Hello!
What The Denmark is back 🙌🙌🙌
The (expanded) team have been working hard at our next set of episodes to help you understand Danish culture better.
As well as these new topics, you might also start seeing What The Denmark on Instagram, Facebook as well as a few other news outlets who have been in touch with us...
In this first episode we talk about... Danish pronunciation.
Hvad siger du?
[Pronounced hva' si'r du - (What did you say?)]
I find that Danish is a really fun language to learn.
The bit that makes it particularly tricky is getting over the initial stumbling block of being able to say things in a (somewhat) comprehensible manner, and understanding what others are saying back to you.
As such, attempts to speak Danish with Danes can often be met with a "Hvad siger du?" or (more often) a reply in English.
How to overcome such a predicament?
Well, in this episode we cover a lot of the rationale for why Danish can be hard to pronounce:
- Vowels, vowels, vowels: three extra letters; a vowel-heavy language; intonation; assimilation (a.k.a. sounding like you have potatoes in your mouth)
- How Danish differs from Swedish and Norwegian: and perhaps reflects the countries' personalities?
- Danish is effectively two languages: the one you speak and the one you read/ write
- Viking roots: how the longstanding (written) history of Danish differs from, say, languages written down more recently (such as, say, Swahili)
- The Danish word committee: how new words enter the lexicon compared to, say, Norway ("is it majonæse or mayonaise?")
- Danglish: the fun mix of Danish and English (it's hard to be a nissemand)
- Lene, Lena, Line, Lina: four distinct Danish names that are basically indistinguishable to non-Danes because of the additional vowel sounds that Danish possesses
- Monophthongs vs diphthongs: plus other linguistic differences between Danish and other languages
there was also a bunch of interesting things around how people acquire new languages, especially early in life.
Advice for pronouncing Danish well
We then go into ways to overcome some of the issues with pronunciation, featuring guest appearances from three language teachers: Signe Tofte Brantelid (Studieskolen), Naja Hou Alberdi (Copenhagen Language Center) and Anders Basby (UC Plus).
Some examples of this
- Adopt the "mimic method": don't start properly learning words and their meanings before you've learnt to make all of the new sounds in the new language
- Sing-along: it helps with finding the intonation in sentences
- Hold a pen on your tongue: for mastering the Danish soft d
- Gurgle some water: to practice the r at the back of your mouth
- Hold your nose: if you're from South East Asia then you may struggle to differentiate between the 'l' and 'n' sounds. By holding your nose you can feel where the difference is
Josefine also brought in a copy of the classic Danish children's book Halfdans ABC. Great for practicing pronunciation (but also an insight into Danes' dark sense of humour?!)
Helpful phrases to use
If you're wanting to practice your Danish out "in the wild" then the below are good to forewarn the (Danish) person you're speaking to that some imperfect Danish is about to be spoken:
Danish: Undskyld, jeg lærer dansk. Kan vi tale lidt langsomt?
English: Sorry, I’m learning Danish. Can we speak a little slowly?
Danish: Kan vi snakke dansk i 5 minutter?
English: Can we speak Danish for 5 minutes?
and if you're a Dane reading this...
Then the general rule I'd recommend is that if someone is speaking imperfect Danish with you, it's probably because they are practicing.
If you have the time then a really nice thing to do is to speak back (slowly) in Danish so the person can practice.
Of course, often the most efficient way to communicate is probably in English, but if you are able to, allowing the other person to communicate in Danish is such a welcoming thing to experience (and they can always switch to English if they don't understand) 😊
Upcoming episodes
After you're done with the pronunciation episode then we have a whole series of interesting topics coming up over the next couple of months featuring some great guests!
Be sure to "follow" the show on your podcast platform so you get notified when the next one comes out!
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It's great to be back, and I hope you enjoy this (and future) episodes. Any questions/ comments/ feedback/ thoughts on how we can grow the show - just hit reply!
Happy Friday,
Sam
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