The languages of the Nordic countries can be roughly divided between Scandinavian languages and Finno-Ugric languages, belonging in the first group the Danish, Swedish, Norwegian and Icelandic, and in the second group the Finnish language. Also the Laplandic Sami- language is representative of the Northern European languages and belongs to the Uralic language family root, whereas the Greenlandic comes from the Eskimo-Aleut- language root.
In terms of writing, the Danish is relatively close to the other continental Scandinavian languages, but the Danish-speaking sound include the reduction and assimilation of consonants and vowels, making it quite different and more difficult to understand from the Swedish, Norwegian and Icelandic. Still, it is considered that the Scandinavian speaking people, whether they are from Sweden, Norway, Denmark or Iceland, can understand well between them thanks to the similarity of their languages. Some people may have difficulties, especially older people who speak a dialect, but most people can understand the standard Scandinavian language, as they hear it on the radio and television of the other Scandinavian countries.
In general, of germanic origin, the scandinavian languages are said to be quite easy to learn, although not so easy to understand when they are spoken. The Finnish language in turn is said to be grammatically very difficult, but easier to understand because of its clear phonetics; the Finnish is pronounced exactly how it is written, in a phonetically similar way to some romanic languages such as the Spanish or the Italian, despite their different roots. Learn more about the Nordic languages in the following links:
- Finnish
- Danish
- Swedish
- Norwegian
- Icelandic
- Sami- language
- Greenlandic
- Faroese language
