the place of Swedish in Finland.

[Jukka Aho]

With regard to language teaching, would it make sense to only teach Swedish in Finnish-speaking schools in areas of Finland where the Swedish-speaking population is above a certain level? This would allow areas in the East to concentrate on languages that might be more useful to them.

That has been suggested before but the whole system is based on the two national languages being treated on equal terms (see here and here as well) — if not in practice, at least in principle. Changing any of that appears not to be so much a matter of practical considerations, but that of principle, with all the historical (and constitutional) baggage thrown into the mix as well.

[onkko]

But Finns with little to no insight or access to pan-Nordic culture will always remain on some level intellectually and culturally impoverished. It might not make them second-class Finnish citizens, but it would probably make them second-class European citizens. Then again a sense of such inadequacy may well be an important part of what drives much of the animosity in the first place.

Ah, so mongols have to learn master-race language to be intellectuals Nothing new tho, http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axel_Olof_Freudenthal said that ages ago. "Amid the scientific racism of the 19th-century Europe, Freudenthal went on to claim racial supremacy of Swede over Finn in a way that parallel theories of Aryan suppremacy."

Could you point me how it actually helps to know swedish instead, for example, french?
Also list where swedish is better than finnish, remember that we demolished hegemony of swedish hundred years ago, there was and is protests against finnish education because masterrace. I mean in cases of intellectual and cultural texts. How many relevant to anything texts are only in swedish and if there are then why?
Also tell me why "pan-nordic" is done in english instead of swedish? And i dont mean only fin-swe but also de-swe and no-swe etc. Have been there and done that, no one even tried to speak swedish. When i talk with swedes they dont even know that we "should know" swedish.
Also i want explanation that why swedish when all others are nordic too, including finns.

[cors187]

English has replaced it decades ago and its dying part of colonial sweden. Soon we get rid of it in goverment and schools.
Sure we will have swedish speaking minority but we wont need to learn swedish to serve them. Bad slaves we are...

I agree.

[cors187]

Ah, so mongols have to learn master-race language to be intellectuals Nothing new tho, http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axel_Olof_Freudenthal said that ages ago. "Amid the scientific racism of the 19th-century Europe, Freudenthal went on to claim racial supremacy of Swede over Finn in a way that parallel theories of Aryan supremacy."

We discussed this in a racism thread a long time ago , but the reality is that the "Thoughts" and therefore the person "Communications" and "Actions" , which directly stems from the "Original thoughts" can be measured on a graph line
On one side of this graph line is the Attribute "Supremacy" among other Attributes.
Language is directly related to "Supremacy" because it stems from"thoughts" in a primal order.
The simple example is a MMA fighter who doesnt think and therefore has a superior primal order.As opposed to another MMA fighter whose thought, communication,action time is more complex and restricts him on time and increases error opportunities.

[AldenG]

But Finns with little to no insight or access to pan-Nordic culture will always remain on some level intellectually and culturally impoverished. It might not make them second-class Finnish citizens, but it would probably make them second-class European citizens. Then again a sense of such inadequacy may well be an important part of what drives much of the animosity in the first place.

Ah, so mongols have to learn master-race language to be intellectuals Nothing new tho, http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axel_Olof_Freudenthal said that ages ago. "Amid the scientific racism of the 19th-century Europe, Freudenthal went on to claim racial supremacy of Swede over Finn in a way that parallel theories of Aryan suppremacy."

Could you point me how it actually helps to know swedish instead, for example, french?
Also list where swedish is better than finnish, remember that we demolished hegemony of swedish hundred years ago, there was and is protests against finnish education because masterrace. I mean in cases of intellectual and cultural texts. How many relevant to anything texts are only in swedish and if there are then why?
Also tell me why "pan-nordic" is done in english instead of swedish? And i dont mean only fin-swe but also de-swe and no-swe etc. Have been there and done that, no one even tried to speak swedish. When i talk with swedes they dont even know that we "should know" swedish.
Also i want explanation that why swedish when all others are nordic too, including finns.

You are so obsessed with who is the master and who is the slave, or which language or culture is superior and which is inferior, that it makes you unable to see anything else. Slave/master, superior/inferior, they're two sides of the same coin, actually, but that coin is part of an obsolete currency. There is no master and no slave anywhere around you, and there hasn't been during your lifetime. Master and slave, superior and inferior, are irrelevant and uninteresting to anything on the Finnish or Nordic scene today.

But looking at relationships in those terms must lead to odd personal relationships.

You sound like you've been skillfully manipulated to serve some demagogue's personal agenda. It would be ironic to have your energies and thoughts commandeered and enslaved to a demagogue who talk about how he's freeing you from enslavement, now wouldn't it. Then again, not so much -- it's only what demagogues do every day, standard and predictable operating procedure for them. It's only fascinating to see it up close and operating so successfully.

You should be a lot less worried about what some "Swedish overlords" are trying to do to you and a lot more concerned about what's being done to you by people you trust who are much closer to you, people who do not deserve your trust. They're the ones who will suck you dry and give you nothing back.

[foca]

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[foca]

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[foca]

No surprise I guess that during my childhood education the prism through which history was viewed was that of Britain and the USA... Those closely related "Centres of the Universe"...

Over the years I have read more and more about the history of various other countries and cultures. That Sweden was such a strong, dynamic and rather nasty world player in the late middle ages-early modern age always seems to surprise me....the general modern view of Sweden in North America is that it is a kind of progressive, benign, sensible country whose people wouldn't "harm a fly"...so to speak........

But Sweden has a deep and dark history in European affairs...maybe not surprising that most Swedes would no longer know about all of this...it probably isn't emphasized in their schools anymore.

The latest "Swedish surprise" I had was in reading this book:

Rural Society and the Search for Order in Early Modern Germany

Its point of focus is a small Protestant German principality on the edge of Bavaria...Hohenlohe....and I was surprised to find the Swedish army ....mercenaries for the most part ....had a major role in the turmoil in this part of Germany during the Thirty Years War..... it came as a surpise to me because it seems so far away from Sweden.....

[Aside: The Swedes were there because Hohenlohe was a Protestant area and the surrounding countryside was Catholic.....and so, of course, this area had to be fought over. This book is great for people interested in this sort of thing.....I could see in it clear outlines of some of the attitudes and ways of doing things I've encountered during a couple trips to this general area in modern times.

Despite a lot of people's protestations to the contrary, the past never totally disappears it just gets overlain with another layer which will become a part of the area's history. I don't know if the Hakkapeliitat were in Hohenlohe....but they were certainly in Bavaria during the Thirty Years War....the book doesn't mention them, but then to the German peasants they would have been just another version of the dreaded Swedes......

"Bet´t Kinder, bet´t. Morgen kommt der Schwed"

The German peasants, of course, whether Protestant or Catholic, were always on the losing end of things....their food and lodgings were taken either by "law" or by "pilllage"....your "friends" were just as nasty in the end as your "enemies"...]

As it happens finns were often a sagnificant part of Swedish armies over the centures , not only during the Thirty Years' war. so all wars with Russia yielded a toll on Finnish peasants being sent to fight there. there are memoirs of a German mercenary in the Russian service where he depicts a meeting with a Finnish detachment in the Swedish army in 1612. So Finns came to Russia during turmoil times in the beginning of 17th century and then in the 18th during the Great Northern war and yet again in the beginning of 19th. They came to Saxony and Poland to fight for Swedish interests, they died in multitude abandoned by Karl xii under Poltava. now the question is : did the Finnish people really needed that? there are different data sources but one of them states that Finland lost over 15 percent of the population by the end of the Thirty Years' war.
Yes, swedes brought enlightenment and education, Christianity and Nordic civilization ( not very original, as it is, but still) to Finland, but at what price ? ........

[Jukka Aho]

Just stumbled upon this column on HS.fi, written by an Estonian immigrant:

• Ruotsin kieli vaikeuttaa kotoutumista

[sy]

Totally agree with the writer. The requirement of Swedish proficiency for public posts is unfair to immigrants. Naturalized citizens who have already mastered Finnish should be treated as second-class citizens.

[Rob A.]

Just stumbled upon this column on HS.fi, written by an Estonian immigrant:

• Ruotsin kieli vaikeuttaa kotoutumista

I read through this....it was actually a good translation exercise for me... Thanks Jukka....and not too difficult...

The very last sentence is a good reminder of the way things are said in Finnish as opposed to English:

Kirjoittaja on Helsingissä asuva virolainen. ...Literally: "Writer is in-Helsinki living Estonian." And typical English: "The writer is an Estonian who lives in Helsinki."... Practice, practice, practice... I don't get enough of it, but I still love this language...

But as to the content...Well, I suppose you can sympathize with the difficulties the ulkomaalaiset have, but it makes me uncomfortable to hear that they think it should be an issue for the locals to consider.... I think there are two basic ways to view languages ...there's is the emotional, cultural, "my-beloved-mother-tongue" view and the practical, "day-to-day-use" view and trying to mix the two in a debate will cause "misunderstandings".....

Probably the most you can say about Swedish in Finland is that there are historic reasons for this, and these historic reasons are still sufficiently "alive" in the political process that most politicians will not go there unless they are trying to incite emotional reactions for whatever reason.....

[opinto]

Olen oppinut vähän Norja sitten Ruotsin ja nyt pidän Suomea, mutta haluan oppia suomea Suomen kanssa Ruotsin kirjoja niin voin parantaa minun Ruotsin kanssa Suomi.
Suomi on tärkeintä minulle kuitenkin mielestäni minun pitäisi oppia karjalan ja saabpmi kunnioituksesta, koska suomalaiset ovat oikeutetusti huomauttaneet pakollisen ruotsin mutta entä Saabpmi ottaa oppia suomea ja olen asunut Norja rajaa Luoteis Värmlannin ja Ruotsin Fins puhui Suomen ja ei ollut Swede niitä vastaan, evät ja mitään sitä vastaan ​​ei puhu suomi ruotsi vaikka minun on vaikea, koska Englanti oppia muita kieliä, koska he haluavat puhua ja harjoitella Englanti. Kaikki kielet ovat tärkeitä.

[onkko]

Totally agree with the writer. The requirement of Swedish proficiency for public posts is unfair to immigrants. Naturalized citizens who have already mastered Finnish should be treated as second-class citizens.

What about finns who are treated as second class citizens?

[onkko]

You are so obsessed with who is the master and who is the slave, or which language or culture is superior and which is inferior, that it makes you unable to see anything else. Slave/master, superior/inferior, they're two sides of the same coin, actually, but that coin is part of an obsolete currency. There is no master and no slave anywhere around you, and there hasn't been during your lifetime. Master and slave, superior and inferior, are irrelevant and uninteresting to anything on the Finnish or Nordic scene today.

But looking at relationships in those terms must lead to odd personal relationships.

You sound like you've been skillfully manipulated to serve some demagogue's personal agenda. It would be ironic to have your energies and thoughts commandeered and enslaved to a demagogue who talk about how he's freeing you from enslavement, now wouldn't it. Then again, not so much -- it's only what demagogues do every day, standard and predictable operating procedure for them. It's only fascinating to see it up close and operating so successfully.

You should be a lot less worried about what some "Swedish overlords" are trying to do to you and a lot more concerned about what's being done to you by people you trust who are much closer to you, people who do not deserve your trust. They're the ones who will suck you dry and give you nothing back.

So AldenG how many languages you have to speak.
Lets say you live in housing company where about 5% can speak klingon and some of them speak that as native language and about 0,5% cant understand anything else than klingon. Of course you would learn klingon would you? And to be sure everyone can serve Klingonians everyone has to learn klingon.
Then of course lot of goverment jobs require klingon to appease klingons, you cant get job withouth that skill.
Like eastern border where 0.00001% are klingon speakers and 80% russians you have to speak klingon, russian is plus.

[foca]

So AldenG how many languages you have to speak.
Lets say you live in housing company where about 5% can speak klingon and some of them speak that as native language and about 0,5% cant understand anything else than klingon. Of course you would learn klingon would you? And to be sure everyone can serve Klingonians everyone has to learn klingon.
Then of course lot of goverment jobs require klingon to appease klingons, you cant get job withouth that skill.
Like eastern border where 0.00001% are klingon speakers and 80% russians you have to speak klingon, russian is plus.

So let us perform a little mental experiment . let us say that we follow you logic and apply it to 19 th century Finland . then Klingon equals Finnish , and most of the people ( just numerically) in the housing company speak another tongue...and thus the Russification was not a bad thing ...

do not do onto others that you do not want to be done to you ( so far Finnish people, onkko excluded, have managed to do it).

Besides not all klingonians are overlords here, they do serve other klingonians, by the way and non - klingonians too , and not in Klingon , by the way....