Srog -> Language

This will be the first of six posts on cultural aspects of Denmark. The first one, and a pretty important one, is language. Before I continue I'd like to make note that some of my references come from a book called Xenophobe's Guide to the Danes. This aids me in saying things better than I can. (It's actually rather funny to read because it's all so true!)

To start with, Danish is an impossible language to learn and I, along with the other exchange students and probably any foreign, are all resigned to the fact that if you are not Danish you can't speak it properly. The Danish alphabet is the same as ours with the addition of three letters; æ, ø, and å. These come at the end of the alphabet and the double 'a' (aa) is just another way of writing 'å' (f.eks. Aarhus or Århus). The letters c and q are almost always only present in foreign words.

Danish is was can only be described as an economically well off language. They have relatively fewer words than we do. Like the Germans, they find little need in creating new words as opposed to just sticking two already made words together (f.eks. 'flying machine' is an airplane, 'swine meat' is pork). They also have words that mean very different things. We have this in English, but not to the degree which I believe one may find in Danish (f.eks. fyr in Danish can mean fire, pine, or young man in English). Another confusing thing (my cousin pointed it out) is hello and goodbye. In Danish, hello is hej (pronounced hi) and goodbye is hej hej, but often times people will say vi ses (see you later) then just hej instead of hej hej.

Reading Danish and actually speaking Danish are two completely off the wall things. Reading is one thing - you see a certain letter combination (word) and associate a meaning (definition/translation) to it. Often times when we don't know how to say the words we kind of make up our own and go on with it. Doing this in Danish will make you fail miserably! Many of the vowels are soft in Danish along with some consonants so they are often missed to the untrained ear (mine is still in the wild stage). Two letters really stick out; the 'd' and the 'r'. The 'd' is what we exchange students (at least the ones in my language school class) call the retarded 'd'. It sounds like an 'l' to most of us, but it is said like a 'd'; however, if you say an 'l' in place of the soft (retarded) 'd' you end up saying something else. The 'r' is something I'm convinced only Danes can say properly. In a lot of romance languages (Spanish, Italian...) the 'r' is rolled with the tip of the tongue. The Germans have a guttural like 'r' and we Americans over pronounce the shit out of ours. The Danes somehow manage to fetch their 'r' sound from behind the tonsils with muscles that I nor most of the world have. One of the most difficult phrases that all Danes will ask foreigners to say is rødgrød med flød (berry pudding with cream). It has the 'r' which we can't say, the vowel 'ø' which we are puzzled by and that stupid, retarded 'd' in all of them. It's a real dozy.

Reading is the easiest party of the language, in my opinion, but this only applies to reading done in one's own head. Reading out loud is a joke. The Danish language written and spoken could easily be mistaken as two separate languages. In Danish, your best bet is to mumble everything and not say half of the letters. Hvad in Danish means what. It is said (in American) 'vel' but you have to stick your tongue out as you say the 'l'. It can also be said 'va' which is slang (like saying huh in English). The one that really puzzles me, and I just kind of found this one out at language school yesterday, is arrangerede (arranged). When the Danes say this at normal cadence it sounds to have only two syllables, but if they slow it down just three. I swear to the heavens above and all that has ever been deemed holly, that they are saying 'a-rang-sher' when they speak slowly and 'ang-sher' when they speak normally. They also love to shorten their spoken language (f.eks. ikke to ik', tage to ta', give to gi', have to ha').

You will be beyond puzzled, that is if you aren't already. Just ask me to read something to you and I guarantee you won't have a clue how I survived for 11 months.