From: walver@kielo.uta.fi (Ville V. Walveranta)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.nordic
Subject: Re: Pakkoruotsi Suomen kouluissa
Date: 14 Nov 92 02:49:52 GMT
	<ksand-101192180814@wintermute.apple.com>
	<WALVER.92Nov12071717@kielo.uta.fi> <TORKEL.92Nov12095026@isis.sics.se>
	<WALVER.92Nov13082933@kielo.uta.fi> <144@complex.complex.is>
Reply-To: walver@uta.fi (Ville Walveranta)
Organization: University of Tampere, Finland
In-reply-to: frisk@complex.is's message of 13 Nov 92 10:27:24 GMT

frisk@complex.is (Fridrik Skulason) writes in soc.culture.nordic:

> Iceland is a bit similar to Finland in that our languages are not
> (easily) understandable to Danish/Swedish/Norwegian speakers.  My
> problem is that I fail to understand why there should be any opposition
> to learing Swedish in Finland.  Here in Iceland we have mandatory Danish
> instead - after all, we were subject to Danish rule for a long time.  It
> is possible to take Swedish or Norwegian instead, but very few children
> do that - in general only if they have relatives in/from Norway or
> Sweden.

        There's always lots of discussion about 'Nordic cooperation',
        however, not so many pepole actually ever get into such
        job/situation they would actually need the skill. I think the
        opposition is largely based on the fact that the people who have
        to take Swedish at school feel it's redundant. I did - I
        would've studied Spanish or French instead. However, I don't
        deny the possibility I might someday need to be able to speak
        Swedish - or at least that it would be useful. If such situation
        emerges, however, I will be _interested_ learning the language.

        I'm sure some 30-60 % of the schoolchildren / students in
        Finland would still select Swedish even though it was made
        optional. They might not study it six years as under the current
        system, but the time they did the studies would be much more
        effective. Thus it would be possible to get familiar with more
        than just one or two languages. If you're motivated, you should
        be able to learn the basics of a new language in two, three
        years.

> Now, occasionally some people here might grumble about having to learn
> Danish, but people here are cenerally in favour of Nordic cooperation,
> and clos ties with the other Nordic nations - something which would be
> more difficult if we did not speak/read/write any of the nordic
> languages. Danmark may not be the most important trading partner of
> Iceland any more, but we want to maintain those ties and consider us one
> of the nordic nations.

> Is that not the case in Finland ? Widespread opposition to learning
> another nordic language (of which Swedish is the natural choice in
> Finland's case) would seem to indicate that it is not.

        I think it's not - at least not as clearly as in Iceland.
        Probably partially because the other Nordic countries, Sweden,
        Island, Norway and Denmark still have more common language and
        cultural background. Finnish is _very_ different - and I'm
        afraid - so are most of the Finns. There's often small friction
        between the Finns and the Swedes which often stands out on the
        ferries between Helsinki/Turku and Stockholm. What describes
        that friction best is a Finnish saying "Svenska talande b{ttre
        folke" (sp?-)... The saying probably reflects the general
        opinion of the many industry-leaders and politicans in Finland
        who have Swedish family-bagkground. Kind of racism... :-/

        However, that's not suprising knowing the Finnish culture
        well... Unfortunately I have to say that even though there are
        lots of defects in Sweden as well, the Swedish people often are
        more, hm, internationally oriented and cultivated than many
        Finns. That shows outside of Fenno-Skandia very clearly: Swedish
        products and the country in general is relatively well-known
        while Finland is often never or rarely heard of. Also, in number
        of universities around the world Swedish is taught. Only in a
        handful of colleges there's also a Finnish class of some sort.

> Of course, here in Iceland we have other mandatory languages as well -
> our third language is English.  In college there are either one or two
> additional mandatory languages - all offer French and German, but the
> one I wenat to (back in '80) offered Spanish and Russian as well.

        Wow! So you have total of four or five mandatory languages
        between the first grade of elementary school and graduation from
        a college!

        -- Willy
--

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