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Munduko Hizkuntzen Amarauna
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Munduko hizkuntzen amarauna


DATUAK IKUSI

 

Registration number 191 
Questionnaire number 782  Inkesta bete deneko hizkuntza English
Respondent's details Wiggen Geirr  Institution belonged to: University of Oslo  Address ILS, P. O. Box 1099 Blindern N-0316 Oslo NORWAY  State NORWAY  E-mail geirr.wiggen@ils.uio.no  Language Code 634002  Name of the language NORWEGIAN  Heteroglotonym NORWEGIAN   Autoglotonym NORSK  Other names of the language Norv?gien, Noruego   Basque name Norvegiera  Country where the language is spoken NORWAY  Linguistic filiation Family: Indo-European Group: Germanic Subgroup: North Germanic, Scandinavian  Varieties   Art?cles   01.Does this language have other varieties? If so, what are these? As a spoken language, N. exists in a series of social and geographic dialects throught Norway. Varyingly maintained it also exists among the substantial number of Norw. immigrants to the U.S.A and their descendants. In writing, N. exists in two main varie  02.Does the language exist in a written form? Yes. There are two basic norms or written n.: a) Bokmal ( <><>< span="">03.Is there standardisation of the language? Spoken N. is not officially standardized. It is used dialectally in all quarters and levels of social life. P.t, however, southeast (urban Oslo) variants are gaining a certain regional and even national norms status and influence most varieties of N., though varyingly much.- In writing, Bokmal and Nyorsk are standardized orthographically and morphologically, but both standards allow for considerable formal variation, so that the writers may choose forms that correspond to their spoken dialectal ones while learning to accept, when reading, those of the others that differ from their own.  04.Do you consider yourself a member of this linguistic community? If so, why? Yes. I am born and bred within it and have N. as my mother tongue.  05.Where is this language spoken? What are its geographical boundaries? Throughout Norway. In addition, N. is understood and used in various degrees where Norwegians/Norwegian descendants live outside Norway, esp. in the U.S.A. Norwegian is not used, but widely understood by Danes, Swedes and Swedish speaking Finns, to a lesser degree both used and understood by Faroese and Icelanders and understood by quite a few Finnish-speaking Finns.  06.Have these geographical boundaries changed over the years? If so, how have they altered? Not in modern times.- During most of the Middle Ages, however, old N. was used throughout the whole western part of the North Germanic language area, later to develop differently in the insular Atlantic area and on the Scandinavian mainland, leading to the extinxtion of Norn (the N. spoken on Shetland and the Orkneys) by 1850 and to the establishment of Faroese and Icelandic as separate languages. Likewise, N. har yielded to Swedish in formerly Norw. parts of present day Sweden. Within Norway, N. has gained ground among the aboriginal Sami people in the middle and, especially, northern parts of the country. The same holds true with the areas of the historically younger (from ca. 1600) Finnish speaking minority, which became extinct in southern Norway by ca. 1900 and bare survives in northern Norway (Kven) today.   07.What is the physical terrain of this area like?   08.Are any other languages spoken within the same territory? If so, what are these? 1) One aboriginal language group, Sami (ca.30,000 users), partly not interintelligible.
2)One lesser indigenous minority, Kven ( a Finnish variety since ca. 1600, now ab 2000 users)
3) Gypsy Romany (since the 1500s, ca.200 users, mainly of the Lovaritska dialect)
4)The tinkers' Romany, grammatically Swedish-Norwegian, but lexically heavily influenced by the gypsies' Romany (ca. 2000 more or less proficient users) 5)Norwegian Sign Langugae (primary language to some 3-5000 deaf/hearing-disabled). 6)Rotwelsch (Hebrew rooted tongue of the iterant boat-people in southern Norway)
7) Some 100 different immigrant languages (ca.5%of the Norw. population). 1)-4) are all more or less endangered, 6) is moribund.  		09.Could you enclose a sketch or indicate the area in which this language is spoken? (if you wish, you can draw a sketch in the space on the next page)   10.What State(s) / country (ies) do/es the territory/ies where the language is spoken belong to? Norway  11.What is the total number of inhabitants (whether or not they speak this language) of this territory? 4,2 million  12.How many of the inhabitants understand, speak, read or write this language? Understand: nearly 100%
Speak: 95-100%
Read: nearly 100%
  		13.How many of the speakers are monolingual (use only this language)? Some 95% (but many know other languages as school-taught foreign languages).  14.How many of the speakers are bilingual (use this and another language)? What other language(s) do they speak? Some 5-6% (including practically all Samis, Kvens, gypsies and tinkers + most recent immigrants (who now receive teaching of Norwegian until they reach a certain level of proficiency).  15.How many of the speakers are multilingual (speak this and more than one other language)? What other languages do they speak? Over 90% of the children and adolescents finish 13 years of schooling now, and they will have studies 2-4 foreign languages, most od them 3 (English (obligatorily throughout all school years), German and French (though some even choose Spanish, Russian, Italian, Sami, Finnish or Latin instead of the latter two). Swedish and Danish are intelligible to most Norwegians anyway and are studied at school as part of Norwegian as a mother tongue.  16.Are speakers of this language dispersed throughout the territory, or are they concentrated in specific population centres?   17.How has the number of speakers of this language evolved over time (increased, decreased or remained stable)? Increased according to the number of population.  18.Is the language passed down from generation to generation? If not, why not? What language is replacing it? Yes. Presently, N. is not endangered. But during the 1990s English has begun to gain a foothold in some societal domains (e.g. parts of the petroleum, computer and other 'heavy' industrial areas as well as within academic spheres) industry, not only as a lingua franca, but even as a means of communication between Norwegians. If this line of development is mantained or, indeed, enhanced, Norwegian might face losses of domains.  19.Could you indicate how often the members of each generation use the language with other generations (old people with old people, young people with old people, etc) in their informal contacts (in the street, at home, in leisure time,...)?   20.ADo the speakers of other languages learn this language? In what circumstances?   20.BDo the speakers of other languages speak this language? In what circumstances? Yes. The Samis and the Kvens are generally bilingual, some even trilingual. Primarily Sami speaking Samis speak N. not only in contact with non-Sami Norwegians and they use N. as a lingua franca among themselves in self-governmental bodies (although Sami is an official language in the Sami core areas of northenmost Norway). The immigrants all learn N. (cf.14).   21.Is there any historical, political or economic factor which has affected the situation Yes. The presence of Bokmal as the dominant variety of written N. is due to the colonial dominance of Norway by Denmark 1380-1814, when Danish was the sole written language allowed. Likewise, the alternative Nynorsk variety came into being in opposition to Danish as part of the nation building of Norway after 1814. Today, the only linguistic pressure comes from commercial Anglo-American usage. That is the part of the ongoing economic and political internationalization, which might also prove to threaten a hitherto generally felt Scandinavian, and to some degree even Nordic, language community.   22.Has any other factor directly influenced the growth or threatened the future of the language (migration, temporary labour, deportations, wars...)? No. The war 1940-45 never came as far as to threaten N. nor has N. exerted transnational influence since the days of the Vikings (ca. 700/800-1050).  23.Is the language currently threatened? If so, what is the cause?   24.Is the community which speaks this language in danger? If so, what is the cause?   25.Is there any internal migration (movement of the population within the territory)? Is there any external migration (movement out of the territory to others)? If so, what is the cause? Internal migration has increased during the latter decades, above all as part of a rapid urbanization, but is nevertheless much less than what is the case in the neighbouring Nordic countries. And, moreover, until recently some 50% of all internal moving has been moving home after some years in regional/national centres/towns for educational/occupational reasons. Norwegians, thus, seem to remain loyal to their local origins, both culturally and demographically (cf. the mantained dialect use, 3). This situation is partly conditioned by a considerable internal social migration, with many children of workers and small farmer having had and taken the opportunity to educate themselves and, thus, move socially, while maintaining their contact and solidarity, incl. feelings, opinions, values etc. of life, with their parental origins. Today, external migration (emigration) is hardly noticeable.  26.What is the main economic activity of this community?   27.What is the influence of religion on this community? Officially, more than 90% are Protestants (Lutheran Christians organized in a State church), but less than 20% are regular church goers. Quite a few of them are rather Low Church or approaching Calvinist reformism. Some 1% are Roman catholics (wherof ca. 50% recent immigrants), ca. 1% muslims. Norway must probably be said to be rather secularized today, although Christian values/traditions are widely upheld.  28.Does the language have any official status (official, joint-official language, acceptance...)? Yes, both N. as such and Bokmal and Nynorsk as its written varieties.  29.Is the language used in contact with the administration? Indicate whether its use in Yes, throughout.  30.Is this language used in education (whether as the teaching medium or as a subject of study)? Indicate whether there is spoken and /or written use of the language in elementary and higher education. Yes, throughout.  31.Is this language used in the media (radio, newspapers and television...)? Yes, throughout.  32.Is the language used in religious services and ceremonies? Indicate whether there is spoken or written use of the language in religious services and ceremonies. Yes, but challenged by English lately in some important domains.(cf.18)  33.Is the language used in business and labour relations? Indicate whether the use is spoken and/or written. Yes throughout but challenged by English lately in some important domains.  34.Are there any other areas in which this language is used in its written form? In all areas.  35.Is there any organisation or body responsible for linguistic policy and planning with respect to this language? What kind of activities does this perform? Yes. The Norwegian Language Council (orig.: Norsk sprakrad), a separate external body under the Dept. of Culture, its 38 members elected for periods of 4 years. This body standardizes written N. (cf.3), take measures to protect and maintain the use of N. everywhere, is heard in all legal matters concerning language (use), initiates new legislation and looks after the obedience of the existing one, administers onomastic policies, controls the language of all school textbooks, carries out Nordic and international cooperation in language political and language planning issues etc.  36.Is there any kind of cultural or linguistic organisation or body which promotes the knowledge and/or use of the language? What kind of activities does this perform? In addition to the Norwegian Language Council, there is a series of private grass-root/academic organizations which work for the promotion of certain styles/varieties of N. Moreover, there is the whole educational establishment, libraries, publishers etc. with similar obligations.  37.Does he language have a literary tradition? If so, please give some information about this literary tradition. Yes, since the early Middle Ages sagas and poetry, in modern times a large number of literary artists (e.g. Ibsen, Undset, Hamsun, Vesaas etc.), their works supported by a certain number of copies being bought for the benefit of libraries. In addition, a large literary production and consumption of all kinds of non-fictional literature, incl. a remarkable appetite for encyclopaedic works and as many as ca. 170 different newspapers. Academic textbooks in N., however, are presently yielding to English ones.   38.What is the attitude of the majority of the members of this community towards the knowledge and use of this language? Unproblematized positive. The use of N. is taken for granted. (But a historically inherited insecurity of everything Norwegian may sometimes result in either an undue insistence on N. or, more often, in an unreasonable lack of self-esteem leading to unnecessary snobish/insecure uses of English.  39.What is the attitude of the majority of the members of the neighbouring communities towards the knowledge and use of the language? Traditionally, Sweden and the Swedish have not heeded N. much. With the recent strong economy of Norway that is about to change now. Denmark and the Danes have heeded N. more and still do so. So do the Faroese, but Iceland and the Icelanders turn to English more and more now on the cost of all Scandinavian languages. That is also the case with Finland and, especially, the Finnish speaking Finns.  40.Please add any other details regarding the situation of the language which you consider of interest. 27 July 1998 I sent to UNESCO in Paris some publications of mine relevant to this point:
1) Dialect and School in the European Countries: Norway. Sociolinguistica 3, 75-84. T?bingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag.
2) Norway in the 1990s: a sociolinguistic profile. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 115, 47-84. Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gryter.
3) Les lleng?es de l'ensenyament a Noruega: lleis i regulacions. In: Els Drets Ling?istics a la nova Europa. Actes del II Simposi Internacional de Lleng?es Europees i Legislacions, gandia (Pa?s Valenci?), 2,3 i 4 de marc de 1995, 73-96. Barcelona: CIEMEN, Editorial Mediterr?nia.
4) Nynorsk- Bokmal. In: Hans Goebl, Peter Hans Nelde, Zdenek Star? & Wolfgang W?lck (eds.), Kontaktlinguistik. Contact linguistics. Linguistique de contact [= Handb?cher zur Sprach- und Kommunikationswissenshaft 14], 2. Halbband/Volume 2/ Tome 2, Art. 117, 948-957. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter.
5) Minority Languages in the Nordic Countries in a Language Death Perspective. In: Wolfgang W?lck & Annick De Houwer (eds.), Recent studies in contact linguistics [=Plurilingua XVIII], 418-429. Bonn: Ferd. D?mmlers Verlag. 69 The Nordic language community: sociolinguistic conditions and future perspectives. (Manuscript in English. To appear in French in an anthology edited by prof. Marc Auchat, Nancy.)
7) Third level language courses in Norway and Norwegian taught abroad in Europe. (English version in manuscript)
This publications might be retrieved from Paris, I should think. If not, please do not hesitate to get in touch with me about them.