Good Morning Britain

It's a Scandi thing that English is very widely spoken. When I watched Finland's Eurovision selection show, UMK, one of the composers was a guy called Thomas G:Son, a Swede. They did his green room interview entirely in English, without subtitles.

Certainly during the grand final of Melodifestivalen, Sweden's biggest programme (again, a Eurovision selection show) they consult international juries and this section is, again, done almost exclusively in English.

90% of the music's in English but apart from the international juries it's still conducted in Swedish. That said, of all the Eurovision selections its got the biggest international following.

Interesting to see a three presenter shot at the top of the programme rather than close up of the two main presenters or single head shot.

Scandinavian language skills put the UK to shame - I doubt at the world cup for example any of the of Scandi teams had anyone not fluent in two languages or more while the England squad is 95%+ monolingual.

The British idea of speaking a foriegn language is shouting loudly and slowly in English while making gestures.

Sometimes including the odd French word or number I know.

Hva sier du?


You don't really seem to be taking into account the fact that English is one of the most popular languages in the world and that there are many similarities between English and the Scandinavian languages. It is quite easy (in my experience anyway) to learn Norwegian, and because the three Scandinavian languages are so similar, Swedish and Danish as well. I'm sure many of us would be able to learn a Scandinavian language, if we had the need or desire to. However, because English is such a global language and it has near as become an international default, most of us have no need to, which I find rather disappointing. Frankly, I think everybody should consider learning a language because, even if you never use it, you can say you have tried it and you have made an effort. I absolutely love learning languages. I have GCSEs in French and German and am studying for a German A-Level, plus learning a small bit of Norwegian and Japanese in my spare time. However, I am unlikely to use my French, Norwegian or Japanese, but I am proud to have some knowledge and to be able to occasionally show it off.

What I'm saying is that it is less that they put us to shame with learning a foreign language, but more we don't have as much of a need to learn a foreign language. I should also mention that the education system in those countries are better and it is more difficult for adults to learn foreign languages.

Anyway, I should stop as I have already gone far enough off topic.

God natt.

Finland isn’t in Scandinavia. Swedish is, however Finland’s second official language, so it’s strange that they’d interview the Swede in English. Maybe more Finns would understand English than Swedish, though.

I'll just leave this here for you: https://yle.fi/uutiset/osasto/news/citizens_against_mandatory_swedish/6771945

I think it somewhat makes clear the view of Swedish by some of the Finnish population.

Since you brought it up - is taking a foreign language required to leave school before university or college? In the US two years is the general requirement and most start in 7th grade 12/13 years old. I took four years of Spanish (would have continued but I got sick and had to do distance learning over the phone and there wasn’t a demand for Spanish 4 so I only got a 1 hour a week worth of instruction - which made it difficult to learn so I didn’t continue) but there’s not a large Spanish community here and I regret that I lost the skills. I’m slowly reacclimating myself through watching Telemundo news or telenovelas (which have captions in English) and feel decently confident listening but not sure enough of my self to speak.

Sorry for getting off topic.

I'm not sure of the rules throughout the country, but in my school, you have to do a foreign language from Year 7-9 (final year before starting GCSEs), plus a second foreign language in Year 9. You then have the option to take two foreign languages for GCSEs, just the one, or none at all.


However, I have heard about other schools where they have two timetables, alternating each week, and students study two foreign languages from Year 7.

Also, even if you can only understand a language, and can't speak it, just be proud of that. It will certainly be better that others (and I'll be honest, I only got my French GCSE last year, and my speaking is practically non-existent).

Yes, it is a contentious issue...