Spelling- conservative or liberal in Scandinavia?

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Kim Stearns        Page         5/2/2007

Spelling- conservative or liberal in Scandinavia?

In order to argue whether spelling in Scandinavia is conservative or liberal, the meaning of the question concerned must first be clarified.

According to the oxford dictionary, spelling is defined as “the forming of words with letters in a conventionally accepted order”, so principally I am going to look at written language rather than spoken.

Liberal is defined as being “tolerant of different views and standards of behaviour in others” and “favouring gradual reform, especially political reforms that extend democracy, and protect the personal freedom of the individual”. Subsequently, in relation to spelling, this would include the countries in Scandinavia whose written languages have changed a lot over the years, or as they say, have become modernised.

Conservative, is defined as being “in favour of preserving the status quo and traditional values and customs, and opposed to any great sudden change” and also “somebody who is reluctant to consider new ideas or accept change”. This would include written languages that have changed very little over the years, i.e. has remained pure and uninfluenced by surrounding countries and not adopting such foreign loan words. This could be due to the isolation of an island or something of the sort. The term conservative in this context does however, include Scandinavian countries in which their pronunciation has changed significantly but their spelling has not done so to accommodate such change.

Another important aspect to consider is which countries does Scandinavia actually consist of?

This is a disputed fact and there is no clear-cut answer, as it differs from source to source. According to Microsoft® Encarta® Encyclopaedia 2002,  “Scandinavia (ancient Scandia), name applied collectively to three countries of northern Europe—Norway and Sweden (which together form the Scandinavian Peninsula), and Denmark. The three countries are so grouped because of their historical, cultural, and linguistic affinities. The term Scandinavia is sometimes extended to include Iceland, which is linguistically related to the others, and less often to Finland, which is not linguistically related. The term Nordic has been applied to the five countries of northern Europe (Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, and Iceland) that are united by geographical and economic factors." (”Scandinavia," Microsoft (R) Encarta. Copyright (c) 1994 Microsoft Corporation. Copyright (c) 1994 Funk & Wagnall's Corporation.)

In this essay I am going to talk about the specific term ‘Scandinavia’ as comprising of just Denmark, Norway and Sweden. This excludes the Faroe Islands and Greenland, which are both under Danish sovereignty. And I am going to use the term Nordic countries, as consisting of the five independent states: Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland and Iceland. This also including three territories, which are largely self-governing without having acquired full independence: Greenland and the Faroe Islands, which are both under Danish sovereignty and the Åland Islands, which are under Finnish sovereignty.

Scandinavia makes use of both a conservative and liberal combination of grammatical approaches to spelling.

Some spelling conventions are based on grammar rather than on phonetics. When the old English language began to be written, even though some fairly common practices developed, spelling was still very varied. When printing was invented in the 15th century it acted as a powerful force for the standardisation of spelling. Many present-day English spellings were standardised at that time and loyally represent 15th-century pronunciations. English, however, subsequently underwent significant shifts in pronunciation. Most of the remaining modern spelling conventions were established as such by the dictionaries of the English lexicographer Samuel Johnson in 1755 and the American lexicographer Noah Webster in 1828.

Some languages, like Dutch and Norwegian, have undergone government-sponsored spelling reforms. The non-phonetic spellings in English—such as reign and light—have inspired many campaigns for reform. Two surges for reform happened in the 1870s and 1880s and just after 1900. Musick became music, and catalogue is gradually becoming catalog in the United States.

The Scandinavian languages in general belong to the Scandinavian part of the Germanic subfamily of the Indo-European languages. Danish, like Swedish, Norwegian, and Icelandic, originally came from a common Scandinavian language. Many changes occurred in the parent language during the time of the Vikings (800-1050 ad). This lead to distinct differences between the East Scandinavian dialects, from which Danish and Swedish evolved, and the West Scandinavian dialects, which are the sources of Norwegian and Icelandic.

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There were three main stages to the Danish language to get it to how we know it today. In the Old Danish language (about 800-1100) there was no common language. Instead three “provincial languages” were used. They were that of Scania (then a part of Denmark), Zealand, and Jutland. Middle Danish underwent important changes, such as the levelling of intonation and the simplification of grammar. It also absorbed many loan words, especially from Low German. This was mainly through contact with traders from the Hanseatic League. Zealandic was used in the government offices and became the model for a common language.

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