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[ARCHIVE] Explanation of Norwegian writing languages (in depth)

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Jacko079
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[ARCHIVE] Explanation of Norwegian writing languages (in depth)

Post by Jacko079 »

This was originally posted by Adriannicolai07

remember that norwegian is not a stanardized language, so Norwegian can sound completely different from where you come from, and it is still a correct form of Norwegian.

everything that is spoken is in a dialect, everything that is written is in a writing language.

norwegian has two writing languages that the municipalities and counties can choose what form to write in. those are bokmål and nynorsk. most western counties use nynorsk and the rest use bokmål, but they still have their own unique dialect.
bokmål and nynorsk can not be spoken, because they are only for writing, and not speaking. people speak in their dialect.
for example in northern Norway, they speak quite a strong dialect, but they write the same as they do in oslo (bokmål), however they speak very differently.

in a northern dialect: (write bokmål) they say "Æ", but they write "Jeg". (Me) they say "Fesk", but they write "Fisk". (Fish) etc.
in a north-western dialect: (write nynorsk) they say "I" or "E", but write "Eg". (Me) they say "ka", but write "Kva". (What) etc.
even norwegians confuse the writing languages for talking. many people I have met are always saying "He speaks Bokmål" or "He speaks Nynorsk". That is not possible.

When people say "He/she speaks Bokmål", they are most likely referring to the standard east urban dialect they speak around Oslo because Bokmål is very similar written to the spoken east urban dialect.
The same is for when people say "He/she speaks Nynorsk". They are probably referring to the western coastal dialects then.
Some people often have the tendency to write in a dialect/how they speak. This is not formal and is not often used. This is just a simplified method of writing to your friends or your parents.

For example the place I come from (a place called Stord, in western Norway), they say: "Koffor", but they need to write "Hvorfor" or "Kvifor". (Why) "Ka", but they need to write "Hva" or "Kva". (What) "Kor", but they need to write "Hvor" or "Kvar", (Where) They can write "Koffor" for example, but that is not correct and is only a informal fast way to write something. You do not want to write in dialect to anyone except good friends or family.

I hope this helps people to understand a little more about the confusing stuff about the writing languages in Norwegian.

Learning: Italian and Arabic.

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