Will Swedish disappear in future?

Akaland   Wed Aug 06, 2008 1:33 am GMT
The future of the Swedish language may me sad.
Why?

In Sweden, its official status has been challenged by lots of immigrants.
Take 2005 as example, A bill was proposed in 2005 that would have made Swedish an official language, but failed to pass by the narrowest possible margin (145–147) due to a pairing-off failure.

In Finland, its official status has also been challenged. Few Finns rather learn English instead of Swedish. Not lots of people understand Swedish,so Finland has been monolingual country, not bilingual.

Nowadays, except Sweden and Finland, there are no country where people speak Swedish or recognize Swedish as official language.
K. T.   Wed Aug 06, 2008 1:46 am GMT
I don't know about Swedish, but if you leave a Danish around at our house, it will disappear!
Guest   Wed Aug 06, 2008 3:44 am GMT
Swedish is not an official language in Sweden? That's fucked up!
Guest   Wed Aug 06, 2008 4:40 am GMT
I suppose there's a chance that all Western languages will disappear, as Western culture goes down the drain. We have to be politically correct at all times, while our enemies are under no such constraint.
Guest   Wed Aug 06, 2008 4:44 am GMT
<<Swedish is not an official language in Sweden? That's fucked up!>>

Is English an official language in the US?

Wouldn't it be politically incorrect to make Swedish an officlal language in Sweden (or English in the US).
Guest   Wed Aug 06, 2008 4:50 am GMT
In order for the culture Finnish, Danish, Norwegian, Icelandic, and Faroese Islanders to survive, they need Swedish.

Don't you know that there is a Swedish-based speech called Skandevinska currently being used in all over Scandinavia including Finland as lingua-franca. The strongest proponents of Swedish/Skandivenska are the Faroese Islanders.

There's no dispute that Sweden is the moset developed and influential Scandinavian country. Many Danes and Icelanders speak Swedish, Norwegians can perfectly understand it and can communicate with it with the Swedes using their langauge in a slightly modified form to be more easily understood by the Swedes plus Finns are bilinguals.
Karamell   Wed Aug 06, 2008 5:24 am GMT
Let's take Eurovision Song Contest as the example.
The singers from Sweden always sing in English,not in Swedish.
Does it give us the message that Swedish will disappear?
Guest   Wed Aug 06, 2008 5:24 am GMT
<<Is English an official language in the US?

Wouldn't it be politically incorrect to make Swedish an officlal language in Sweden (or English in the US).>>

English is not unique to the USA though. It is like English not being official in ENGLAND!
Karamell   Wed Aug 06, 2008 5:27 am GMT
Finns are not bilingual.

Only less than 10% of Finns speak Swedish... it will be less....
Guest   Wed Aug 06, 2008 5:37 am GMT
I think Arabic should be made official language in Sweden, after all, Swedes are the vast minority. Maybe Swedish should be made co-official, however it would be costly and inefficient for hiring translators and such. All ethnic Swedes will soon learn Arabic anyway because it's necessary to read the Koran, whereas Arabs have no need to learn Swedish.
JIAJIA   Wed Aug 06, 2008 6:40 am GMT
I think that, Swedish plays a best important role in Europe, though it seems very similar to Norwegian and Danish. It's only my personal opinion.
JIAJIA   Wed Aug 06, 2008 7:27 am GMT
Sorry, the above post in not correct...It should be:

I think that, Swedish plays a best important role in 【Scandinavia】, though it seems very similar to Norwegian and Danish. It's only my personal opinion.
Guest   Wed Aug 06, 2008 7:32 am GMT
Well, it's still not correct in terms of grammar. What does "a best important role" mean? The word "best" must always be used with the definite article "the" since "best" is superlative. Do you mean "a very important role"?
Guest   Wed Aug 06, 2008 7:48 am GMT
《Well, it's still not correct in terms of grammar. What does "a best important role" mean? The word "best" must always be used with the definite article "the" since "best" is superlative. Do you mean "a very important role"?》

Yes, Swedish plays a very important role, maybe it's the most important one among 【Scandinavian】 languages. Sorry for my Chinglish or errors.
Xie   Wed Aug 06, 2008 7:50 am GMT
This is the same as asking whether (Hong Kong) Cantonese will disappear in future. We have almost 7 mil. now, but even 9 mil. Our official language is called "Chinese", so this is perfectly subject to political manipulations. Our other official language is called "English" (also as the sole business language, formally), so our stereotype is our shortsighted middle-class parents are letting their children forget "Chinese" and speak English all the time, even in their monolingual, monocultural and monoracial family, so that they can speak English at a native level.

Why bother?