Hi I´m Henning Gustavsen, a Norwegian citizen and teacher with a degree from Vestfold University College! In Learn “Norwegian Get a Job” you will discover why you should learn Norwegian. This might sound strange to you, Norway is a small country with just about 5 million inhabitants and only about 17 million people (the Scandinavians) have any chance to understand it without any effort. There are many reasons why someone would like to learn Norwegian, maybe you have relatives living in Norway today, or perhaps your ancestors emigrated from Norway a long time ago? It may also be that you are planning a vacation to Norway so see the wonderful nature and experience the culture of the Vikings! Quite a few people would like to learn Norwegian well in order to get a job in Norway! The Norwegians are always looking for educated people that they can integrate into their society. If you want to work in Norway, learning Norwegian is by far the best thing you can do. The Norwegian Language belongs to the Scandinavian Languages which are mutual intelligible to the citizens of Sweden, Norway and Denmark. It is also considered to be one of the easiest languages to learn for native English speakers. Due to its simple grammar and transparent words that are commonly uses in other Germanic languages like Dutch, German and English. If you want to learn one of the Nordic languages, but you are not sure which one to select, choosing the Norwegian language is the best choice for most. You might think that this is easy for you to say! Being a Norwegian citizen and teacher of Norwegian from Vestfold University College. This is of course true, but even scholars from other Scandinavian Countries like Denmark would say the same thing. Why is this so, you may ask yourself? Well here´s a small list of reasons. Norwegian has the written language in common with Denmark. The main written language in Norway is called “Bokmål” about 90% of the population in Norway use this written language, which is nothing but a lightly adjusted version of the Danish written language. Norway was in Union with Denmark for almost 400 years and during this time Norway had no written language of its own. Before that time Old Norse language was used in Norway and the other Nordic countries. Denmark was on the same side as France in the Napoleonic war and when Napoleon lost, Denmark had to give Norway to Sweden. At this time Norway got more independence than previously and on the 17th of May 1814 Norway got its own constitution. During this time when Norway was in Union with Sweden the Norwegian language was influenced by the intonation and the musicality of the Swedish language. Norwegians speak a lot of dialects and they are used to hearing different versions of spoken language every day. To them Danish and Swedish is just like another dialect. Being influenced by both their neighbors and sharing a lot of the same history, Norwegians and the Norwegian language is best understood by people living in the other Nordic countries. In short this means that by learning Norwegian you can easily communicate with more than 20 million Scandinavians instead of just the people from one country. Learning Danish is by far the worst choice you can make, the intelligibility of the language if much lower than both Norwegian and Swedish due to it´s throat like pronunciation. Even Danes have problems understanding their own oral language from time to time. Norwegian also has a lot of words in common with other Germanic languages and this makes it even easier to learn. The grammar is simple and resembles that of English. Anyone with a reasonable understanding of the English language will have an easier time learning the Norwegian language than Swedish or Danish.
