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Does anyone here speak Norwegian?
Joshua
Veteran
Hey, there's no good resources for learning Norwegian online, and the Norwegian peoples have refused to release eBooks in Norwegian. Lydbøker are the only means, and what about those who aren't yet fluent? There's Project Runeberg, that's it.
Therefore I'm writing a Norwegian Grammar along with a website for it since there's a big underground of linguaphiles in angst because of Norway, however my ability to speak Norwegian is sub par so I need someone to ask a couple questions on grammar and colloquial pronunciations here and there. I'll be posting this in other more appropriate forums, but because I've noticed an international scene here I thought I'd try my luck.
Thank you.
Therefore I'm writing a Norwegian Grammar along with a website for it since there's a big underground of linguaphiles in angst because of Norway, however my ability to speak Norwegian is sub par so I need someone to ask a couple questions on grammar and colloquial pronunciations here and there. I'll be posting this in other more appropriate forums, but because I've noticed an international scene here I thought I'd try my luck.
Thank you.
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Comments
Just kidding I made that up.
No worries. Norwegian is so easy that some random mutterings with German or Ebonics influences ought to form random Norwegian words.
I lived in Arizona for a bit, I was in this oasis, surrounded by Mexican ghettos all around, in Goodyear. El español, junto con el noruega, es el idioma más fácil para los hablantes nativos del inglés de aprender. Although, I think Spanish is supremely ugly outside of Spain. It's a pity the language got so popular in the first place.
For nå, føler jeg ganske bra. Selv om jeg spiste fire kylling bein verdt av marg i dag, og jeg tror at de kan ha vært litt rå.
Og, Dakini, tilgi min forferdelig norsk.
Også, takk så mye for hjelpen.
I can understand a little... don't know what happened to my font
I'm Jokke, and I was referred here by Brian. I'm a born Norwegian living in Norway, and could probably answer any questions regarding the Norwegian language, and help you translate words and sentences.
Thank you Jokke, any help would be greatly appreciated.
All I really need help with now is the occasional pronunciation anomaly, for instance it seems that words which end in 'ig' like 'vanskelig' which are normally pronounced 'vanskeli' when in the plural, 'vanskelige', to my English ear sounds like 'vanskje' when I'd expect an 'l' there. Silly things like this. Or a word like 'elleve' sounds a bit like 'ellve'.
Norway won't release eBooks for some reason, so I'm stuck with fairy tales and Wiki articles and such. Maybe some folkeeventyr recommendations would be helpful, for instance I'm reading "Østenfor Sol og Vestenfor Måne" and have no clue if this is a silly or unpopular tale?
Besides for that just the occasional idiom or phrase I can't figure out. I might have a dozen or so easy questions at first and then only sporadic ones afterward.
Thanks so very much if you can help!!!
You're right that we do drop a few letters in spoken language. The word "Vanskelig" (difficult) is indeed pronounced "vanskeli", dropping the g.
Be aware that Norway have two different official languages; Bokmål (direct translation "bookvoice"), the most common written language, and Nynorsk (New Norwegian), which is a gathering of dialects that somehow turned into a written language. These two languages are quite different, but for a non-native speaker could be hard to tell apart. I would advice focusing on Bokmål when learning Norwegian, it's the simplest and most used.
There are a few sites with Norwegian folk tales, if you Google them in Norwegian. This site: http://www.reisenett.no/eventyr/html/asbjornsen.htm has a good list of traditional tales, just click on the titles of the fairytales. A few words in the tales could be old and hard to translate, but I'll think you get the meaning.
you're about 8 posts too late.
Mange tak anyway....
Norway hasn't gotten into the whole Ebook thing, mainly because of publishers reluctancy to release books because of price, among other things. The average price of a hardcover, 250 page paper book in Norwegian bookstore is around $50-$60. The technology (Kindle, iPad) has reached our corner of the world, but not sold very well, and the buyers typically aren't that interested in books. No demand, no sales.
May I ask what you think about Swedish? I ask because on account that Swedish has twice the amount of speakers as Norwegian renders it a much more widespread language, in fact a long standing tradition whenever I study a new language is to begin with reading 'The Little Prince' (originally 'Le Petit Prince', or in Norwegian 'Den Lille Prinsen' and the book is around $70 with no free copies or otherwise less legal means. My next favorite book to get intermediate with is always to read a longer Harry Potter book, these are over $100 dollars, however I've gotten a hold of the first book in Swedish for free. Suddenly The Little Prince isn't as expensive as it seemed, and so I'm very tempted to learn Swedish instead.
I did plan to learn it anyways, it's like learning Portuguese when you know Spanish. Though Norwegian is in the middle of the dialect continuum as I've both read and recently validated. I can actually read Danish as easily as Norwegian, it's pretty unbelievable. For this reason I might have to stick with Norwegian even if finding affordable materials is a pain in the ass. I also hear that Swedish sounds like redneck talk to a Scandinavian ear.
If what I said was a bit discombobulated I apologize, I'm incredibly hung over.
Thank you very much again. You are my light in the dark!
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http://www.arild-hauge.com/troll.htm
Tell me Jokke, does even a Norwegian think it'd be unbelievable to learn Icelandic to read these Old Norse sagas and tales?
To my ear, Swedish sounds a bit like a West Germanic language, to a Scandinavian ear it sounds redneck. Norwegian to my ear sounds like Swedish without the West German draw and more with a Scottish flair, though to a Scandinavian ear it sounds clearer and more proper in some strange way. To my ear Icelandic is the perfect culmination of this Scottish draw I love, plus those dental fricatives are among my favorite sounds, and they are very rare in the world's languages yet despite this they enjoy a more frequent use in Icelandic than English. There is also the written language factor, like Gaelige there is simply something that seems breathtaking in its written form, a magnetic appeal. I also love ancient languages and I'm oddly attracted to Old Norse and Anglo-Saxon. Obviously Anglo-Saxon is out of the question, it's almost as silly as me being fluent in Esperanto. But this Icelandic is a powerhouse, I absolutely love it. The inflections aren't even so bad, only four cases and weak adjectives are pretty freaking weak. To make matters better, thanks to the ridiculously easy nature of Germanic verbs there's no conjugations for future and conditional, just separate modal verbs like always, plus no dreaded moods or aspects beyond the typical subjunctive. Icelandic really isn't hard for somebody with a linguistic background but due to the better half of why I'm learning Norwegian which is because my roommate is willing to learn it (which is enough to prompt me to learn any language since living in Indiana gives me access to only Mexican Spanish) and my roommate abandoned the idea of German because I was describing the grammar to him not to mention the complete lack of resources (it makes Norwegian appear to have a warehouse of free resources, there's more speakers of freaking Frisian than Icelandic), therefore Icelandic is obviously not feasible. But I wish!
Yeah, score 2 for Josh.
We all face challenges trying to maintain fluency after learning a language. Don't let it get you down.
Linguistics professor _--GO FOR IT!!!!!
Thanks for the ego boost, though I wasn't lying. I'm more or less a renunciate and the professor life would really hinder that. Besides I enjoy disappearing in small towns enveloped by corn oceans with standards as high as Walmart or apparently as low as mooching off my girlfriend's mom. That's how the mind is to be guided Dakini! I have all the time in the world for studies, wall gazing and hobby pursuits minus the nine to fiver I'll be compelled to get soon enough.
I think it would be cool to translate the dharma into those languages. You should learn sanskrit and Pali and get to work. Maybe you could get a grant from Naropa University or something?
Just dreaming..
How many languages can you read? Speak?
My brain won't forget Esperanto for some reason, even though I studied it eight years ago. I'm very good with Esperanto, I can think in the language a feat which I can only do with French after reading at least thirty pages or more a day consistently while watching films in French occasionally. My active Spanish is terrible at this point, though since Vincenzi didn't criticize it, being a native hispanohablante, I'd imagine it's still good enough to "rub along" as Simon would say about my French. When I was learning Esperanto as a teenager I discovered that there's a large Brazilian Esperanto speaking population with seemingly half the active online Esperantists being Brasileiros. Therefore I used Portuguese a lot, then I took an intensive class in college that took me close to fluency, now I can't even conjugate irregular verbs properly, but I can read it easily. I've studied Italian, German and Latin very intensely, however Italian is useless, German seems to have a never ending vocabulary and mastering Wheelock's Latin doesn't quite measure up so I abandoned those, but with a dico I can usually read them well. The only real language I'm confident enough in to have an intellectual discussion is French.
I did the Pali thing, I'd love to learn it but it would be a tremendous dedication. Not only is its grammar quite comparable to Russian but the way things are at least expressed in the Dhammapada isn't intuitive enough for me. If I remember correctly "made by mind" is literally "mind-best". When I get a job I'll buy that popular book, I think it's called Warders.
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If you want a linguabeast check out Dakini. Navajo..
I guess you might find that statement offensive. Where are you from again? Was it Costa Rica?
Some Spanish is okay. Peruvian is really neutral, no accent and crystal clear pronunciation, nothing to dislike. Argentine sounds a bit redneck, has the most distinctive deviation from proper pronunciation and is completely slurred. It's charming. Their neighbor Chile has an interesting Spanish, they eliminate half the consonants like you find in spoken Russian, when combined with its strange draw it sounds almost native american, like their Quechuan population. Mexican to my ear is more a question of how much cholo twang is there? I hate that nasaly cholo sound. Eeeh ese, que onda? Ugh.
Though since I've been around Mexican since first grade when I learnt my first Spanish words, I can nail that accent. I can sound like a native Mexican or I can go full cholo. It's a pity it's the only accent I've perfected.
however, the OP never mentioned the translation that Jeffrey is asking about... It did have obvious errors, but what I asked about is why spanish is ugly outside spain?
and now, why italian is useless?
it sounds either offensive, ignorant or both.
yes, I was born in Costa Rica. the pronunciation is quite neutral (some say Peruvian is similar). I lived in Spain, and found their pronunciation just different... but not ugly.
although to be honest, there's 2 languages I consider ugly in the sense that they seem forced/uncomfortable to speak: French (nasal) and Chinese (tonal)... and 2 languages that are just plain dumb in the way they are written: English and Chinese... but that can be reformed (easier than changing pronunciation).
nordic languages sound nice... I have some suomi (from Finland) songs, and one that is from Sweden or close to it.
Italian isn't completely useless like Icelandic, however it doesn't quite enjoy a status in western countries like English, French or German. In other words it's really only useful in Italy and some random European countries where it shared national status with one to three other languages.
I agree that Chinese sounds odd (though pleasant) but Parisian French to my ear is very beautiful, just like written French. English and French could use spelling reforms, however, it is part of the appeal, it's difficult to systematize an international pronunciation scheme plus especially in the case of French the written language functions as an etymological clue to facilitate language acquisition when coming from another Romance language background. A classic case being circumflexes usually indicating an 's' which was once there. This works with English too when learning another Germanic language, silent 'k's' and 'w's'come to mind.
If you were implying that Finnish is even in the Indo-European family it is not, the closest is the theoretical Nostratic.
Could you please correct my Spanish sentence? Was it the definite articles? Spanish words things oddly sometimes, this is why French is often easier than it's given credit for.
I, personally, think Swedish can be somewhat hard to listen to, but that's just my inner racist. No, joke aside, in general, the Norwegians I've discussed language with agree that Swedish is easy to understand when spoken, but hard in writing. Danish is near impossible to understand in spoken form, but quite easy in written. Bokmål, as you probably know, is based off the Danish language, after that painful period under Danish rule.
When it comes to Icelandic, it's a fascinating language. I have several friends trying to learn Icelandic in order to read old Norse texts and sagas. If I'm spoken to in Icelandic, with clear and slow speech, I can almost make out the meaning of the sentence, part due to the likeness of some words, part because i understand a tiny little bit of Icelandic.
the only error is "noruego"
if you want to learn norwegian, why not go to Norway to study?
The problem is that I'm poor, I have defaulted student loans too. With the US financial system collapsing I doubt I'll get a loan and job competition is very high, people turn in good resumees for fast food jobs now. Besides I could just go to Minnesota or Wisconsin. Lol, just kidding.
I can't believe you have friends learning Icelandic, that's really cool. Maybe one day long if after I manage to learn Norwegian, I will set my sights on Icelandic!
So Jokke, how ought I ask you questions, should it be here, by private message or by email? Anyways, here's a good question: I'm sure I've made plenty of mistakes in the bottom sentence, but specifically the 'være glad for' part, did I say that correctly? It's tricky because 'være glad i' means 'to love' so I'm a bit confused here.
Tusen takk igjen, er jeg veldig glad for å høre fra deg og ser frem til dine budskaper i fremtiden.
as with italian, there has to be number and gender concordance. "el noruego" (both article and noun "male"),
I don't mind you asking questions on the board, but I'm open for other solutions if you wish.
"Tusen takk igjen, er jeg veldig glad for å høre fra deg og ser frem til dine budskaper i fremtiden."
This sentence is very good, a few comments:
-"Tusen takk igjen" Good
-"er jeg veldig glad" Should be: jeg er (I am)veldig glad.
-"for å høre fra deg" Good
-"og ser fram til dine budskaper i framtiden" There is something not quite right about using the word "budskap". It's not gramatically wrong, but I feel "budskap" is VERY formal. Alternately you could say "og ser fram til å høre fra deg i framtiden" (looking forward to hear from you in the future).
"Være glad i" is often translated with love as you say, but it's more like showing fondness for someone. For the word love, we use "elsker" as in "jeg elsker deg" (I love you), but "elsker" is reserved for more intimate relationships. You don't tell your friend "Jeg elsker deg", but you could say "Jeg er glad i deg".
I still don't know when to reverse the subject and verb correctly, I just guess sometimes and sometimes I'm right, this time I was wrong, haha. Luckily I have a very good grammar book on Norwegian, I need to read it better. ** EDIT: it looks like this happens in dependent clauses, I'll need to memorize those words hvis, fordi, siden... etc Another brick off the wall, nice.
I wish I could take credit for the 'for å høre' part but credit is due to Google Translation's fine job there. I remember when I was much younger and Google Translations were terrible, they aren't perfect but nevertheless they are supremely better.
Well Jokke, my Norse savior, thank you.
* Aha, a question, is 'well' the way I used it 'vel' in Norwegian?
* the word 'rom' sounds exactly like 'room' in English, however does the word 'rommet' because of the double m sound like 'rumet' or 'råmet'? I figured the latter but I really don't know.
* those 'gn' sounds like in the word 'regne', does it sound like it looks, or like the French sound: 'renje'? But deeper in the mouth than a normal n, confused here.
* is the diphthong 'ei' pronounced more like 'æi' rather than 'ei' or 'ai'? E.g., 'nei' and this is how 'jeg' or 'meg' is pronounced too right?
* is the diphthong 'øy' pronounced more like 'øi' than how its written? E.g., 'nøyaktig'.
* are final, unstressed 'e's' pronounced more like 'æ' or a schwa like 'uh' in English? E.g., snakke is it more like 'snakkuh' or 'snakkæ'?
I suggest you find a dictionary that has phonetics (like IPA). wiktionary.org even has audio recordings of some common words.
*Rom (room) is pronounced straight forward, "rom". You pronounce it like the drink rum, only with o instead of u. It's a very firm word, unlike English where you kinda drag the O's in room.
*"Regne" is pronounced almost like "ræine", it's quite soft and you drag the Æ a little bit. Note that everything I explain is as spoken in Oslo (the capital) where the dialect is closest to bokmål. I have a quite different dialect and thus, words like "regne", "jeg", "deg", and plenty others are pronounced differently all across Norway.
*Many E's in the Norwegian language are pronounced as Æ's. "Nei" (no) is pronounced "næi", "jeg" (I) and "meg" are pronounced "Jæi" and "mæi".
*You are correct that "nøyaktig" (accurate) is pronounced "nøiakti" (note the silent G).
*I*d say that 98% of the Norwegian population pronounces "snakke" (to talk) with an E at the end. The exception is in a few, VERY local dialects, where the Æ-ending is used. In those dialects, they also drag the Æ quite a bit.
Wow, I (being Dane) think that Norwegian is (somehow) easily understood spoken and perfectly clear when written. Swedish on the other hand is more easily read than understood when spoken - most Danes do understand it though.
I always thought Norwegians understood Danish better than Swedish - we have way, way more words in common. Maybe because Danish is in another rythm and more words are swallowed or mumbled? When travelling I find waiters, shop keepers and the like who think I am either English or Norwegian - they can't hear the difference when we just chat
I used to live in Danmark many years ago, you may be able to tell by my user name.
Farvel saa laenge
Yes, with rythm I meant the speed - I once heard a radio programme about Danish and its relation to the other Nordic languages. It was said that Danish has a "machine gun rythm" (which isn't a rythm at all - it was described as "dakdakdakdakdak"). Norwegian was said to have a "DAKdak, DAKdak, DAKdak"-rythm
@Fenrir
At least the people from the outer rims of Jutland does ^_^ I think people from Copenhagen talk clearly enough. I come from Kolding originally - the South Jutland-ic influence is most prominent there, but the last twenty years has seen a lot of immigration to the area which flattens the dialect.
Personally I try (and have always practiced) speaking plane Danish "Rigs-dansk" without dialect - like the Queen, but without the royal touch
I just like it better..
Do you come from Denmark originally, and why did you move (in/out - if I may ask)? I think a lot about emigrating because I find the Danish culture to be undesirable. Tribe mentality and "småborgerlighed" conflicts a lot with my values.
Edit: "Småborgerlig" = petty bourgeoisie