
and quite similar to its sister North Germanic Languages, Danish
and Norwegian
.
comprised the territories of contemporary Finland and Estonia as well as parts of Russia, Latvia, Germany, Denmark and Norway. Hence, Sweden's linguistic landscape has historically been very different from that of today.
Since Swedish emerged from Old Norse
until the 19th century, the Swedish dialects were generally much more different than today and since the 20th century Standard Swedish
prevails throughout the country. The Scandinavian languages constitute a dialectal continuum and some of the traditional Swedish dialects
could equally be described as Danish (Scanian) or Norwegian
(Jamtlandic).
Finnish
was the majority language of Sweden's eastern parts, though it was used almost exclusively as a spoken language, although these areas also was home for a significant Swedish-speaking minority. Finnish became a minority language in the west, as well, since many Finnish speakers migrated there for economic reasons.
Estonian
was the language of the majority in Swedish Estonia
but the province, like Finland hosted a Swedish-speaking minority
and also a more significant minority of Germans.
In mediaeval Sweden, the Low German language
had a very important role as a commercial language and the lingua franca of the Hanseatic league
. As such, the Low German language influenced Swedish and other languages in the region considerably. In mediaeval Stockholm
, half of the population were Low German speakers. Low German was also the language spoken in the 17th century Swedish territories in northern Germany i.e. Swedish Pomerania
, Bremen-Verden
, Wismar
and Wildeshausen
(as well as the rest of northern Germany) and by the German minority in Estonia and Swedish Livonia
. Livonia was also inhabited by Latvians
, Estonians
and Livonians.
In Swedish Ingria
, apart from Swedish also Finnish, Ingrian
and Votian were spoken.
Latin as the language of the Catholic Church was introduced in Sweden with the Christianisation, around AD 1000. Like in most of Europe
, Latin remained the Lingua Franca
and scholarly language of the educated communities for centuries in Sweden. For instance, Carolus Linnaeus
' most famous work Systema Naturae
, published in 1735, was written in Latin.
During the 18th century, French
was the second language of Europe's upper classes and Sweden was no exception. The Swedish aristocracy often spoke French among themselves and code-switching
between French and Swedish was common. The Swedish King Gustav III
was a true Francophile
and French was the common language at his court.
Gradually Sweden lost its overseas possessions and obtained its current borders in 1809, when it lost its eastern part (Finland
) to the Russian Empire
. As a consequence, Sweden became a rather homogeneous country with the exceptions of the indigenous Sami-people and the Finnish-speaking Tornedalians
in the northernmost parts of the country.
During the 19th century Sweden became more industrialised, resulting in important demographic changes. The population duplicated and people moved from the countryside to towns and cities. As a consequence, of this and factors such as generalised education and mass media, the traditional dialects began to give room for the standard language (Standard Swedish
). A large numbers of Swedes also decided to emigrate, especially to the United States
. There, the Swedes came in contact with the English language
. Since then, like in the rest of Europe and indeed the world, English has grown as an important foreign language in Sweden, especially since the allied victory of World War II
.
During the second half of the 20th century and the first decade of the 21st century, Sweden has received great numbers of immigrants who speak other languages than Swedish (see: Immigrant languages below). It's unclear to what degree these communities will hold on to their languages and to what degree they will assimilate.
The Kingdom of Sweden is a nation-state
for the Swedish people, and as such, their national language is held in very high regard. Of Sweden's roughly nine million people, almost all speak Swedish as at least a second language, and the majority as a first language (7,825,000, according to SIL's Ethnologue
). Swedish is also an official language in Finland
where it is spoken by a large number of Swedish-speaking Finns. The language is also spoken to some degree by ethnic Swedes living outside Sweden, for example, just over half a million people of Swedish descent in the United States speak the language, according to Ethnologue.
exist, some of which are divergent enough from standard Swedish to be considered separate languages.
, especially in the Älvdalen Municipality
, by a population of 1,500.http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=dlc
and Fårö
. It is an open issue whether modern Gutnish is to be considered an independent language or a Scandinavian dialect. It derives, however, from Old Gutnish, which is indisputably a separate branch of the Old Norse language family.
Spoken mainly in Jämtland
, but with a scattered speaker population throughout the rest of Sweden, Jamtlandic or Jamska is a West Scandinavian language
with 95% lexical similarity to Norwegian and Swedish, but generally more archaic. It has a native speaker population of 30,000http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=jmk.
Spoken by some 800,000 people in the Swedish province of Scania
(Skåne in Swedish), the Scanian dialect is considered by some to be a dialect of Danish
http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=scy, and a related dialect is also spoken in Bornholm
, where it is called "East Danish" (Scania was part of the kingdom of Denmark until 1658). The variety spoken today is heavily influenced by standard Swedish.
Finnish
, a Uralic
language, has long been spoken in Sweden (the same holds true for Swedish in Finland, see Finland-Swedes
, Åland), as Finland was part of the Swedish kingdom for centuries). Today ethnic Finns (mainly first and second generation immigrants) constitute up to 5% of the population of Sweden, and the Finnish language is used by over 200,000. A high concentration of Finnish-speakers (some 16,000) resides in the county of Norrbotten
.
, it is so closely related to Finnish that they are mutually intelligible, and is sometimes considered a dialect of Finnish. Meänkieli is mainly used in the municipalities of Gällivare
, Haparanda
, Kiruna
, Pajala
and Övertorneå
, all of which lie in the Torne Valley
. Between 40,000 and 70,000 people speak Meänkeli as their first language.
The Sami people
(formerly known as Lapps) are a people indigenous to all of northern Scandinavia
(see Sápmi (area)) who speak a closely related group of languages usually grouped together under the name "Sami", although at least three separate Sami Languages are spoken in Sweden. The languages are, like Finnish and Meänkeli, Uralic. Due to prolonged exposure to Germanic-language-speaking neighbors in Sweden and Norway, Sami languages have a large number of Germanic loanwords, which are not normally found in other Uralic languages like Finnish, Estonian
, or Hungarian
. Between 15,000 and 20,000 Sami people live in Sweden of whom 9,000 are Sami-language speakers. Worldwide, between 20,000 and 40,000 people speak Sami Languages (most Sami now speak Swedish, Norwegian, Finnish, or Russian as their first language, depending on the country in which they reside). In Sweden, the largest concentrations of Sami-language-speaking Sami are found in the municipalities of Arjeplog
, Gällivare
, Jokkmokk
and Kiruna
, and its immediate neighbourhood.
. Due to the geographic origins of its speakers, Romani is an Indo-Aryan language, closely related to languages spoken in modern-day India, and sometimes written with an Indic Script (see Romani writing systems
). Around 90% of Sweden's Roma people speak Romani, meaning that there are approximately 9,500 Chib speakers. In Sweden, there is no major geographic center for Romani like there is for Finnish, Sami, or Meänkieli, but it is considered to be of historical importance by the Swedish government, and as such the government is seen as having an obligation to preserve them, a distinction also held by Yiddish.
Yiddish is a Germanic language with significant Hebrew and Slavic influence, written with a variant of the Hebrew Alphabet (see Yiddish orthography
) and, formerly, spoken by most Ashkenazic Jews (although most now speak the language of the country in which they live). Although the Jewish population of Sweden was traditionally Sephardic, after the 18th century, Ashkenazic immigration began, and the immigrants brought with them their Yiddish language (See History of the Jews in Sweden
). There are around 18,000 Jews in Sweden, and of that number, roughly 4,000 are estimated to have enough knowledge of Yiddish to be speakers of it. Like Romani, it is seen by the government to be of historical importance. The organization Sällskapet för Jiddisch och Jiddischkultur i Sverige (Society for Yiddish and Yiddish Culture in Sweden) has over 200 members, many of whom are mother-tongue Yiddish speakers, and arranges regular activities for the speech community and in external advocacy of the Yiddish language.
A majority of Swedes, especially those born after World War II
, are able to understand and speak English
thanks to trade links, the popularity of overseas travel, a strong Anglo-American influence and the tradition of subtitling
rather than dubbing foreign television shows and films. English, whether in American or British dialects, became a compulsory subject for secondary school
students studying natural science
s as early as 1849 and has been a compulsory subject for all Swedish students since the late 1940s.
Depending on the local school authorities, English is currently a compulsory subject from third
until ninth grade
, and all students continuing in secondary school study English for at least another year. Most students also learn one and sometimes two additional languages; the most popular being German
, French
and Spanish
. Some Danish
and Norwegian
is, at times, also taught as part of the Swedish course taught to native speakers of Swedish to emphasize differences and similarities between the languages.
The role of English
There is currently an ongoing debate among linguists whether English should be considered a foreign or second language
in Sweden (and the other Scandinavian countries) due to its widespread use in society. This has also triggered opposition: in 2002 the Swedish government proposed an action plan to strengthen the status of Swedish and in 2009 Swedish was announced the official language of the country for first time in history.
, Greece
, Italy
, Romania
, Spain
, Turkey
and former Yugoslavia
). Second and third-generation Swedes of Southern European descent adapted Swedish as their main tongue, or in addition to languages passed down in families, such as Bulgarian
, Greek
, Italian
, Dutch
, Serbo-Croatian
and Turkish
. However, the criteria in European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages
state that minority languages need a long history in the country to receive the classification, and thus, these languages have not come into question. See further: Immigration to Sweden
.
Swedish language
Swedish is a North Germanic language, spoken by approximately 10 million people, predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland, especially along its coast and on the Åland islands. It is largely mutually intelligible with Norwegian and Danish...
is the official language of Sweden
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
and is spoken by the vast majority of the nine million inhabitants of the country. It is a North Germanic language
North Germanic languages
The North Germanic languages or Scandinavian languages, the languages of Scandinavians, make up one of the three branches of the Germanic languages, a sub-family of the Indo-European languages, along with the West Germanic languages and the extinct East Germanic languages...
and quite similar to its sister North Germanic Languages, Danish
Danish language
Danish is a North Germanic language spoken by around six million people, principally in the country of Denmark. It is also spoken by 50,000 Germans of Danish ethnicity in the northern parts of Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, where it holds the status of minority language...
and Norwegian
Norwegian language
Norwegian is a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Norway, where it is the official language. Together with Swedish and Danish, Norwegian forms a continuum of more or less mutually intelligible local and regional variants .These Scandinavian languages together with the Faroese language...
.
History
For most of its history, Sweden was a larger country than today. At its height in 1658 the Swedish realmSwedish Empire
The Swedish Empire refers to the Kingdom of Sweden between 1561 and 1721 . During this time, Sweden was one of the great European powers. In Swedish, the period is called Stormaktstiden, literally meaning "the Great Power Era"...
comprised the territories of contemporary Finland and Estonia as well as parts of Russia, Latvia, Germany, Denmark and Norway. Hence, Sweden's linguistic landscape has historically been very different from that of today.
Since Swedish emerged from Old Norse
Old Norse
Old Norse is a North Germanic language that was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and inhabitants of their overseas settlements during the Viking Age, until about 1300....
until the 19th century, the Swedish dialects were generally much more different than today and since the 20th century Standard Swedish
Standard Swedish
Standard Swedish denotes Swedish as a spoken and written standard language. While Swedish as a written language is uniform and standardized, the spoken standard may vary considerably from region to region...
prevails throughout the country. The Scandinavian languages constitute a dialectal continuum and some of the traditional Swedish dialects
Swedish dialects
Swedish dialects can be categorized into Traditional Dialects and Modern Dialects .-Traditional dialects:...
could equally be described as Danish (Scanian) or Norwegian
Norwegian dialects
The Norwegian dialects are commonly divided into 4 main groups, North Norwegian , Trøndelag Norwegian , West Norwegian , and East Norwegian...
(Jamtlandic).
Finnish
Finnish language
Finnish is the language spoken by the majority of the population in Finland Primarily for use by restaurant menus and by ethnic Finns outside Finland. It is one of the two official languages of Finland and an official minority language in Sweden. In Sweden, both standard Finnish and Meänkieli, a...
was the majority language of Sweden's eastern parts, though it was used almost exclusively as a spoken language, although these areas also was home for a significant Swedish-speaking minority. Finnish became a minority language in the west, as well, since many Finnish speakers migrated there for economic reasons.
Estonian
Estonian language
Estonian is the official language of Estonia, spoken by about 1.1 million people in Estonia and tens of thousands in various émigré communities...
was the language of the majority in Swedish Estonia
Swedish Estonia
The Duchy of Estonia , also known as Swedish Estonia, was a dominion of the Swedish Empire from 1561 until 1721, when it was ceded to Russia in the Treaty of Nystad, following its capitulation in the Great Northern War. The dominion arose when the northern parts of present-day Estonia were united...
but the province, like Finland hosted a Swedish-speaking minority
Estonian Swedes
The Estonian Swedes, Estonia-Swedes, or Coastal Swedes are a Swedish-speaking linguistic minority traditionally residing in the coastal areas and islands of what is now western and northern Estonia...
and also a more significant minority of Germans.
In mediaeval Sweden, the Low German language
Middle Low German
Middle Low German is a language that is the descendant of Old Saxon and is the ancestor of modern Low German. It served as the international lingua franca of the Hanseatic League...
had a very important role as a commercial language and the lingua franca of the Hanseatic league
Hanseatic League
The Hanseatic League was an economic alliance of trading cities and their merchant guilds that dominated trade along the coast of Northern Europe...
. As such, the Low German language influenced Swedish and other languages in the region considerably. In mediaeval Stockholm
Stockholm
Stockholm is the capital and the largest city of Sweden and constitutes the most populated urban area in Scandinavia. Stockholm is the most populous city in Sweden, with a population of 851,155 in the municipality , 1.37 million in the urban area , and around 2.1 million in the metropolitan area...
, half of the population were Low German speakers. Low German was also the language spoken in the 17th century Swedish territories in northern Germany i.e. Swedish Pomerania
Swedish Pomerania
Swedish Pomerania was a Dominion under the Swedish Crown from 1630 to 1815, situated on what is now the Baltic coast of Germany and Poland. Following the Polish War and the Thirty Years' War, Sweden held extensive control over the lands on the southern Baltic coast, including Pomerania and parts...
, Bremen-Verden
Bremen-Verden
Bremen-Verden, formally the Duchies of Bremen and Verden , were two territories and immediate fiefs of the Holy Roman Empire, which emerged and gained Imperial immediacy in 1180...
, Wismar
Wismar
Wismar , is a small port and Hanseatic League town in northern Germany on the Baltic Sea, in the state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern,about 45 km due east of Lübeck, and 30 km due north of Schwerin. Its natural harbour, located in the Bay of Wismar is well-protected by a promontory. The...
and Wildeshausen
Wildeshausen
Wildeshausen is a town and the capital of the Oldenburg district in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is situated by the river Hunte.-History:...
(as well as the rest of northern Germany) and by the German minority in Estonia and Swedish Livonia
Swedish Livonia
- Swedish infantry and cavalry regiments:Infantry regiments:* Garnisonsregementet i Riga * Guvenörsregementet i Riga * Livländsk infanteribataljon I...
. Livonia was also inhabited by Latvians
Latvians
Latvians or Letts are the indigenous Baltic people of Latvia.-History:Latvians occasionally refer to themselves by the ancient name of Latvji, which may have originated from the word Latve which is a name of the river that presumably flowed through what is now eastern Latvia...
, Estonians
Estonians
Estonians are a Finnic people closely related to the Finns and inhabiting, primarily, the country of Estonia. They speak a Finnic language known as Estonian...
and Livonians.
In Swedish Ingria
Swedish Ingria
Swedish Ingria was a dominion of the Swedish Empire from 1580 to 1595 and then again from 1617 to 1721, when it was ceded to the Russian Empire in the Treaty of Nystad....
, apart from Swedish also Finnish, Ingrian
Ingrian language
The Ingrian language is a Finnic language spoken by the Izhorians of Ingria. It has approximately 500 speakers left, most of whom are aging...
and Votian were spoken.
Latin as the language of the Catholic Church was introduced in Sweden with the Christianisation, around AD 1000. Like in most of Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
, Latin remained the Lingua Franca
Lingua Franca
Lingua Franca was an American magazine about intellectual and literary life in academia.-Founding:The magazine was founded in 1990 by Jeffrey Kittay, an editor and Professor of French Literature at Yale University...
and scholarly language of the educated communities for centuries in Sweden. For instance, Carolus Linnaeus
Carolus Linnaeus
Carl Linnaeus , also known after his ennoblement as , was a Swedish botanist, physician, and zoologist, who laid the foundations for the modern scheme of binomial nomenclature. He is known as the father of modern taxonomy, and is also considered one of the fathers of modern ecology...
' most famous work Systema Naturae
Systema Naturae
The book was one of the major works of the Swedish botanist, zoologist and physician Carolus Linnaeus. The first edition was published in 1735...
, published in 1735, was written in Latin.
During the 18th century, French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
was the second language of Europe's upper classes and Sweden was no exception. The Swedish aristocracy often spoke French among themselves and code-switching
Code-switching
In linguistics, code-switching is the concurrent use of more than one language, or language variety, in conversation. Multilinguals—people who speak more than one language—sometimes use elements of multiple languages in conversing with each other...
between French and Swedish was common. The Swedish King Gustav III
Gustav III of Sweden
Gustav III was King of Sweden from 1771 until his death. He was the eldest son of King Adolph Frederick and Queen Louise Ulrica of Sweden, she a sister of Frederick the Great of Prussia....
was a true Francophile
Francophile
Is a person with a positive predisposition or interest toward the government, culture, history, or people of France. This could include France itself and its history, the French language, French cuisine, literature, etc...
and French was the common language at his court.
Gradually Sweden lost its overseas possessions and obtained its current borders in 1809, when it lost its eastern part (Finland
Finland
Finland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...
) to the Russian Empire
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
. As a consequence, Sweden became a rather homogeneous country with the exceptions of the indigenous Sami-people and the Finnish-speaking Tornedalians
Tornedalians
The Tornedalians are descendants of Finns who in some point in history settled to the areas of today's Northern Sweden near the Torne Valley district and west from there.-History:...
in the northernmost parts of the country.
During the 19th century Sweden became more industrialised, resulting in important demographic changes. The population duplicated and people moved from the countryside to towns and cities. As a consequence, of this and factors such as generalised education and mass media, the traditional dialects began to give room for the standard language (Standard Swedish
Standard Swedish
Standard Swedish denotes Swedish as a spoken and written standard language. While Swedish as a written language is uniform and standardized, the spoken standard may vary considerably from region to region...
). A large numbers of Swedes also decided to emigrate, especially to the United States
Swedish emigration to the United States
During the Swedish emigration to the United States in the 19th and early 20th centuries, about 1.3 million Swedes left Sweden for the United States...
. There, the Swedes came in contact with the English language
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
. Since then, like in the rest of Europe and indeed the world, English has grown as an important foreign language in Sweden, especially since the allied victory of World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
.
During the second half of the 20th century and the first decade of the 21st century, Sweden has received great numbers of immigrants who speak other languages than Swedish (see: Immigrant languages below). It's unclear to what degree these communities will hold on to their languages and to what degree they will assimilate.
Swedish
Nation-state
The nation state is a state that self-identifies as deriving its political legitimacy from serving as a sovereign entity for a nation as a sovereign territorial unit. The state is a political and geopolitical entity; the nation is a cultural and/or ethnic entity...
for the Swedish people, and as such, their national language is held in very high regard. Of Sweden's roughly nine million people, almost all speak Swedish as at least a second language, and the majority as a first language (7,825,000, according to SIL's Ethnologue
Ethnologue
Ethnologue: Languages of the World is a web and print publication of SIL International , a Christian linguistic service organization, which studies lesser-known languages, to provide the speakers with Bibles in their native language and support their efforts in language development.The Ethnologue...
). Swedish is also an official language in Finland
Finland
Finland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...
where it is spoken by a large number of Swedish-speaking Finns. The language is also spoken to some degree by ethnic Swedes living outside Sweden, for example, just over half a million people of Swedish descent in the United States speak the language, according to Ethnologue.
Dialects
A number of Swedish dialectsSwedish dialects
Swedish dialects can be categorized into Traditional Dialects and Modern Dialects .-Traditional dialects:...
exist, some of which are divergent enough from standard Swedish to be considered separate languages.
Dalecarlian
The Dalecarlian (Elfdalian) dialect group is highly divergent, even within itself, so that speakers of separate sub-dialects do not always understand each other. Dialects of this group are spoken in the northern parts of the province of DalarnaDalarna
', English exonym: Dalecarlia, is a historical province or landskap in central Sweden. Another English language form established in literature is the Dales. Places involving the element Dalecarlia exist in the United States....
, especially in the Älvdalen Municipality
Älvdalen Municipality
Älvdalen Municipality is a municipality in Dalarna County in central Sweden. Its seat is located in the town of Älvdalen....
, by a population of 1,500.http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=dlc
Modern Gutnish
Modern Gutnish exists as a spoken language in GotlandGotland
Gotland is a county, province, municipality and diocese of Sweden; it is Sweden's largest island and the largest island in the Baltic Sea. At 3,140 square kilometers in area, the region makes up less than one percent of Sweden's total land area...
and Fårö
Fårö
Fårö is a small Baltic Sea island north of the island of Gotland, off Sweden's southeastern coast. It is the second-largest island in the province. It has a population of fewer than 600 and has become a popular summer resort. The island has no banks, post offices, medical services or police...
. It is an open issue whether modern Gutnish is to be considered an independent language or a Scandinavian dialect. It derives, however, from Old Gutnish, which is indisputably a separate branch of the Old Norse language family.
Jamtlandic
Jämtland
Jämtland or Jamtland is a historical province or landskap in the center of Sweden in northern Europe. It borders to Härjedalen and Medelpad in the south, Ångermanland in the east, Lapland in the north and Trøndelag and Norway in the west...
, but with a scattered speaker population throughout the rest of Sweden, Jamtlandic or Jamska is a West Scandinavian language
North Germanic languages
The North Germanic languages or Scandinavian languages, the languages of Scandinavians, make up one of the three branches of the Germanic languages, a sub-family of the Indo-European languages, along with the West Germanic languages and the extinct East Germanic languages...
with 95% lexical similarity to Norwegian and Swedish, but generally more archaic. It has a native speaker population of 30,000http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=jmk.
Scanian
Scania
Scania is the southernmost of the 25 traditional non-administrative provinces of Sweden, constituting a peninsula on the southern tip of the Scandinavian peninsula, and some adjacent islands. The modern administrative subdivision Skåne County is almost, but not totally, congruent with the...
(Skåne in Swedish), the Scanian dialect is considered by some to be a dialect of Danish
Danish language
Danish is a North Germanic language spoken by around six million people, principally in the country of Denmark. It is also spoken by 50,000 Germans of Danish ethnicity in the northern parts of Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, where it holds the status of minority language...
http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=scy, and a related dialect is also spoken in Bornholm
Bornholm
Bornholm is a Danish island in the Baltic Sea located to the east of the rest of Denmark, the south of Sweden, and the north of Poland. The main industries on the island include fishing, arts and crafts like glass making and pottery using locally worked clay, and dairy farming. Tourism is...
, where it is called "East Danish" (Scania was part of the kingdom of Denmark until 1658). The variety spoken today is heavily influenced by standard Swedish.
Recognized minority languages
In 1999, the Minority Language Committee of Sweden formally declared five minority languages of Sweden: Finnish, Meänkieli (also known as Tornedal, Tornionlaaksonsuomi or Tornedalian), the Sami languages, Romani, and Yiddish.Finnish
Finnish language
Finnish is the language spoken by the majority of the population in Finland Primarily for use by restaurant menus and by ethnic Finns outside Finland. It is one of the two official languages of Finland and an official minority language in Sweden. In Sweden, both standard Finnish and Meänkieli, a...
, a Uralic
Uralic languages
The Uralic languages constitute a language family of some three dozen languages spoken by approximately 25 million people. The healthiest Uralic languages in terms of the number of native speakers are Hungarian, Finnish, Estonian, Mari and Udmurt...
language, has long been spoken in Sweden (the same holds true for Swedish in Finland, see Finland-Swedes
Finland-Swedes
Swedish-speaking Finns constitute a linguistic minority in Finland. They maintain a strong identity and are alternatively seen either as a distinct subgroup of the Finnish people or as a separate ethnic group or even as a distinct nationality...
, Åland), as Finland was part of the Swedish kingdom for centuries). Today ethnic Finns (mainly first and second generation immigrants) constitute up to 5% of the population of Sweden, and the Finnish language is used by over 200,000. A high concentration of Finnish-speakers (some 16,000) resides in the county of Norrbotten
Norrbotten
Norrbotten is a Swedish province in northernmost Sweden. It borders south to Västerbotten, west to Swedish Lapland, and east to Finland.- Administration :...
.
Meänkieli
Meänkieli is also a Finnic language. Spoken by the Tornedalian peopleTornedalians
The Tornedalians are descendants of Finns who in some point in history settled to the areas of today's Northern Sweden near the Torne Valley district and west from there.-History:...
, it is so closely related to Finnish that they are mutually intelligible, and is sometimes considered a dialect of Finnish. Meänkieli is mainly used in the municipalities of Gällivare
Gällivare
Gällivare is a locality and the seat of Gällivare Municipality in Norrbotten County, Sweden with 8,480 inhabitants in 2005. The town was founded in the 17th century...
, Haparanda
Haparanda
Haparanda is a locality and the seat of Haparanda Municipality in Norrbotten County, Sweden with 4,778 inhabitants in 2005. It is adjacent to Tornio, Finland...
, Kiruna
Kiruna
Kiruna is the northernmost city in Sweden, situated in Lapland province, with 18,154 inhabitants in 2005. It is the seat of Kiruna Municipality Kiruna (Northern Sami: Giron, Finnish: Kiiruna) is the northernmost city in Sweden, situated in Lapland province, with 18,154 inhabitants in 2005. It is...
, Pajala
Pajala
Pajala is a locality and the seat of Pajala Municipality in Norrbotten County, Sweden with 1,985 inhabitants in 2005.-History:Lars Levi Læstadius lived and worked in Pajala Municipality in the middle of the 19th century...
and Övertorneå
Övertorneå
Övertorneå is a locality and the seat of Övertorneå Municipality in Norrbotten County, Sweden with 1,965 inhabitants in 2005.It is located at the shore of the Torne River, opposite to Ylitornio...
, all of which lie in the Torne Valley
Torne Valley
The Torne Valley or Torne River Valley lies at the border of Sweden and Finland. In 2009 it became one of the Sub-regions of Finland. It is named after the Torne River flowing through the valley and into the Gulf of Bothnia...
. Between 40,000 and 70,000 people speak Meänkeli as their first language.
Sami
Sami people
The Sami people, also spelled Sámi, or Saami, are the arctic indigenous people inhabiting Sápmi, which today encompasses parts of far northern Sweden, Norway, Finland, the Kola Peninsula of Russia, and the border area between south and middle Sweden and Norway. The Sámi are Europe’s northernmost...
(formerly known as Lapps) are a people indigenous to all of northern Scandinavia
Scandinavia
Scandinavia is a cultural, historical and ethno-linguistic region in northern Europe that includes the three kingdoms of Denmark, Norway and Sweden, characterized by their common ethno-cultural heritage and language. Modern Norway and Sweden proper are situated on the Scandinavian Peninsula,...
(see Sápmi (area)) who speak a closely related group of languages usually grouped together under the name "Sami", although at least three separate Sami Languages are spoken in Sweden. The languages are, like Finnish and Meänkeli, Uralic. Due to prolonged exposure to Germanic-language-speaking neighbors in Sweden and Norway, Sami languages have a large number of Germanic loanwords, which are not normally found in other Uralic languages like Finnish, Estonian
Estonian language
Estonian is the official language of Estonia, spoken by about 1.1 million people in Estonia and tens of thousands in various émigré communities...
, or Hungarian
Hungarian language
Hungarian is a Uralic language, part of the Ugric group. With some 14 million speakers, it is one of the most widely spoken non-Indo-European languages in Europe....
. Between 15,000 and 20,000 Sami people live in Sweden of whom 9,000 are Sami-language speakers. Worldwide, between 20,000 and 40,000 people speak Sami Languages (most Sami now speak Swedish, Norwegian, Finnish, or Russian as their first language, depending on the country in which they reside). In Sweden, the largest concentrations of Sami-language-speaking Sami are found in the municipalities of Arjeplog
Arjeplog
Arjeplog is a locality and the seat of Arjeplog Municipality in Norrbotten County, Sweden with 1,947 inhabitants in 2005.It is a popular winter test site for the European car industry....
, Gällivare
Gällivare
Gällivare is a locality and the seat of Gällivare Municipality in Norrbotten County, Sweden with 8,480 inhabitants in 2005. The town was founded in the 17th century...
, Jokkmokk
Jokkmokk
Jokkmokk is a locality and the seat of Jokkmokk Municipality in Norrbotten County, Sweden with 2,976 inhabitants in 2005. The Sámi name of the place means "River's Curve", due to the meandering river that runs through it...
and Kiruna
Kiruna
Kiruna is the northernmost city in Sweden, situated in Lapland province, with 18,154 inhabitants in 2005. It is the seat of Kiruna Municipality Kiruna (Northern Sami: Giron, Finnish: Kiiruna) is the northernmost city in Sweden, situated in Lapland province, with 18,154 inhabitants in 2005. It is...
, and its immediate neighbourhood.
Romani
Romani (also known as the Romani Chib) is the language spoken by the Roma People, a nomadic ethnic group originating in northern IndiaIndia
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
. Due to the geographic origins of its speakers, Romani is an Indo-Aryan language, closely related to languages spoken in modern-day India, and sometimes written with an Indic Script (see Romani writing systems
Romani writing systems
The Romani language has for most of its history been an entirely oral language, with no written form in common use. Although the first example of written Romani dates from 1542, it is not until the twentieth century that vernacular writing by native Romani people arose.Written Romani in the 20th...
). Around 90% of Sweden's Roma people speak Romani, meaning that there are approximately 9,500 Chib speakers. In Sweden, there is no major geographic center for Romani like there is for Finnish, Sami, or Meänkieli, but it is considered to be of historical importance by the Swedish government, and as such the government is seen as having an obligation to preserve them, a distinction also held by Yiddish.
Yiddish
Yiddish is a Germanic language with significant Hebrew and Slavic influence, written with a variant of the Hebrew Alphabet (see Yiddish orthography
Yiddish orthography
The Yiddish language is written using Hebrew script as the basis of a full vocalic alphabet. This adaptation uses letters that are silent or glottal stops in Hebrew, as vowels in Yiddish...
) and, formerly, spoken by most Ashkenazic Jews (although most now speak the language of the country in which they live). Although the Jewish population of Sweden was traditionally Sephardic, after the 18th century, Ashkenazic immigration began, and the immigrants brought with them their Yiddish language (See History of the Jews in Sweden
History of the Jews in Sweden
The History of the Jews in Sweden probably began with arrivals from the Hanseatic League in medieval times, but there are no records. In Elizabethan times it was common for European royalty to have Jewish doctors at court, and there is a record of a Jewish doctor who served Gustav Vasa in the 16th...
). There are around 18,000 Jews in Sweden, and of that number, roughly 4,000 are estimated to have enough knowledge of Yiddish to be speakers of it. Like Romani, it is seen by the government to be of historical importance. The organization Sällskapet för Jiddisch och Jiddischkultur i Sverige (Society for Yiddish and Yiddish Culture in Sweden) has over 200 members, many of whom are mother-tongue Yiddish speakers, and arranges regular activities for the speech community and in external advocacy of the Yiddish language.
Swedish Sign Language
Not an officially recognized minority language.Foreign languages
A majority of Swedes, especially those born after World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, are able to understand and speak English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
thanks to trade links, the popularity of overseas travel, a strong Anglo-American influence and the tradition of subtitling
Subtitle (captioning)
Subtitles are textual versions of the dialog in films and television programs, usually displayed at the bottom of the screen. They can either be a form of written translation of a dialog in a foreign language, or a written rendering of the dialog in the same language, with or without added...
rather than dubbing foreign television shows and films. English, whether in American or British dialects, became a compulsory subject for secondary school
Secondary education
Secondary education is the stage of education following primary education. Secondary education includes the final stage of compulsory education and in many countries it is entirely compulsory. The next stage of education is usually college or university...
students studying natural science
Natural science
The natural sciences are branches of science that seek to elucidate the rules that govern the natural world by using empirical and scientific methods...
s as early as 1849 and has been a compulsory subject for all Swedish students since the late 1940s.
Depending on the local school authorities, English is currently a compulsory subject from third
Third grade
In the United States, third grade is a year of primary education. It is the third school year after kindergarten. Students are usually 8 – 9 years old, depending on when their birthday occurs....
until ninth grade
Ninth grade
Ninth grade is the ninth post-kindergarten year of school education in some school systems. The students are 13 to 15 years of age, depending on when their birthday occurs. Depending on the school district, ninth grade is usually the first year of high school....
, and all students continuing in secondary school study English for at least another year. Most students also learn one and sometimes two additional languages; the most popular being German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
, French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
and Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
. Some Danish
Danish language
Danish is a North Germanic language spoken by around six million people, principally in the country of Denmark. It is also spoken by 50,000 Germans of Danish ethnicity in the northern parts of Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, where it holds the status of minority language...
and Norwegian
Norwegian language
Norwegian is a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Norway, where it is the official language. Together with Swedish and Danish, Norwegian forms a continuum of more or less mutually intelligible local and regional variants .These Scandinavian languages together with the Faroese language...
is, at times, also taught as part of the Swedish course taught to native speakers of Swedish to emphasize differences and similarities between the languages.
The role of English
There is currently an ongoing debate among linguists whether English should be considered a foreign or second language
Second language
A second language or L2 is any language learned after the first language or mother tongue. Some languages, often called auxiliary languages, are used primarily as second languages or lingua francas ....
in Sweden (and the other Scandinavian countries) due to its widespread use in society. This has also triggered opposition: in 2002 the Swedish government proposed an action plan to strengthen the status of Swedish and in 2009 Swedish was announced the official language of the country for first time in history.
Immigrant languages
Like many developed European countries from the late 1940s to the 1970s, Sweden has received tens of thousands of guest workers from countries in Southern Europe (i.e. BulgariaBulgaria
Bulgaria , officially the Republic of Bulgaria , is a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic in Southeast Europe. The country borders Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea to the east...
, Greece
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
, Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
, Romania
Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
, Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
, Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...
and former Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia refers to three political entities that existed successively on the western part of the Balkans during most of the 20th century....
). Second and third-generation Swedes of Southern European descent adapted Swedish as their main tongue, or in addition to languages passed down in families, such as Bulgarian
Bulgarian language
Bulgarian is an Indo-European language, a member of the Slavic linguistic group.Bulgarian, along with the closely related Macedonian language, demonstrates several linguistic characteristics that set it apart from all other Slavic languages such as the elimination of case declension, the...
, Greek
Greek language
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
, Italian
Italian language
Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...
, Dutch
Dutch language
Dutch is a West Germanic language and the native language of the majority of the population of the Netherlands, Belgium, and Suriname, the three member states of the Dutch Language Union. Most speakers live in the European Union, where it is a first language for about 23 million and a second...
, Serbo-Croatian
Serbo-Croatian language
Serbo-Croatian or Serbo-Croat, less commonly Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian , is a South Slavic language with multiple standards and the primary language of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Montenegro...
and Turkish
Turkish language
Turkish is a language spoken as a native language by over 83 million people worldwide, making it the most commonly spoken of the Turkic languages. Its speakers are located predominantly in Turkey and Northern Cyprus with smaller groups in Iraq, Greece, Bulgaria, the Republic of Macedonia, Kosovo,...
. However, the criteria in European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages
European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages
The European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages is a European treaty adopted in 1992 under the auspices of the Council of Europe to protect and promote historical regional and minority languages in Europe...
state that minority languages need a long history in the country to receive the classification, and thus, these languages have not come into question. See further: Immigration to Sweden
Immigration to Sweden
Immigration to Sweden is the process by which people migrate to Sweden to reside in the country. Many, but not all, become Swedish citizens. People have been migrating to the geographic region of Sweden for hundreds of years, with rates of immigration and source countries varying throughout...
.
See also
- Swedish languageSwedish languageSwedish is a North Germanic language, spoken by approximately 10 million people, predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland, especially along its coast and on the Åland islands. It is largely mutually intelligible with Norwegian and Danish...
- Finnish languageFinnish languageFinnish is the language spoken by the majority of the population in Finland Primarily for use by restaurant menus and by ethnic Finns outside Finland. It is one of the two official languages of Finland and an official minority language in Sweden. In Sweden, both standard Finnish and Meänkieli, a...
- MeänkieliMeänkieliMeänkieli is the name used in Sweden for Finnish dialects spoken in the northernmost parts of the country, around the valley of the Torne River....
- Sami languagesSami languagesSami or Saami is a general name for a group of Uralic languages spoken by the Sami people in parts of northern Finland, Norway, Sweden and extreme northwestern Russia, in Northern Europe. Sami is frequently and erroneously believed to be a single language. Several names are used for the Sami...
- Romani languageRomani languageRomani or Romany, Gypsy or Gipsy is any of several languages of the Romani people. They are Indic, sometimes classified in the "Central" or "Northwestern" zone, and sometimes treated as a branch of their own....
- Yiddish languageYiddish languageYiddish is a High German language of Ashkenazi Jewish origin, spoken throughout the world. It developed as a fusion of German dialects with Hebrew, Aramaic, Slavic languages and traces of Romance languages...
- Languages of the European UnionLanguages of the European UnionThe languages of the European Union are languages used by people within the member states of the European Union. They include the twenty-three official languages of the European Union along with a range of others...
- Minority languageMinority languageA minority language is a language spoken by a minority of the population of a territory. Such people are termed linguistic minorities or language minorities.-International politics:...