Learn what Bokmål and Nynorsk are
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| Hi everybody! Anette here. Welcome to Ask a Teacher, where I’ll answer some of your most common Norwegian questions. |
| The question for this lesson is… What are Bokmål and Nynorsk? |
| Many of you have probably heard of Bokmål and Nynorsk, literally meaning “book language” and “new Norwegian,” respectively. But, did you know that you can’t actually speak Bokmål or Nynorsk? |
| So, what exactly are they? They’re the two official written standards in Norway. |
| Danish was the written language in Norway from the 1600s to the 1900s because of a union with Denmark. Because of this, Bokmål is highly influenced by Danish and is used by around 85% of Norway’s population, regardless of which dialect is spoken. |
| Nynorsk is only used by around 10-15% of the population, but there are a lot of dialects that may seem closer to Nynorsk than Bokmål. Nynorsk was created by Ivar Aasen, a Norwegian philologist, lexicographer, playwright and poet, in the 1800s as an alternative to the Danish language. He traveled around Norway studying dialects and based Nynorsk on the similarities between the dialects. |
| Norwegians learn both Bokmål and Nynorsk in school, but unfortunately, many Norwegians don’t seem to want to study Nynorsk, which is a shame, as it’s quite rare to have two official written languages in one country. However, the Norwegian broadcasting corporation, NRK, supports both written languages. Newspapers have articles in Nynorsk, too. |
| Having two official written languages can sometimes cause confusion, for both Norwegians themselves and foreigners. For example, stamps in Norway are issued with “Norway” spelled as either Norge, which is Bokmål or Noreg which is Nynorsk. Some stamp collectors actually think that this is a misprint! |
| How was this lesson? Pretty interesting right? |
| Do you have any more questions? Leave them in the comments below and I’ll try to answer them! |
| Hade. Vi sees snart! “Bye. See you soon!” |
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