Swedes in Finland
Marko A Ledvij
In summer 1987 I spent 12 days in Finland (that was
my first and, so far, last visit to that country.)
I remember that first day in Helsinki I was very
confused seeing the names of, e.g., tram stops,
banks, shops etc. in 'two parts' where first half
was often very similar to the second, before finding
out that it is actually the same thing first in Finnish
and than in Swedish. If I am not mistaken, in the main
street (Mannerheim ??) in the very center of Helsinki,
as I learned later, there was a Swedish theater.
Since I am from the country where the interethnic tolerance
is practically nonexisting, I wonder what the situation
is like in Finland. In particular,
-are ethnic Swedes equal in rights with ethnic Fins?
-do they have schools in Swedish?
-is anybody aware of any interethnic incidents
or any hostilities between Fins and Swedes?
-do all ethnic Swedes residing in Helsinki speak Finnish?
-do ethnic Fins speak Swedish?
-are, e.g., shop-assistants in Helsinki supposed to
speak both languages?
Thank you in advance,
Marko.
mihol...@abo.fi
> Hi everybody,
> In summer 1987 I spent 12 days in Finland (that was
> my first and, so far, last visit to that country.)
> I remember that first day in Helsinki I was very
> confused seeing the names of, e.g., tram stops,
> banks, shops etc. in 'two parts' where first half
> was often very similar to the second, before finding
> out that it is actually the same thing first in Finnish
> and than in Swedish. If I am not mistaken, in the main
> street (Mannerheim ??) in the very center of Helsinki,
> as I learned later, there was a Swedish theater.
> Since I am from the country where the interethnic tolerance
> is practically nonexisting, I wonder what the situation
> is like in Finland. In particular,
> -are ethnic Swedes equal in rights with ethnic Fins?
YES WE ARE, ACCORDING TO FINNISH LAW.
> -do they have schools in Swedish?
THIS MESSAGE IS POSTED FROM ONE. ]BO AKADEMI IN ]BO (TURKU) A SWEDISH-SPEAKING
UNIVERSITY.
> -is anybody aware of any interethnic incidents
> or any hostilities between Fins and Swedes?
WE DON'T THROW BOMBS AT EACH OTHER. (ONLY THE OCCASIONAL FIST AND INSULT)
> -do all ethnic Swedes residing in Helsinki speak Finnish?
MOST OF THEM DO.
> -do ethnic Fins speak Swedish?
MOST OF THEM DONT
> -are, e.g., shop-assistants in Helsinki supposed to
> speak both languages?
>
AT SOME SHOPS THEY HAVE LITTLE BADGES WITH SWEDISH FLAGS ON THEM. (THIS MEANS
THAT THEY CAN PRONUNCE THE PRICE IN SWEDISH) SERIOUSLY, YOU CAN GET SWEDISH
SERVICE AT MOST DEPARTMENT STORES.
> Thank you in advance,
VARS]GOD.
> Marko.
HMH
H. Vaisane
> (Marko A Ledvij) writes:
>> -are ethnic Swedes equal in rights with ethnic Fins?
>YES WE ARE, ACCORDING TO FINNISH LAW.
Nope, according to Finnish law Swedish-speaking Finns are more equal
than Finnish-speaking Finns.
By the way, maybe it is just how the word 'Swede' is used, but do
Swedish-speaking Finns consider themselves to be Swedes (i.e. people
somehow 'similar' to people living in Sweden) or Finns whose native
language happens to be Swedish?
>> -is anybody aware of any interethnic incidents
>> or any hostilities between Fins and Swedes?
>WE DON'T THROW BOMBS AT EACH OTHER. (ONLY THE OCCASIONAL FIST AND INSULT)
Plus the occasional flame-war in soc.culture.nordic (-:
>> -are, e.g., shop-assistants in Helsinki supposed to
>> speak both languages?
>AT SOME SHOPS THEY HAVE LITTLE BADGES WITH SWEDISH FLAGS ON THEM. (THIS MEANS
>THAT THEY CAN PRONUNCE THE PRICE IN SWEDISH) SERIOUSLY, YOU CAN GET SWEDISH
>SERVICE AT MOST DEPARTMENT STORES.
You can't get Finnish service in Ahvenanmaa either...
Tuomas Ilmari Viljanen
>Hi everybody,
>In summer 1987 I spent 12 days in Finland
(text deleted)
>-are ethnic Swedes equal in rights with ethnic Fins?
Yes, they are. Finland is officially a state with two official languages
(Finnish and Swedish). IMHO it is wrong to speak about "ethnic Swedes" and
"ethnic Finns", rather there is one people with two languages in Finland.
The rights of the minorities, whether they are Swedish-speaking people in
Finnish-dominated territory or vice versa, are guaranteed by the Constitution.
>-do they have schools in Swedish?
Yes, they have, in all degrees of education. Abo Akademi in Turku (Abo in
Swedish) is the Swedish university.
>-is anybody aware of any interethnic incidents
During the 19th century there were some, and during the 30's, when Fennophiles
and Suecophiles quarreled whether education in the University in Helsinki
should be in Finnish or Swedish, which ended in a winning draw for both.
Today there are only when both participants go home from bar heavily intoxicat-
ed. But more grave there are none.
> or any hostilities between Fins and Swedes?
Mainly amongst children under twelve. Quarreling about language is considered
rather childish. There are better things to quarrel about.
The most severe conflict between Finland and Sweden is the annual track-and-
field sports tournament.
>-do all ethnic Swedes residing in Helsinki speak Finnish?
>-do ethnic Fins speak Swedish?
These two questions can be discussed together. In Finland's comprehensive
schools children are taught the "other indigenous language", i. e. the Finnish-
speaking read Swedish and vice versa. As a result, most Swedish-speaking learn
to speak Finnish, but the result with the Finnish-speaking depends on their
motivation to learn, which can be very low in the territory where Finnish
language is nearly only spoken. I myself speak both languages.
>-are, e.g., shop-assistants in Helsinki supposed to
> speak both languages?
Most often they do. One can do with both languages (and with English,
Russian, German, French and Estonian) in the largest stores in Helsinki,
such as Stockmann. Whether they speak the other language well or not so
well depends on the shop assistants.
>Thank you in advance,
>Marko.
Hope this helped.
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++ Lahderanta 20 A 19 ++ TRAVEL THE WORLD ! ++
++ SF-02720 Espoo 72 FINLAND ++ MEET LOTS OF INTERESTING PEOPLE ++
++ 358-0-592175 or c34...@saha.hut.fi ++ AND SINK THEM ALL !!! ++
Janne Kivel{
>Nope, according to Finnish law Swedish-speaking Finns are more equal
>than Finnish-speaking Finns.
This is true if you're trying to get to the university.
>By the way, maybe it is just how the word 'Swede' is used, but do
>Swedish-speaking Finns consider themselves to be Swedes (i.e. people
>somehow 'similar' to people living in Sweden) or Finns whose native
>language happens to be Swedish?
This is a generalization that's not quite true. The only people in Finland
who perhaps could be called 'ethnic Swedes' are the Aalanders. Some Swedish
speaking people in Osthrobothnia/\sterbotten/Pohjanmaa take the language
issue very seriously and would even like to be Swedes rather than Finns.
The different language groups have lived there side by side for a long
time, but there's no evidence of any hostilities.
>Plus the occasional flame-war in soc.culture.nordic (-:
There's simply not be enough tension for a flame war.
Janne Kivel"a
Tuomas Ilmari Viljanen
>hvai...@cs.joensuu.fi (H. Vaisane) writes:
>
>>Nope, according to Finnish law Swedish-speaking Finns are more equal
>>than Finnish-speaking Finns.
>
>This is true if you're trying to get to the university.
Agreed. It is much easier to get in an university if you speak Swedish, since
there are separate total #:s for Finnish- and Swedish-speaking students
taken in, and the totals for Swedish-speaking are proportionally much larger
than for the Finnish-speaking.
>>By the way, maybe it is just how the word 'Swede' is used, but do
>>Swedish-speaking Finns consider themselves to be Swedes (i.e. people
>>somehow 'similar' to people living in Sweden) or Finns whose native
>>language happens to be Swedish?
According to my experience, the Swedish-speaking population here in Finland
does not identify themselves with the Swedes in Sweden (the only exception
of this are the Aalanders perhaps). They consider that there is one people
with two languages. In Yugoslavia there were two peoples with one language.
Of course, people in all Nordic countries consider themselves to be somewhat
'similar' when compared with f. eg. the Russians. Of course there are people
who take language issue very seriously, in both sides, but still they do not
form any significant part of the population (under one thousandth perhaps)
My own granny was from the Swedish-speaking Pohjanmaa (Ostrobothnia), and
she considered herself to be a Finn, whose native tongue was Swedish. I
consider myself to be a Finn, whose native tongue is Finnish.
>>Plus the occasional flame-war in soc.culture.nordic (-:
>
>There's simply not be enough tension for a flame war.
>
Agreed. There are better things to quarrel about, like environment, employment
situation, the speed of snail of mail, the course of USD :-) etc.
Sverre Slotte RC 943
> By the way, maybe it is just how the word 'Swede' is used, but do
> Swedish-speaking Finns consider themselves to be Swedes (i.e. people
> somehow 'similar' to people living in Sweden) or Finns whose native
> language happens to be Swedish?
At least I consider myself a 100% Finn. I cheer for the Finnish hockey
team and Finnish skiers, for instance. But if there are no Finnish
competitors I quickly "adopt" the Swedish ones.
In my opinion a Swede is someone living in the kingdom of Sweden. The
word "finlandssvensk" pretty much says what it is all about: a Swedish
speaking Finn. Although we normally do speak Finnish as well.
"Jag talar vad jag vill, du talar vad du kan."
> Nope, according to Finnish law Swedish-speaking Finns are more equal
> than Finnish-speaking Finns.
f33...@puukko.hut.fi (Janne Kivel{) skrev:
< This is true if you're trying to get to the university.
Would you care to tell me in what way I have been treated "more equally"
than you by the Helsinki U of Tech?
Sverre
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Nokia Research Center Phone: + 358 0 4376208
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Femton }rs flicka och fuller pokal {r allt vad i v{rlden helst mig behagar.
Ack vad jag |nskar uti mina dagar hos Venus bli f{nrik hos Bacchus korpral.
Fredmans S}ng No 7 Carl Michael Bellman - den svenske Anacreon
mihol...@abo.fi
> mihol...@abo.fi writes:
>> (Marko A Ledvij) writes:
>>> -are ethnic Swedes equal in rights with ethnic Fins?
>>YES WE ARE, ACCORDING TO FINNISH LAW.
>
> Nope, according to Finnish law Swedish-speaking Finns are more equal
> than Finnish-speaking Finns.
HOW?!! (I just can't let that pass...)
>
> By the way, maybe it is just how the word 'Swede' is used, but do
> Swedish-speaking Finns consider themselves to be Swedes (i.e. people
> somehow 'similar' to people living in Sweden) or Finns whose native
> language happens to be Swedish?
Or members of a thousand-year old Swedish-culture living with countrymen who
have a different mother-tongue...8-)
>
>
>>> -is anybody aware of any interethnic incidents
>>> or any hostilities between Fins and Swedes?
>>WE DON'T THROW BOMBS AT EACH OTHER. (ONLY THE OCCASIONAL FIST AND INSULT)
>
> Plus the occasional flame-war in soc.culture.nordic (-:
>
>
>>> -are, e.g., shop-assistants in Helsinki supposed to
>>> speak both languages?
>>AT SOME SHOPS THEY HAVE LITTLE BADGES WITH SWEDISH FLAGS ON THEM. (THIS MEANS
>>THAT THEY CAN PRONUNCE THE PRICE IN SWEDISH) SERIOUSLY, YOU CAN GET SWEDISH
>>SERVICE AT MOST DEPARTMENT STORES.
>
> You can't get Finnish service in Ahvenanmaa either...
>
Oh yes you can! Ask some of the hundreds of thousands of Finnish-speaking
people who go there every summer. You get
better service in Finnish on ]land than swedish service in Helsingfors (which
is rather remarkable considdering that ]land is monolingual and Helsingfors
bilingual with a 10% Swedish-speaking minority....)
HMH
Janne Kivel{
nin...@tnclus.tele.nokia.fi writes:
>People who think swedishspeaking are treated "more equally" probably
>deep down think that Finland is a monolingual finnishspeaking
>country.
It is easy to think so if you live in Savo, which certainly is monolingual
Finnish-speaking region. (I don't come from there though)
>Another thing is easily forgotten. The bilingual finlandswedes'
>ability to speak finnish is not received as a free gift. It is a
>result of hard work in school. BTW finnish was my most difficult
>subject, true but sad :-).
Not many Finnish-speaking Finns become bilingual though. One of the reasongs
might be the lack of practice. There simply isn't enough of you
'finlandsvensk' people around to develop one's language skills. And the
"Swedish Swedes" tend to favour English when communicating with Finns.
Furthermore, you always speak Finnish except with another 'finlandsvensk'.
>Niklas Indola
>
Janne Kivel"a
Janne Kivel{
sve...@rc.nokia.fi (Sverre Slotte RC 943) writes:
>Would you care to tell me in what way I have been treated "more equally"
>than you by the Helsinki U of Tech?
You know very well what I'm talking about. The total number of places for
Swedish-speaking students is relatively larger than the one reserved for
Finnish speakers if you think of all the universities in Finland.
In Helsinki University of technology the teaching is in Finnish. I don't
know if there was any Finnish exam when you entered the University (there
probably was). If I tried to enter Hanken I would have to take exam
in Swedish language.
This is no big deal really, but in this respect you 'finlandssvensk' are
more equal than us.
>Sverre
Janne Kivel"a
nin...@tnclus.tele.nokia.fi
People who think swedishspeaking are treated "more equally" probably
deep down think that Finland is a monolingual finnishspeaking
country. They have never been to Ostrobothnia, for instance, and
seen a monolingual swedishspeaking area. They know about Aland
but that's an island - not really Finland.
Another thing is easily forgotten. The bilingual finlandswedes'
ability to speak finnish is not received as a free gift. It is a
result of hard work in school. BTW finnish was my most difficult
subject, true but sad :-).
Niklas Indola
Johan W. Wikman
Hi
In article <1992Mar10....@nntp.hut.fi> f33...@puukko.hut.fi (Janne Kivel{) writes:
[stuff deleted]
In Helsinki University of technology the teaching is in Finnish. I don't
know if there was any Finnish exam when you entered the University (there
probably was). If I tried to enter Hanken I would have to take exam
in Swedish language.
The language of HUT is finnish and swedish. When I participated in
the entrance examination I got the questions in swedish (you could
have gotten them in english aswell if you'd wanted to), and answered
them in swedish. I answer all my exams in swedish and I most certainly
will write my diploma work in swedish.
The teaching is not only in finnish, there are some courses lectured
in swedish aswell, although I have never participated in one. Not to
forget the rather big number of courses that are lectured in english.
Hanken (the swedish school of economics) is a swedish (teaching language)
school, just as Kauppis (the finnish school of economics) is finnish.
If I wanted to enter Kauppis I think I would have to take an exam in
the finnish language.
This is no big deal really, but in this respect you 'finlandssvensk' are
more equal than us.
Agreed about it not being a big deal, but I really do not feel more
equal than anybody else.
Janne Kivel"a
Johan Wikman
H. Vaisane
> (H. Vaisane) writes:
>> Nope, according to Finnish law Swedish-speaking Finns are more equal
>> than Finnish-speaking Finns.
>HOW?!! (I just can't let that pass...)
There are quotas for Swedish-speaking Finns in universities.
Jyrki Kuoppala
>Of course, people in all Nordic countries consider themselves to be somewhat
>'similar' when compared with f. eg. the Russians.
If you count Finland in here, then I don't agree in general. I think
the rhetorics which talk about "common cultural background" or such
used when talking about "Nordic Cooperation" and used to justify for
example Swedish are quite bogus when concerning Finland vs.
Sweden/Norway/Denmark and might also be bogus for Iceland and Denmark
in many parts.
On the other hand, in political culture there are similarities which
make a distinction between the Nordic countries (well, many of them at
least, I don't know enough to talk about all) and most of the rest of
the world - and I have no problem with that (like alcohol policies,
social security systems, etc.) and there is cooperation in the form of
a common job market and passportless no-bureocracy moving of people.
//Jyrki
Janne Kivel{
j...@cs.HUT.FI (Jyrki Kuoppala) writes:
>If you count Finland in here, then I don't agree in general. I think
>the rhetorics which talk about "common cultural background" or such
>used when talking about "Nordic Cooperation" and used to justify for
>example Swedish are quite bogus when concerning Finland vs.
>Sweden/Norway/Denmark and might also be bogus for Iceland and Denmark
>in many parts.
What we need is the newly independent Baltic republics to join the Nordic
Council (Nordiska R}det). That way Finland wouldn't be so 'lonely' with
totally different language than the others have.
That could force the Danes to use English instead of their own language,
which surprisingly doesn't look so difficult in written form but is totally
incomprehensible when spoken.
>//Jyrki
Janne
Annika Forsten INF
> Most often they do. One can do with both languages (and with English,
> Russian, German, French and Estonian) in the largest stores in Helsinki,
> such as Stockmann. Whether they speak the other language well or not so
> well depends on the shop assistants.
Yes, well, Stockman is a bit extra, it's sort of Sweish-speaking. I
believe they require Sweish-speaking capabilities of all employees an a rather
large percentage have Sweish as their mother tongue.
annika forsten, finland
Annika Forsten INF
> Agreed. It is much easier to get in an university if you speak Swedish, since
> there are separate total #:s for Finnish- and Swedish-speaking students
> taken in, and the totals for Swedish-speaking are proportionally much larger
> than for the Finnish-speaking.
If you speak Sweish well enough you're competing with the Sweish-speaking
on the same terms. So it is up to you. This probably goes for us
Sweish-speaking at Finnish-speaking universities too. (sorry the forth
letter of the alphabet gave up working on my keyboard.
annika forsten, finlan
p.s. I think of myself as a 100% Finn although I use to hate the Finnish
language because it was so tough to learn.
Jarmo Ryyti
From Finland:
By swedish standards those people who do not speak in Sweden swedish
are considered as "home-language"-speakers, thus other languages spoken
in Sweden are not considered as mother tongues.
This practise in Finland means that there are no people speaaing swedish
as a mother tongue but swedish is a home language only.
In Sweden the practise is such that it has seen as good from the economical
and pedagogical point of you not to start any finnish speaking education
system over there. This means in Finland if we had a same practice that
from the economical and pedagogical point of you swedish speaking education
system had to abolish in Finland. The researchers in Sweden has seen it as
good that the minorities have not their own schools but are studying
with the majority/swedish speaking children. This practise seen as good
in Sweden means that it must be good also in Finland and the practise
which we have now is a harmful one for the swedish speaking minority.
They build a glanguage ghetto
by themselves and do not assimilitate with the majority culture...
This is loaned directly from swedish sources written in english...
The Federation of Finnishness, grounded by the authour Johannes Linnankoski
1906 and still well and kicking demands equal rigths for the finnish speaking
minority in Sweden equivalent for those in Finland for the swedish home-language speakers...
I assume that all readers of this news group consider abouve as a fair
goal and support equal rights and equal system.
Sorry my bad englis, you can write in german or in finnish if needed.
and do not understand.
regards,
jarmo
Ps. Hopefully I do not mix anyone's feelings too much...the matter is
a delicate object and I like it very much, what about hte others?
mihol...@abo.fi
> In article <1992Mar9.1...@nntp.hut.fi> f33...@puukko.hut.fi (Janne Kivel{) writes:
>>hvai...@cs.joensuu.fi (H. Vaisane) writes:
>>
>>>Nope, according to Finnish law Swedish-speaking Finns are more equal
>>>than Finnish-speaking Finns.
>>
>>This is true if you're trying to get to the university.
>
> Agreed. It is much easier to get in an university if you speak Swedish, since
> there are separate total #:s for Finnish- and Swedish-speaking students
> taken in, and the totals for Swedish-speaking are proportionally much larger
> than for the Finnish-speaking.
Ahh! But anyone who can speak swedish can enter ]bo Akademi!
UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU
Jarmo Ryyti
What is interesting is to compare how sweden treats her finnish speaking minority. It is as big as swedish speaking minority in finland but swedish state
do not
accept finns as a minority with full rigths. NO schools in for the finns, only
some primary schoos in some places, no legal status as a minority, no universty, nothing. In finnish speaking areas in the north of sweden finnish was a banned
language for decades. sweden has always had a finnish speaking minority but
because it has a status of lower social class language finnish speakers
have it very difficult in sweden. by a law finnish is not considered as mother
tongue but as a "home language" in sweden.
in finland swedish speakers have been over-class people and so their rigths
have also been much better than vice versa.
jarmo
Kent Sandvik
> > (Marko A Ledvij) writes:
> >> -are ethnic Swedes equal in rights with ethnic Fins?
> >YES WE ARE, ACCORDING TO FINNISH LAW.
>
> Nope, according to Finnish law Swedish-speaking Finns are more equal
> than Finnish-speaking Finns.
Could you please explain this, or "voisitko selittaa?", or
"kunde du forklara detta", thx?
Cheers,
Kent
Bertil Jonell
>This practise seen as good
>in Sweden means that it must be good also in Finland and the practise
>which we have now is a harmful one for the swedish speaking minority.
I'm curious about one thing: How are children that speak neither Finnish
nor Swedish treated in Finland? Do they get any hemspr}ksundervisning
(home language education) in school?
>jarmo
-bertil-
--
"It can be shown that for any nutty theory, beyond-the-fringe political view or
strange religion there exists a proponent on the Net. The proof is left as an
exercise for your kill-file."
Jarmo Ryyti
There are living just few thousends swedes in Finland Niklas!
There are Finlandswedes about 300 000 who register themselves as
swedish speakers in the statistics. Most them are speaking swedish just at home
and thus swedish in a king home language for them.
In Sweden there are finns living the same amount who are born in Finland
or in Sweden and besides that old finnish speaking population in the north.
Varmeland which was once populated by the finnish spekers the state of sweden
succeeded to destroy. The last finnish speaker of that area Niitty-Jussi as
he was called died 1960's. The same time Swedish ministers travelled around
the world speaking about the human rights and equality as you well know.
It was and is still in Sweden so like Olof Palme who was killed a few years
ago: He was in India, in the morning he attended the meeting of the peace
movement and in the afternoon he met indian businessmen and negotiated
military equipment business on belhalf of swedish industry.
I am sorry to say that I dislike such people most. Palme was murdered I
really think that because he playd double role games, and finally he
was shot.
You find that kind double thinkers Sweden full. In size it is one of the
biggest weapon seller in the world and everybody knows the game the swedes
play in the media as spokesmen of the peace and stuff like that...
The same with the minority policy, as far as it does not concern
finnish speaking minority in Sweden the Swedes know best and like
to advice the other like South-Africa, Baltics. On Aland Islesone hour
from Stockholm there are a kind of apartheid legally made towards finnish
speaking inhabitants and inStockholm you cannot find anyone who considers it
as an infair thing...not to mention there were demonstrations, the opposity.
I like swedish people and I have never had any problems with them the opposite,
but the policy they run in their own country and abroad is shameful and
disgusting.
jarmo
Johan W. Wikman
Hi
In article <1992Mar11.1...@jyu.fi> ry...@jyu.fi (Jarmo Ryyti) writes:
[lots of irrelevant stuff deleted]
HI,
What is interesting is to compare how sweden treats her finnish speaking
minority. It is as big as swedish speaking minority in finland but swedish
state do not accept finns as a minority with full rigths. NO schools in
for the finns, only some primary schoos in some places, no legal status
as a minority, no universty, nothing.
Come now, you *do* realize that the swedes (here meaning a finn who has
swedish as mothertongue) in Finland have lived here for centuries and
consider themselves as finns. I have, for instance, made some genealogical
research and as far as I have come (late 18th century) my family has
always lived in Finland and has always been swedish speaking.
The vast majority of the finns in Sweden left Finland in the 1950ies
is search for work, not in search for a new country. And I am quite
positive that the finns in sweden consider themselves as finns, not as
swedes who speak finnish. According to a resent gallup poll some 150000
russians living in the St Petersburg area would like to move temporarily
to Finland in search for work. Do you also feel that these russians
should immediately be given schools, universities, equal rights etc. ?
In finnish speaking areas in the north of sweden finnish was a banned
language for decades. sweden has always had a finnish speaking minority
but because it has a status of lower social class language finnish
speakers have it very difficult in sweden. by a law finnish is not
considered as mothertongue but as a "home language" in sweden.
If this is a fact, then I agree with you that this original minority
should have schools etc, but you cannot apply this to the entire
finnish minority who came to sweden only a few decades ago.
in finland swedish speakers have been over-class people and so their
rigths have also been much better than vice versa.
You are not suggesting that the swedish speaking would still be
some over-class people, are you ?
jarmo
-johan
Johan W. Wikman
Hi
In article <1992Mar11....@jyu.fi> ry...@jyu.fi (Jarmo Ryyti) writes:
[Lots of stuff deleted, where Jarmo describes how the swedish-speaking
in Finland in the same way as the finnish-speaking in Sweden.
You can check the original text in his article.]
Jarmo,
do you really not realize the diffence between having been a minority for
centuries and having been a "gastarbeiter" minority for decades ? Are you
also completely unaware of the quite big number of areas in Finland (mainly
on the coast) where the swedish speakers are the majority. In some cases
almost 100% and I'm not talking about Aaland here. Can you show me any such
areas in Sweden ?
-johan
mihol...@abo.fi
You can't compare a group of people that has moved into a country a couple of
decades ago just to get better wages (95% of all Finnish speakers in Sweden
belong to this group), with a group of people who's roots in Finland go back
even to pre-viking time (instead of pre-Viking Line age as for the former group)
If you by 'over-class' mean 'upper class', you KNOW that even if the people in
the upper-class (like marskalk Mannerheim for example) all were
Swedish-speaking, most of us are working-class or middle-class. (An example:
Otto Ville Kuusinen and his gang who betrayed our country in WW2 were
finnish-speaking, does this make all finnish-speaking people communist
traitors?):-)
HMH
>
mihol...@abo.fi
When i read your opinions some things flash through my mind: 1930:s, brown
shirts, IKL...
Grow up.
HMH
mihol...@abo.fi
> In article <1992Mar10...@tnclus.tele.nokia.fi> nin...@tnclus.tele.nokia.fi writes:
>>I also feel 100%.
>>
>>People who think swedishspeaking are treated "more equally" probably
>>deep down think that Finland is a monolingual finnishspeaking
>>country. They have never been to Ostrobothnia, for instance, and
>>seen a monolingual swedishspeaking area. They know about Aland
>>but that's an island - not really Finland.
>>
>>Another thing is easily forgotten. The bilingual finlandswedes'
>>ability to speak finnish is not received as a free gift. It is a
>>result of hard work in school. BTW finnish was my most difficult
>>subject, true but sad :-).
>>
>>Niklas Indola
>>
> My comment,
> There are living just few thousends swedes in Finland Niklas!
> There are Finlandswedes about 300 000 who register themselves as
> swedish speakers in the statistics. Most them are speaking swedish just at home
> and thus swedish in a king home language for them.
>
YEESS! Now we got them! Hyv{ Jarmo!
Why didn't we realize this before!:
-There are people in Finland who, just to piss us off, register themselves as
swedish-speaking. And then what do they do? -They SPEAK SWEDISH AT HOME!!!
I'm sure they even read the finnish text lines in the cinemas!!!(Bastards!)
But now you have revealed them! An evil conspiracy against the MAJORITY CULTURE
and at the taxpayers expense!
There probably isn't more than 50 or so left of them, if we don't include the
racist, fascist, militant ]landers (]land should be traded with Carelia anyway,
says our Fuhrer kansanedustaja Jurva.)
> In Sweden there are finns living the same amount who are born in Finland
UUUUUUU UUUUU UUUUUU UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU
Of which 50,000 are 'Finlandssvenskar'....
> or in Sweden and besides that old finnish speaking population in the north.
> Varmeland which was once populated by the finnish spekers the state of sweden
> succeeded to destroy. The last finnish speaker of that area Niitty-Jussi as
> he was called died 1960's. The same time Swedish ministers travelled around
>
Finland was once populated almost entirely by Lapps.
-I say: No more Finnish participation in the United Nations before the Lapps
get their land back!!!
> the world speaking about the human rights and equality as you well know.
> It was and is still in Sweden so like Olof Palme who was killed a few years
> ago: He was in India, in the morning he attended the meeting of the peace
> movement and in the afternoon he met indian businessmen and negotiated
> military equipment business on belhalf of swedish industry.
> I am sorry to say that I dislike such people most. Palme was murdered I
> really think that because he playd double role games, and finally he
> was shot.
> You find that kind double thinkers Sweden full. In size it is one of the
> biggest weapon seller in the world and everybody knows the game the swedes
Aha! So then it was probably the Swedes who sold finnish gunpowder to
third-world countries at war....
> play in the media as spokesmen of the peace and stuff like that...
> The same with the minority policy, as far as it does not concern
> finnish speaking minority in Sweden the Swedes know best and like
> to advice the other like South-Africa, Baltics. On Aland Islesone hour
> from Stockholm there are a kind of apartheid legally made towards finnish
Oh please:
Tell us more about this act of treason from those racist ]landers who without
blinking stab their would-be ugric brothers in the back!
> speaking inhabitants and inStockholm you cannot find anyone who considers it
> as an infair thing...not to mention there were demonstrations, the opposity.
> I like swedish people and I have never had any problems with them the opposite,
No i don't think you have ever had any problems with swedes because i think
that you never have sat your foot outside Jyv{skyl{.
> but the policy they run in their own country and abroad is shameful and
> disgusting.
> jarmo
That goes for most of your opinions as well....
HMH
mihol...@abo.fi
> Janne
I agree, only with the comment that many Danes can speak quite an
understandable Swedish.
HMH
ter...@phys.anu.edu.au
> the human rights and equality as you well know. It was and is still in
> Sweden so like Olof Palme who was killed a few years ago: He was in India,
> in the morning he attended the meeting of the peace movement and in the
> afternoon he met indian businessmen and negotiated military equipment
> business on belhalf of swedish industry.
Well, I don't know about "peace movement", but there was this funny anti-
nuclear weapons initiative. Among the 6-7 countries in it was nuclear
weapons country India and at least one other country which was actively
trying to get nuclear weapons. And of course Olofpalmia aka Sweden.
> I am sorry to say that I dislike such people most. Palme was murdered I
> really think that because he playd double role games, and finally he
> was shot.
> You find that kind double thinkers Sweden full. In size it is one of the
> biggest weapon seller in the world and everybody knows the game the swedes
> play in the media as spokesmen of the peace and stuff like that...
Have you considered the possibility that there is one group of Swedes who
run/work in the defense industry (which isn't as large as you seem to think)
and another group of Swedes who do the peace thing?
> ...the Swedes know best and like to advice the other like South-Africa,
> Baltics. ... I like swedish people... but the policy they run in their own
> country and abroad is shameful and disgusting.
> jarmo
It's funny you mention the Baltic states. In the Palme era the problem of
the Soviet occupation of these states didn't seem to exist. My old high-
school history teacher explained this (and several other things) with the
fact that Swedish courage grows as distance squared :-)
I think it is unfair of you to equate the actions of Olof Palme, and the
hippocricy-heavy foreign social democratic policy introduced in that party
under his leadership, with Sweden in general. I doubt if Swedes are worse
hippocrits than other people. And now the social democrats are in opposition
:-).
That the murder of Olof Palme was somehow connected to either his Inida
connections or his UN work in the Middle East is no new theory. It is
probably as good (:-<) as the other hypotheses about who wanted him
murdered and for what reason. So I launch another one: Palme was murdered
by a group of militant finns as a protest against the apartheid-like
conditions under which finns live in Sweden. (It's probably a more likely
scenario than a few other I've heard...)
Swedish politics was in a way much more fascinating with Olof Palme and
Ulf Adelsohn than with Ingvar Carlsson and Carl Bildt.
Tomas
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tomas Eriksson Exp. Surface Physics Group, Dept. of Applied Maths,
ter...@phys.anu.edu.au Research School of Physical Sciences & Engineering,
Australian National University, Canberra
tom...@physchem.kth.se Surface Force Group, Dept. of Physical Chemistry,
Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden
Ahonen Timo
>Jarmo,
>do you really not realize the diffence between having been a minority for
>centuries and having been a "gastarbeiter" minority for decades ? Are you
>also completely unaware of the quite big number of areas in Finland (mainly
>on the coast) where the swedish speakers are the majority. In some cases
>almost 100% and I'm not talking about Aaland here. Can you show me any such
>areas in Sweden ?
>-johan
Erm..., this was not addressed to me, and I'm not taking sides with anyone
in this debate, but isn't there quite a number of 'me{n kieli' speakers in
the Torne}dalen, in practise speakers of a dialect of Finnish, who have
lived for as long as..., i.e. they are not 'gastarbeiters'? Nevertheless,
their language hasn't been recognised until quite recently (?) its existence
was confirmed as a 'home language'(again ?).
Timo Ahonen * "... when he was in court he sure looked *
University of Helsinki * a lot different." *
Finland * "... you develop something like total recall." *
Timo....@Helsinki.FI * - from 'The Thin Blue Line' *
Johan W. Wikman
Hi
In article <tahon...@katk.Helsinki.FI> tah...@katk.Helsinki.FI (Ahonen Timo) writes:
[stuff deleted]
Erm..., this was not addressed to me, and I'm not taking sides with anyone
in this debate, but isn't there quite a number of 'me{n kieli' speakers in
the Torne}dalen, in practise speakers of a dialect of Finnish, who have
lived for as long as..., i.e. they are not 'gastarbeiters'? Nevertheless,
their language hasn't been recognised until quite recently (?) its existence
was confirmed as a 'home language'(again ?).
Agreed, Toren}dalen is indeed an area in Sweden where there has been a
finnish speaking minority for quite some time.
Timo Ahonen * "... when he was in court he sure looked *
University of Helsinki * a lot different." *
Finland * "... you develop something like total recall." *
Timo....@Helsinki.FI * - from 'The Thin Blue Line' *
-johan
Johan Wikman
wi...@niksula.cs.hut.fi
Per Westerlund
It is SWEDISH, the Finnish speaking minority is not so big as you could think.
They can see Finnish television if they live near Stockholm.
With regards to the Finnish-speaking minority in Tornedalen and Finnskogarna, they were oppressed just like the Lapps, but now the attitude against the minorities has radically changed.
Per Westerlund
raymond thomas pierrehumbert
>You can't compare a group of people that has moved into a country a couple of
>decades ago just to get better wages (95% of all Finnish speakers in Sweden
>belong to this group), with a group of people who's roots in Finland go back
>even to pre-viking time (instead of pre-Viking Line age as for the former group
a country with Sweden's generally benevolent foreign policy and generally
generous treatment of refugees could justify the overt and widely accepted
prejudice against one of its longer-standing minority populations (Finnish
swedes). I had been appalled by the acceptability of Finnish jokes, the
general picture of the "dumb Finn" (they're fat, they drink too much,
they don't speak good Swedish), the disdain with which Finns coming
in for holiday off the Silja boats are treated, the taunting of Finnish
children by Swedish kids in school (our au pair's brother was kidnapped
by a bunch of schoolkids and left lost in the woods; the nice Swedish
police viewed it as just "normal" high-spirited play, even though the
poor kid was so traumatized he wouldn't go walking alone for months
afterward). I could go on and on, but I see now that it was all
a misunderstanding on my part.
Of course, since the poor Finns had to come to Sweden in search of
a better life (gee, just how did Finland's economy get into such a
slump in the 50's anyway? Couldn't have had anything to do with
reparations to USSR, could it? Of course, Sweden's economy was
SURELY similarly burdened, and it didn't hurt, did it? ;{ ), and
since Sweden was so magnanimous as to let them in to do the dirty
work that no Swede wanted to do, they could HARDLY expect to be
treated like real citizens, could they? I mean, how much charity
do they expect?
And moreover, of course, there is lots of precedent for this kind
of treatment (e.g. the treatment of ethnic Koreans in Japan).
This also explains how Swedes can be so pompous about American
racism (a real problem, admittedly) while at the same time
being so openly prejudiced against Finns; the explanation is
that American blacks have been in America longer than most
of the European white immigrants who are prejudiced against them.
But I take it that prejudice against more recent immigrants who
came out of economic necessity is perfectly OK.
Thank you so much for clarifying what had been a very perplexing
issue for me.
.
Annika Forsten INF
> By swedish standards those people who do not speak in Sweden swedish
> are considered as "home-language"-speakers, thus other languages spoken
> in Sweden are not considered as mother tongues.
> This practise in Finland means that there are no people speaaing swedish
> as a mother tongue but swedish is a home language only.
> In Sweden the practise is such that it has seen as good from the economical
> and pedagogical point of you not to start any finnish speaking education
> system over there. This means in Finland if we had a same practice that
> from the economical and pedagogical point of you swedish speaking education
> system had to abolish in Finland. The researchers in Sweden has seen it as
> good that the minorities have not their own schools but are studying
> with the majority/swedish speaking children. This practise seen as good
> in Sweden means that it must be good also in Finland and the practise
> which we have now is a harmful one for the swedish speaking minority.
Yes, well, I don't agree with this theory, not even for Sweden. They could
be softer in their attitude towards all foreigners, but it may not be so
easy to accept a lot of people coming in and starting to demand a lot of
rights, maybe the Swedes fear the Finns will take over the country :)
We don't really want a lot of Russians coming into Finland for just that
reason, do we? You Finnish-speaking Finns out there, do you see the
Sweadish-speaking Finns trying to keep their current rights as just the same
as if 300.000 Russians moved here and wanted their schools, etc?
annika forsten, finland
Annika Forsten INF
> Another thing is easily forgotten. The bilingual finlandswedes'
> ability to speak finnish is not received as a free gift. It is a
> result of hard work in school. BTW finnish was my most difficult
> subject, true but sad :-).
It is also rather hard to find a job if you don't speak Finnish. A Swedish-
speaking Finn in practice has to learn Finnish in order to manage here
properly (if not living in certain rather Swedish-speaking areas). If one
doesn't want to learn Finnish one moves to Sweden or Aland, something which
rather a few do. A Finn can manage quite well without speaking Swedish,
although a few jobs might be difficult to get.
So, in practice, in some things the Swedish-speaking Finns are better off,
in others, worse off. It's harder work in school to have to learn one
language more, but it sure is nice afterwards when you need them.
If the new schoolplan is accepted (in which Swedish is voluntary up to
15 years of age and obligatory only if you continue school up to 18), we'll
see how it affects the situation. It is certainly very intresting. As
Finnish is also likewise voluntary for Swedish-speaking Finns, it will
also be interesting to see how many leave school without any knowledge of
Finnish.
annika forsten
Jon Bell
> The teaching [at HUT] is not only in finnish, there are some courses
> lectured in swedish aswell, although I have never participated in one.
> Not to forget the rather big number of courses that are lectured in
> english.
Are these courses taught by Finns or by visiting foreigners?
This reminds me that the last time I was in Finland (three years ago), I
looked for books in Finnish on physics and computer science in the
Akateeminen Kirjakauppa. I was disappointed to find that most books in
technical fields seemed to be in English.
I imagine that if the textbook were in English it would simplify things
to lecture in English also...
Jon Bell / Dept. of Physics & C.S. / Presbyterian College / Clinton SC USA
Jon Bell
"Finns in Sweden" which justifies the different treatment they get in
the educational systems of the two countries.
Most Finland-Swedes have many generations of ancestors who have lived in
Finland. In that respect they have more right to call themselves "Finns"
than most Americans have to call themselves "Americans" :-). There is a
well-established Finland-Swedish culture, concentrated in well-defined
regions of Finland. I think it is appropriate that Finland should try to
maintain both of its predominant cultures (Finnish and Finland-Swedish).
I have the impression that most Finns in Sweden are relatively recent
immigrants, and are "spread out" geographically in Sweden much more than
the Finland-Swedes are in Finland. They are in the same situation as
other foreign immigrants (German, American, Vietnamese...), and I think
it is reasonable that Sweden should treat them like the other immigrants.
I'm aware that there are "Sweden-Finns" who do not fit this category,
for example the Finns in the Tornio/Tornea valley up north. I think they
should receive special consideration from the Swedish government.
Jon Bell / Dept. of Physics & C.S. / Presbyterian College / Clinton SC USA
(a "51% Finnish-American")
Janne Kivel{
There is actually one area in Sweden with original Finnish speaking minority.
In Norrland 'Tornedalen' there has been a group of people with Finnish as
their mother tongue for centuries. Their language differs slightly from
Finnish and it is called 'Me{n kieli'. I believe one of the famous Swedish
skiers comes from there, namely Christer Majbaeck.
There used to be a group of Finns living in Dalarna, but I believe that
group no longer exists as a separate ethnic group.
If the borders would have been drawn according to the ethnic groups in 1809,
large parts of Norrland would have belonged to Finland and Aaland would
have belonged to Sweden.
>-johan
Janne Kivel"a
Janne Kivel{
>a better life (gee, just how did Finland's economy get into such a
>slump in the 50's anyway? Couldn't have had anything to do with
>reparations to USSR, could it? Of course, Sweden's economy was
>SURELY similarly burdened, and it didn't hurt, did it? ;{ ), and
>since Sweden was so magnanimous as to let them in to do the dirty
>work that no Swede wanted to do, they could HARDLY expect to be
>treated like real citizens, could they? I mean, how much charity
>do they expect?
The Finnish economic 'slump' of the 1950's has its roots in the war.
Our country had to make large payments to the Soviet Union because
of the war. In order not to irritate the Russians Finland did not
accept any of the Marshall aid that so many Western European countries
used to rebuild their economy.
Sweden on the other hand, did not take part in the war and its society
was in much better shape. In fact there was a demand for workers and
the Finns filled that demand.
>This also explains how Swedes can be so pompous about American
>racism (a real problem, admittedly) while at the same time
>being so openly prejudiced against Finns; the explanation is
>that American blacks have been in America longer than most
>of the European white immigrants who are prejudiced against them.
>But I take it that prejudice against more recent immigrants who
>came out of economic necessity is perfectly OK.
I would not like to comment on Swedish prejudices, but I feel that
Social Democrat government of Sweden was sometimes too eager to be
the conscience of the World.
Swedish treatment of Finnish minority leaves a lot to be desired, but
I don't think they have to be ashamed of it either.
Janne Kivel"a
Janne Kivel{
jtb...@hubcap.clemson.edu (Jon Bell) writes:
>This reminds me that the last time I was in Finland (three years ago), I
>looked for books in Finnish on physics and computer science in the
>Akateeminen Kirjakauppa. I was disappointed to find that most books in
>technical fields seemed to be in English.
The most of the textbooks are really in English. The supporting material
is usually in Finnish so you don't have to rely entirely on the textbook.
The reason that there are so few textbooks in technical fields in Finnish
language is economical. It's very expensive to make a book in Finnish, if
there are only a couple of hundred people that actually purchase the book.
In technical fields the information has to be up-to-date, so making a new
Finnish edition every year is even more expensive.
>I imagine that if the textbook were in English it would simplify things
>to lecture in English also...
Where would that leave the Finnish language? Within a few years we would
live in a country with few professionals talking technical jargon nobody
else understands.
>Jon Bell / Dept. of Physics & C.S. / Presbyterian College / Clinton SC USA
Janne Kivel"a
Bengt G{llmo
> ...
> By swedish standards those people who do not speak in Sweden swedish
> are considered as "home-language"-speakers, thus other languages spoken
> in Sweden are not considered as mother tongues.
This is twisted!
The background to the term 'home language' is that pedagogical experts
feel that children in immigrant families risk growing up without really
having a mother tongue. They become half proficient both in the their
parent's language and in Swedish. This hampers their development, also
in many respects not directly related to language. It is difficult to think
clearly without a language! Therefore, Swedish schools provide training in
the 'home language' of all immigrant children, to make sure they have a
mother tongue, in a large number of languages and at considerable expense
to the Swedish tax payers.
There are people who believe that we are overdoing it, but to have it
presented as some sort of maltreatment of foreigners is a bit too much!
Bengt
--
Bengt Gallmo e-mail: lme...@eds.ericsson.se
Telefonaktiebolaget L M Ericsson phone: +46 8 719 1940
S-126 25 STOCKHOLM fax: +46 8 719 3988
SWEDEN
The bad thing about good things is that they usually come to an end.
The good thing about bad things is that they, also, usually come to an end.
Jarmo Ryyti
You are asking for the areas were finnish was/is spoken in Sweden.
Firs until 1809 nearly half of the area of Sweden was populated by finnish
speakers, Finland was namely that time a part of Sweden.
1809 Northern Sweden was made hald and areas were finnish was and is still
is spoken remained partly into an area of today sweden, tornedalen.
In warmland with two dots, was a finnish speaking population for centuries
but of course no more. You know it why.
The basic problem or is it a problem is that The State of Sweden has always
considered herself as a monocultural state, just the opposite to Finland.
A couple a weeks ago 24 finnish organisations in Sweden declared that they want
the swedish parlament should acknowledge finnish spekers as an official
minority. After 600 years! The swedish minister interviewed in Tv considered
such a thing as an unthinkable thing!!!Of course!!
It has a lot of to do with the status of language. AFrech speaking college
has not diificulties to get state assistance in STHLM but a finnish college
has had a long struggle to become an official state aided college in Sthlm
an area where there lives around 100 000 finnish speakers.
The official policy of Sweden has allways been not to accept finnish speakers
as a minority in Sweden by all means. Today the popular explanation is
that "then the others demand the same" earlier when there were not other but laps
sorry once again: others than lapps and finns the reason was found elsewhere
just in order to keep sweden monolingual.
This very very shortly:
jarmo
>
Juha Iisakka
I believe none. But you must always remember that Swedish is
a minority language in Finland. Except South-Africa and
Burundi (or is it Ruanda ???) the majority rules everywhere.
Because over 90 % of Finnish is Finnis speaking everybody
must understand Finnish (except in ]land). Must everybody
understand Swedish because there is perhaps 6 % Swedish in
Finland?
In schools nowadays you (if you are a Finn) must study
Swedish and English (in practice). In Europe there is
other languages for example German and French. In Finnland
officials are very worried about our bad knowledge of these
languages. BUT...
Not everybody is genius in languages (I was an idiot). They don't
manage many languages in school!
--
Juha Iisakka is...@rieska.oulu.fi
My opinions are mine - not my employer's
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bob Forsythe
>It seems to me there's a big difference between "Swedes in Finland" and
>"Finns in Sweden" which justifies the different treatment they get in
>the educational systems of the two countries.
>
I don't see why.
>Most Finland-Swedes have many generations of ancestors who have lived in
>Finland. In that respect they have more right to call themselves "Finns"
>than most Americans have to call themselves "Americans" :-). There is a
>well-established Finland-Swedish culture, concentrated in well-defined
>regions of Finland. I think it is appropriate that Finland should try to
>maintain both of its predominant cultures (Finnish and Finland-Swedish).
>
Speak for yourself. In my case, some of my family lines have been in
this country since 1621. On the other hand, I'd never even consider it my
"right" to think of others as less "American" than me just because they
haven't been here as long.
>I have the impression that most Finns in Sweden are relatively recent
>immigrants, and are "spread out" geographically in Sweden much more than
>the Finland-Swedes are in Finland. They are in the same situation as
>other foreign immigrants (German, American, Vietnamese...), and I think
>it is reasonable that Sweden should treat them like the other immigrants.
>
Why am I not surprised this argument is coming out of South Carolina? As
far as I'm concerned, anyone who has chosen to live here and become a citizen
is an American. I find it rather egregious that arguments are being made
on the basis of how long someone has been in a country. People have basic
rights, no matter who the are, where they are, or how long they've been there.
>I'm aware that there are "Sweden-Finns" who do not fit this category,
>for example the Finns in the Tornio/Tornea valley up north. I think they
>should receive special consideration from the Swedish government.
>
Nonsense; everyone should be treated fairly, if for no other reason than
they're a human being. I must say, this whole thread bothers me, because I'm
hearing the type of things that Europeans usually use to condemn Americans.
Jarmo Ryyti
>In article <1992Mar11....@jyu.fi>, ry...@jyu.fi (Jarmo Ryyti) writes:
>> ...
>> By swedish standards those people who do not speak in Sweden swedish
>> are considered as "home-language"-speakers, thus other languages spoken
>> in Sweden are not considered as mother tongues.
>> ...
>
>This is twisted!
>
>The background to the term 'home language' is that pedagogical experts
>feel that children in immigrant families risk growing up without really
>having a mother tongue. They become half proficient both in the their
>parent's language and in Swedish. This hampers their development, also
>in many respects not directly related to language. It is difficult to think
>clearly without a language! Therefore, Swedish schools provide training in
>the 'home language' of all immigrant children, to make sure they have a
>mother tongue, in a large number of languages and at considerable expense
>to the Swedish tax payers.
>
>There are people who believe that we are overdoing it, but to have it
>presented as some sort of maltreatment of foreigners is a bit too much!
>
>Bengt
Do you consider finnish speaking swedes as foreigners? Like those living in
Tornedalen? Your governements has however done so since centuries
jarmo
Johan W. Wikman
Hi
Jarmo,
apparently there are (have been?) a number of areas in Sweden, of which
I (am ashamed to say) have been rather unaware of, where finnish is
(has been) spoken in the daily life. Yet I claim, that the *vast*
majority (>90% ?) of the finnish-speaking in Sweden of today have moved
there as late as around 1950 and thus cannot demand equal rights
for the finnish language.
I think that the finnish language in Sweden is in the same position
as the lapp-language is in all nordic countries.
A couple a weeks ago 24 finnish organisations in Sweden declared that
they want the swedish parlament should acknowledge finnish spekers as
an official minority. After 600 years! The swedish minister interviewed
in Tv considered such a thing as an unthinkable thing!!!Of course!!
I havn't heard this interview, but I don't think anybody denies that
the finns in Sweden would be a minority. Of course they are a minority,
just as all the other ethnic groups that immigrated to Sweden during
the 20th century. I believe the issue is whether or not finnish should
be an official language in Sweden. And that I find quite unrealistic
to demand.
-johan
Johan Wikman
wi...@niksula.cs.hut.fi
Johan W. Wikman
Hi
In article <1992Mar15.2...@hubcap.clemson.edu> jtb...@hubcap.clemson.edu (Jon Bell) writes:
wi...@niksula.hut.fi (Johan W. Wikman) writes:
> The teaching [at HUT] is not only in finnish, there are some courses
> lectured in swedish aswell, although I have never participated in one.
> Not to forget the rather big number of courses that are lectured in
> english.
Are these courses taught by Finns or by visiting foreigners?
They are taught by visiting foreigners.
I imagine that if the textbook were in English it would simplify things
to lecture in English also...
I'm studying computer science and I don't remember when I last time
had a textbook in another language than english.
Actually I have difficultes both speaking and writing about computer
science in swedish or finnish because I lack the vocabulary. But that
isn't such a big problem, since at my work, for instance, almost all
documents are written in english (whether that's good or bad I don't know).
Jon Bell / Dept. of Physics & C.S. / Presbyterian College / Clinton SC USA
-johan
Johan Wikman
wi...@niksula.cs.hut.fi
Linus Tolke Y
>Agreed, Toren}dalen is indeed an area in Sweden where there has been a
>finnish speaking minority for quite some time.
Haparanda has, as far as I know, Swedens only daily newspaper using two
languages. Being from the south of Sweden (Sk}ne) it was quite hard to
make myself understood in Haparanda.
Tor Lillqvist
Within a few years we would live in a country with few
professionals talking technical jargon nobody else understands.
Wouldn't that be a positive stuation (only few professionals talking
unintelligible jargon) ? :-)
--
Tor Lillqvist,
working, but not speaking, for the Technical Research Centre of Finland
Tor Lillqvist
Do you consider finnish speaking swedes as foreigners? Like those living in
Tornedalen? Your governements has however done so since centuries
Er, what does this have to do with the followed-up article (about the
term "home language" and teaching it in Sweden)?
Anyway, your reasoning seems a bit obscure. In what way are the
Finnish-speaking Swedes in Tornedalen treated as foreigners? Aren't
they, for instance allowed to vote? If they have (until recently (?))
had all their education in Swedish, and only Swedish service from the
goernment etc, isn't that a sign that they have been treated as other
Swedish citizens?
Isn't the point you should be trying to make that you *want* them to
be treated as "foreigners" currently are, i.e. to get at least partly
education in their "home language".
Johan W. Wikman
Hi
In article <1992Mar16.1...@crash.cts.com> r...@pnet01.cts.com (Bob Forsythe) writes:
[stuff deleted]
Why am I not surprised this argument is coming out of South Carolina?
As far as I'm concerned, anyone who has chosen to live here and become
a citizen is an American. I find it rather egregious that arguments
are being made on the basis of how long someone has been in a country.
People have basic rights, no matter who the are, where they are, or how
long they've been there.
Perhaps my reasoning hasn't been that clear, but I have never meant to
say that the finnish-speaking (or any other minority) in Sweden (or any
other country) shouldn't have the same basic human rights as everybody
else. I'm only opposing the idea that Sweden all of a sudden should have
finnish as an other official language. I don't suppose you want
USA to have all languages used by the immigrants coming to the US
as official languages. In that case, how many official languages would
USA have - 10, 50, 100 ?
-Bob
r...@pnet01.cts.com
-johan
Johan Wikman
wi...@niksula.cs.hut.fi
Juha Iisakka
In article <WILF.92Ma...@batgirl.hut.fi> wi...@niksula.hut.fi (Johan W. Wikman) writes:
>Agreed, Toren}dalen is indeed an area in Sweden where there has been a
>finnish speaking minority for quite some time.
It was a majority for the last war.
Jarmo Ryyti
It seems to be too difficult for the swedes to understand that when the Sweden
Finns get their education in swedish not in finnish it does not mean equality.
Then it would be equality if Finland swedes would get their education
in Finland in finnish, but again the swdes would complain.
So I tell you a Finnish joke in order to understand better swedish minds,
how we see it.
Once a boat loaded by danes, norwegians, finns and swedes was sunk in to the ocean. The passangers swan to the nearest island. What did they do there.
The Danes set up a co-operative, the Finns started to fell forest, the Norwegians started to build up a boat. What did the the Swedes. Yes. They were waiting
to be introduced for the others on the island.
You understand what makes it difficult to make a swde to understand when
the finnish speking children go to a swedish speking school in sweden it is
not equality.
It is like the indians in Canada suddenly start demanding education in
indian langiages in USA. Noone understand it that spekers of a language of lower status
want voluntarily study their in own language insted of English/Swedish.
Just not to start again arguing that the Finns just recently have come
to Sweden I like to tell shortly an episode:
The Finlandskogarna were populated by the Finns from the 15 th century
better known as Warmland Finns. They spoke old Finnish dialect. They lived in Central Sweden. The last
Finnish speaker of that area died out during 1960' known as a Niitty-Jussi.
The president of Finland Urho Kekkonen travelled to meet him just before he died. The genocide in the heartlands of Sweden was completly done by the Sweden.
The swedes of that time did not pay any attention to that thing, they were incolved
in advicing the americans in Viethnam war etc. IF in their forests has been
a butterfly art about going to die out the students of the swedish universities
had started a campaign. But the question was of the Finnish speking old
population in Central Sweden. So, not so important. For many swedes these things
'are quite unknown because the Swedish media is not interested in this kind
of things....
In Sweden a status of finnish speaking people have always been very low.
There are plenty of words descriping this in Swedish language like
Kolfinnar, Finndjavel (Finn devils) etc. So when a Finn starts a school
he coming upwards in social hierarachy in Sweden if the state arranges
not finnish speaking education for him/her. The swedes astonished if
a Finn does not come upwards in Sweden's social hierarchy but demands
education and institutions in Finnish language.
Even today in Sweden School Laws Finnnish lectures given in some schools
are not considered as mother language education
that definitons is reserved for the swedish language.
Such is a mind of the Swedes.
REgards,
jarmo ryyti
By the way I know better swedish than english. So I can get information
form many sources.
Tor Lillqvist
The genocide in the heartlands of Sweden was completly done by the Sweden.
Genocide??? Ugh, that is a mighty strong word to use in this
context.
Such is a mind of the Swedes.
Well, it's good to know that here in Finland people have well-based
opinions not based on emotions, prejudice and generalizations.
Torkel Franzen
>Do you consider finnish speaking swedes as foreigners? Like those living in
>Tornedalen? Your governements has however done so since centuries
>jarmo
Is it time for another round of this nonsense? I distinctly recall how,
a couple of years ago, various interesting but bizarre fantasies about
Tornedalen were put forward in this group. What is it going to be
this time?
Juha Iisakka
They were no fantasies.
Bertil Jonell
>
>>I imagine that if the textbook were in English it would simplify things
>>to lecture in English also...
>
>Where would that leave the Finnish language?
We have some lectures in English and nobody seems to have taken any damage
from that. A recent query if we had anything against having a lecture in
good English (as opposed to bad Swedish) was answered with a resounding
"Yaaaawn, sure".
>>Jon Bell / Dept. of Physics & C.S. / Presbyterian College / Clinton SC USA
>
>Janne Kivel"a
-bertil-
--
"It can be shown that for any nutty theory, beyond-the-fringe political view or
strange religion there exists a proponent on the Net. The proof is left as an
exercise for your kill-file."
Peter Ahlskog, DC
Alot, then I mean ALOT that is not worth a "followup", but anyway
[Optional flame-on..Here comes something from the DoD flame-thrower-section]
Did You have a big stone in Your sandbox under Your whole childhood?
Should I really believe that you are so concerned about the finns in
sweden, as you let shine?!?!?
SO...What is riding You?
What is it that pisses You off?
Let us all know!
I'm curious.....;-)
----
The Future's so Bright, I gotta wear Shades.............
Bertil Jonell
First he writes about:
> [how Sweden, in his opinion, opresses the Finnish speaking Swedes]
Then he recounts:
>So I tell you a Finnish joke in order to understand better swedish minds,
>how we see it.
Come on, first you go on about equality and other enlightened values and then
you start using *ethnic jokes* to explain how "they" think in sweeping
generalizations!
[A joke that tries to push the 'Swedes are all upperclass snots' stereotype,
by the way]
>jarmo ryyti
Bertil Jonell
>indian langiages in USA. Noone understand it that spekers of a language of lower status
>want voluntarily study their in own language insted of English/Swedish.
I asked you this once before: How is education for immigrant or refugee
children handled in Finland?
Would for example the children of a Somali refugee in Finland get some
education in their native language?
>Such is a mind of the Swedes.
That comment is like a picture. It says more than a thousand words about you.
Jon Bell
> People have basic rights, no matter who they are, where they are, or
> how long they've been there.
I agree. The problem comes in defining what those "basic rights" are.
After reflecting on the matter a while, I've decided that the _really_
significant difference between most Swedes in Finland and most Finns in
Sweden is not how long they've been there, but rather this:
The Swedish communities in Finland came under a predominantly
Finnish-speaking government for reasons beyond their control, namely the
re-drawing of boundary lines by war or negotiation. A similar situation
applies to certain Finns in Sweden, and to the French in Canada.
Most Finns in Sweden (I'm open to correction on this!) made a conscious
choice to move there, in which they weighed the economic advantages
against the cultural disadvantages.
I would agree that as a "basic right," people in a particular location
should be allowed to pursue their own affairs in whatever language is
most suitable for them, regardless of any changes in the government that
has sovereignty over them. People should not be compelled to leave
their long-standing homes on the basis of language.
On the other hand, someone who voluntarily moves to another country
should be prepared to accommodate himself to its culture to at least
some extent. This does not excuse acts of xenophobia or worse against
him. A country should protect its immigrants from persecution, and help
them as much as is practical. If there are enough of them to form their
own ethnic communities, they should not be discouraged from doing so.
> Why am I not surprised this argument is coming out of South Carolina?
I grew up in Ohio, in a steel-mill town which had many varieties of
"hyphenated Americans": Finnish, Greek, Polish, Italian, Hungarian, etc.
Many of my friends had immigrant grandparents or other relatives. Many
of those immigrants (including my grandfather) learned at least enough
English to get by in their work, but others (including my grandmother)
never learned more than a few words. I doubt that any of them expected
government services to be provided in any language other than English.
My mother tells me that although she was born in this country, she spoke
only Finnish as a small child, and didn't learn English until she
started to go to school at the age of six. By the time she and most of
her immigrant-children classmates finished school they spoke English as
well as anybody else, and were none the worse for having to struggle
with it at first.
Now, seventy years later, my parents live in Florida (no, not in Lake
Worth :-)). My mother sometimes complains about the way that Miami
provides many services in Spanish to accommodate the Cuban and other
Hispanic immigrants. "They should learn English like we did!" Part of
me agrees with that.
On the other hand, I think that ethnic diversity is valuable and worth
encouraging, so long as the various groups refrain from coming to
blows with each other. Language is probably the most powerful "glue"
which holds an ethnic community together.
So, I take a pragmatic point of view about the degree to which
a government ought to accommodate other languages besides its official
one(s). The larger a group is, and the more cohesive it is, then the
more justified it is for government to try to serve it in its native
language. How well a group meets these qualifications may vary from
place to place in the same country.
This would certainly apply to many Hispanic and Asian communities in
the U.S. The "recent" Finns in Sweden may fall into this category as
well. I don't know enough about them to be sure.
I doubt that it applies to us expatriate Yankees in South Carolina. :-)
Johan W. Wikman
Hi
In article <1992Mar17.0...@jyu.fi> ry...@jyu.fi (Jarmo Ryyti) writes:
My comments,
It seems to be too difficult for the swedes to understand that when
^^^^^^
If you you mean the people living in Sweden and if you mean that I'm
one of them, I want you to know that I'm just as much a finn as you are.
the Sweden Finns get their education in swedish not in finnish it
does not mean equality. Then it would be equality if Finland swedes
would get their education in Finland in finnish, but again the swdes
would complain.
As I, and several others, have pointed out, the situation is not the
same. Originally Finland was inhabited both from the east and the west.
From the west came scandinavians, who spoke swedish and from the east
came the finns who naturally spoke finnish (a short, brief and
incomplete history lesson, so don't pick on details). During the course
of time these people have been intermixed so nowadays you cannot
find any genetic differences between finnish speaking and swedish
speaking finns (this is not my field, I may have oversimplified
something). So you can truly talk about one people, two languages.
[stuff deleted]
It is like the indians in Canada suddenly start demanding education in
indian langiages in USA. Noone understand it that spekers of a language
of lower status want voluntarily study their in own language insted of
English/Swedish.
No, if the one and only official language in Finland would be swedish
and the finnish speaking finns would demand education in finnish, then
the situation would be the same. It is a very, very different situation
in Sweden.
Just not to start again arguing that the Finns just recently have come
to Sweden I like to tell shortly an episode:
The Finlandskogarna were populated by the Finns from the 15 th century
better known as Warmland Finns. They spoke old Finnish dialect. They
lived in Central Sweden. The last Finnish speaker of that area died out
during 1960' known as a Niitty-Jussi.
So one finnish speaking person is enough to make finnish an official
language. Seriously, I made some research and here are some figures
I found. Sweden:
Finns 33929 (1930)
All 7044039 (1950)
In per cent: finns 0.48
Out of curiosity I checked some figures for Finland aswell.
These figures are from 1940, i.e. right after the Finnish-Russian
winter war.
Russians 7200
All 3694445
In per cent: russians 0.19
The difference between 0.19 and 0.48 isn't that big. Perhaps we
ought to make russian the third official language of Finland.
The president of Finland Urho Kekkonen travelled to meet him just
before he died. The genocide in the heartlands of Sweden was
completly done by the Sweden.
Whoops, isn't genocide (kansanmurha) a little bit too tough a word.
I looked up the Warmland finns aswell. During the 16th and 17th
centuries 12000-13000 finns immigrated to Sweden to the woodlands
of Varmland, Kopparberg and Gavleborg counties. Gradually the
finns were assimilated by the surrounding society and eventually
the finnish language disappeared. I don't see anything special about
that. Just think about all those US-Americans who have their
roots in a non-english speaking country. Yet, their mother tounge
is english. This is speculation, but I believe there are a lot more
ethnic finns in USA than in Sweden. How come you are not demanding
finnish schools and universities in USA.
[stuff deleted]
In Sweden a status of finnish speaking people have always been very low.
There are plenty of words descriping this in Swedish language like
Kolfinnar, Finndjavel (Finn devils) etc. So when a Finn starts a school
You have never heard of similar words in finnish about Finland-swedes and
swedes ?
[stuff deleted]
Such is a mind of the Swedes.
REgards,
jarmo ryyti
By the way I know better swedish than english. So I can get information
form many sources.
-johan
Johan Wikman
wi...@niksula.cs.hut.fi
I'm getting tired of this thread. If anyone wants to comment I'd
prefer mailing instead of posting.
ter...@phys.anu.edu.au
DC) writes:
> ry...@jyu.fi writes...
begin (* flame *)
> Alot, then I mean ALOT that is not worth a "followup", but anyway
Well, what's worse is that it was hardly worth posting...
> Did You have a big stone in Your sandbox under Your whole childhood?
> Should I really believe that you are so concerned about the finns in
> sweden, as you let shine?!?!?
>
> SO...What is riding You?
> What is it that pisses You off?
> Let us all know!
In my totally unprofessional opinion, these are his problems:
- taskig barndom
- trasiga leksaker
- asfalterad sandl}da
- bara r|da legobitar
To Jarmo: this alledged "genocide" - can you back that up with any facts?
Any mass-graves of finns massacred in the 1950's or 1960's somewhere in
Dalarna? Eyewitnesses that saw Swedish army patrols rounding up whole finnish
populations in V{rmland and Dalarna, people that were never heard of again?
Or did the Swedish language education that were forced on you (probably at
gunpoint) take so much time that could have been spend learning English that
you perhaps think that genocide means something else than "folkmord"? You're
probably right - Stalin was a very gentle person nothing compared to Erlander.
That's well known, isn't it?
Did some Swedes steal your candy when you were a kid or what?
end (* flame *)
Tomas
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tomas Eriksson ter...@phys.anu.edu.au tom...@physchem.kth.se
Jarmo Ryyti
>ry...@jyu.fi writes...
>
>Alot, then I mean ALOT that is not worth a "followup", but anyway
>
>[Optional flame-on..Here comes something from the DoD flame-thrower-section]
>
>Did You have a big stone in Your sandbox under Your whole childhood?
>Should I really believe that you are so concerned about the finns in
>sweden, as you let shine?!?!?
>
>SO...What is riding You?
>What is it that pisses You off?
>Let us all know!
>
> I'm curious.....;-)
My main concern is not in the west but in the east. I co-operating
in XSU, in Karelia in the field of business education.
My comments concerning minority questions in Sweden make for me a grat joy
while I know that it irritates specially the swedes, and teasing swedes
is one favorite sports in Finland. Because they are our third best neighbours
after norwegians and estonians.
My brother by the way lives in Sweden, a colleque of mine has been for ten
years been as a home-language techer in Sweden for the finnish speaking
kids and has been one co{founder of a newspaper Mean kieli in Tornedalen
for the Finnish speaking minority. And by following such magazines
like Invandrare och minoriteter published in Sweden I like as a hobby to
follow c. since 20 years Swedish policy towards Finnish speaking minority
over there. I usually do not like to go in the mainstream. You understand what I mean. And do not generally like to think the way the majority thinks or
likes make me to think.
If you like more minority stiries I could tell them about Karelia. I was
there last year with some people by a mountin-bike. Karelia is in Russia
if you do not know. Next summer I will take a ride to Estonia.
Best information however I have get direct from the people by hitch-hiking
around in the Eastern Europe before it was freed.
The same method made me to think these things while I for the first time hitch-
hiked with my brother to Swden/Haparanda/Luulaja. The police took us back to
Finland. It was 1961. May be that is way I like to tease swedish minded
people. Swedish police was however quite nice but could not speak Finnish
even if we were near the boarder. We had deserved better service,:-.
REading is not enough, you must also to know.
jarmo
Juha Iisakka
begin (* flame *)
In my totally unprofessional opinion, these are his problems:
- taskig barndom
- trasiga leksaker
- asfalterad sandl}da
- bara r|da legobitar
To Jarmo: this alledged "genocide" - can you back that up with any facts?
Any mass-graves of finns massacred in the 1950's or 1960's somewhere in
Dalarna? Eyewitnesses that saw Swedish army patrols rounding up whole finnish
Could you tell me any good reason why you wrote that?
Only reason to flame Jarmo what I can see, is that you
Swedes are hypocritical people and cannot see anything
wrong in themselves.
You could argument his postings without any stupid flames!
Jarmo Ryyti
>DC) writes:
>> ry...@jyu.fi writes...
>
>begin (* flame *)
>
>
>> Should I really believe that you are so concerned about the finns in
>> sweden, as you let shine?!?!?
>>
>> SO...What is riding You?
>> What is it that pisses You off?
>> Let us all know!
>
>In my totally unprofessional opinion, these are his problems:
>- taskig barndom
>- trasiga leksaker
>- asfalterad sandl}da
>- bara r|da legobitar
>
>To Jarmo: this alledged "genocide" - can you back that up with any facts?
>Any mass-graves of finns massacred in the 1950's or 1960's somewhere in
>Dalarna? Eyewitnesses that saw Swedish army patrols rounding up whole finnish
>populations in V{rmland and Dalarna, people that were never heard of again?
>Or did the Swedish language education that were forced on you (probably at
>gunpoint) take so much time that could have been spend learning English that
>you perhaps think that genocide means something else than "folkmord"? You're
>probably right - Stalin was a very gentle person nothing compared to Erlander.
>That's well known, isn't it?
>
>
Jarmo is answering with a pleasure;
Do you rally think that it is not a pity that one tribe (folkspillra) totally
has died out.
I would find it as a richness if The Finns of Warmland had survived.
But as we know their way of living was wrong for the Swedish state. They
burned down the forests in order to get space for their fields and it
was not suitable for the state of Sweden who found it harmful just the
time the forest became economically valuable. So they were refused and
"civilised" by the swedish main - stream standards. A genocide it is
because their way of living was stopped consiusly, not by accident or so.
The same process goes on in the Amazonas,the victims are this time indians.
those who live otherwise
are a danger for the economics. So during 1900 th century Sweden had her
reasons to destroy the culture of the Forest Finns and as I mentioned the
last of them died during 1960's.
Tornedal-Finns were and are living on the border zone and they were seen
as a danger for the security of Sweden and therefore they had to be made
"real swedes" during the time Finland was a part of Russia and Russia and
Sweden had a common border. This practises were stopped first during 1950'
when the "danger" was eliminated, with other words Tornedal-Finns were
no more than few thousands left.
Every tribe who dissappears from the worls make the life more monotonous.
Have you ever heard of the livvis, they outnumber now less than 20, and
live in Lettland. They are after a few years no more existing. And you
never can get them back. Have you heard about vatjas, there are less
than 100 of them anymore.
They live on the banks of Gulf of Finland
in the outskirts of STP....
There are nowhere an association of Protecting Peoples but many protecting
animals, not that I am against that either.
.Do you by the way include Karelia or Murmansk lan ('') into the Nordic
regions??? Or Estonia?
jarmo
.
Sven Wallman
: I would find it as a richness if The Finns of Warmland had survived.
: But as we know their way of living was wrong for the Swedish state. They
: burned down the forests in order to get space for their fields and it
: was not suitable for the state of Sweden who found it harmful just the
: time the forest became economically valuable. So they were refused and
: "civilised" by the swedish main - stream standards. A genocide it is
: because their way of living was stopped consiusly, not by accident or so.
: The same process goes on in the Amazonas,the victims are this time indians.
: those who live otherwise
: are a danger for the economics. So during 1900 th century Sweden had her
: reasons to destroy the culture of the Forest Finns and as I mentioned the
: last of them died during 1960's.
ehh, i thought the problems the indians in the amazonas have were related
to the fact that farmers and miners burn down the rainforests. btw, you are
right in saying that the finnish speaking minority in V{rmland living there
there in the 18th century are all dead. but i don't think the swedish
government is to blame, because NOONE from that century is alive right now.
scary, huh? .
re: genocides..
i grew up in blekinge, an area occupied by the swedish army since
1658-something.. massacres and various other warcrimes occured... i am sure
there were finns who were members of the swedish armed forces during that time.
hey! i just remembered a war before that one.. the 30 years war..
it was fought in eastern europe. swedish and finnish soldiers murdered and
raped innocent people all over the place! not even the huns were as cruel
as you guys... i demand an apology on behalf of all the civilians swedish
and finnish imperialist soldiers have murdered!!!
:)
--
Sven Wallman, S:t Larsg. 5, 753 11 Uppsala, Sweden, +46 1812 9237
member of Sk}nsk-blekingska-hall{ndska befrielser|relsen
nin...@tnclus.tele.nokia.fi
First, the infamous number 6%.
This is often used to point out that this minority is so small
that service in swedish is useless and costly.
In a strictly mathematical sense this looks OK. But now these
6% happen to be concentrated and that makes the situation totally
different. If a 6% minority were evenly distributed then it
probably wouldn't even survive a generation.
Secondly, mandatory second domestic language in school.
It's easier to learn a language if you are not forced to do it.
Therefore I think both swedish and finnish should be optional.
But then a general course should be included in the schoolplan
where the other language group's language and culture is taught,
more in the sense "know your country". It could be, say two years.
Otherwise there is the risk of polarization which will lead to
hostility.
Niklas Indola
Yngve Koehler Raustein
|> The genocide in the heartlands of Sweden was completly done by the Sweden.
^^^^^^^^
I realize that your English is as bad as your sense of logic, Jarmo, but perhaps
you should consult a dictionary before using words you don't understand.
Yngve
--
Yngve K. Raustein | ``We use choicest juicy chunks of fresh
362 Memorial Drive | Cornish ram's bladder, emptied, steamed,
Cambridge, MA 02139 | flavoured with sesame seeds whipped into a
617-225-7343 | fondue and garnished with lark's vomit.''
Pekka Juhani Taipale
>If you speak Sweish well enough you're competing with the Sweish-speaking
>on the same terms. So it is up to you.
Yeah, right. Everyone is equal. Swedish-speaking people have some
priviledges, but because it is up to you if you speak Swedish or not,
everyone is equal. Wonderful.
Ever wondered what makes Finnish-speaking people so angry about
the language question?
Matti Linnanvuori
I asked you this once before: How is education for immigrant or refugee
children handled in Finland?
Would for example the children of a Somali refugee in Finland get some
education in their native language?
May I try to answer? If there are 5 children speaking a language
other than Finnish or Swedish in a school, the municipality has to
arrange education of that language. (It could be 5 per a
town/municipality.) There is some education of late immigrants'
or refugees' languages and Gypsy language at least in some towns.
Also, there are German, French, English and Russian schools in
Helsinki.
Saami used to have no special status, although there are some (but
not enough) Saami language schools and kindergartens in northern
Lapland. Since this year the Saamis can use their language when
dealing with the authorities in a few northern Lapland municipalites,
but not elsewhere. This was due to some international agreement that
Finland signed.
Up to now, every pupil of any school in Finland has had to study both
Finnish and Swedish. This a unique situation compared to all the
multilingual countries in Europe. It has caused some trouble to recent
immigrants and almost no results to some negative-minded Finns. This
has increased the mutual understanding and the ability to choose one's
home anywhere in Finland. Though, I don't think abolishing the
mandatory Swedish / Finnish (as proposed by a government committee
this year) would be against the human rights of the Swedish speaking
people in Finland.
Pekka Juhani Taipale
>in others, worse off. It's harder work in school to have to learn one
>language more
Hey, waite a minute! I thought this started about the mandatory Swedish
for Finnish-speaking Finns, right?
Bot Finnish- and Swedish-speaking Finns have to study "det andra
inhemska" plus the other foreign languages. So the Swedish-speaking
Finns don't have to learn one language more.
Otherwise, I agree with you:
>but it sure is nice afterwards when you need them.
Yes, I'm happy of my knowledge of Swedish. However, I think it should
be better - and it could have become better if Swedish hadn't been
mandatory at school so that unmotivated kids disturbed those of us who
wanted to learn.
Jyrki Kuoppala
>Erm..., this was not addressed to me, and I'm not taking sides with anyone
>in this debate, but isn't there quite a number of 'me{n kieli' speakers in
>the Torne}dalen, in practise speakers of a dialect of Finnish, who have
>lived for as long as..., i.e. they are not 'gastarbeiters'? Nevertheless,
>their language hasn't been recognised until quite recently (?) its existence
>was confirmed as a 'home language'(again ?).
Yes, this is true. Although I'm not sure how well it is recognized
even now - it wasn't many years (under ten) since there were reports
of speaking "me{n kieli" in day-care centers for children being
forbidden (in Haparanda, if I remember right). And I haven't heard
anything about any recognition of the language in schools or other
"official" organizations.
Similar things go for Sami languages in Northern Lappland of Finland,
which now have some official recognition there. Not sure how good it
is even now, nor how Sweden and Norway treat Sami languages.
And how about "me{n kieli" recognition in Finland? We were taught
Finnish in school in "mother tongue" lessons, there was no possibility
to study "me{n kieli".
//Jyrki
Janne Kivel{
j...@cs.HUT.FI (Jyrki Kuoppala) writes:
>Yes, this is true. Although I'm not sure how well it is recognized
>even now - it wasn't many years (under ten) since there were reports
>of speaking "me{n kieli" in day-care centers for children being
>forbidden (in Haparanda, if I remember right). And I haven't heard
>anything about any recognition of the language in schools or other
>"official" organizations.
Sweden is a monolingual country and it is very likely to stay that.
Whenever some Swede complains about treatment of minorities in some
other country, he should check his own backyard first. The Swedes
can say that the Finns living there are immigrants as well as Yugoslavs
and Turks, but due to long history of Finnish speakers in Sweden
Finnish language should be given some kind of an official status other
than the present one.
>Similar things go for Sami languages in Northern Lappland of Finland,
>which now have some official recognition there. Not sure how good it
>is even now, nor how Sweden and Norway treat Sami languages.
The number of Sami people is much larger in Sweden and Norway than in
Finland. One of the big problems has been the way the borders are drawn.
The winter pastures of reindeer may be on the other side of the border
than summer pastures.
>And how about "me{n kieli" recognition in Finland? We were taught
>Finnish in school in "mother tongue" lessons, there was no possibility
>to study "me{n kieli".
I have heard about "me{n kieli" but I don't know how much it differs from
Finnish. Does it have a grammar of its own or is it some dialect?
>//Jyrki
Janne Kivel"a
Jyrki Kuoppala
>>And how about "me{n kieli" recognition in Finland? We were taught
>>Finnish in school in "mother tongue" lessons, there was no possibility
>>to study "me{n kieli".
>
>I have heard about "me{n kieli" but I don't know how much it differs from
>Finnish. Does it have a grammar of its own or is it some dialect?
Well, it's pretty similar to Finnish. There are different constructs
and expression than in Finnish, also different words, and if you write
it down it looks quite different from Finnish, but that of course goes
for many other dialects/languages spoken in Finland. Some people say
it's a different language, and in local papers there are columns
written in me{n kieli. I'm not sure if me{n kieli differs from
"official Finnish" any more than any other languages/dialects spoken
in other parts of Finland. Anyway, the personal pronouns are
different, vowel combinations are different, I suppose intonation also
is somewhat different, many words are different, etc. It probably is
difficult to understand in many occasions for people from other parts
of Finland.
For examples, read some stories written by Rosa Liksom.
//Jyrki
Hannu Nyman
> So one finnish speaking person is enough to make finnish an official
> language. Seriously, I made some research and here are some figures
> I found. Sweden:
>
> Finns 33929 (1930)
> All 7044039 (1950)
>
> In per cent: finns 0.48
>
What are you trying to prove with that data from 1930s? You should use
current data!
Here are some figures that I found out:
Finns in Sweden over 300000
All 8323000
That makes about 3.6 per cent... Just over 7 times your figure :-)
My figures are from: Uusi Pikkuj{ttil{inen (1985)
Perhaps that gives a better figure of finns in Sweden.
And don't forget those finnish immigrants who have already got the
swedish nationality. There are over 100000 such persons.
>
> I'm getting tired of this thread. If anyone wants to comment I'd
> prefer mailing instead of posting.
>
Oh yes. 'Do not comment my figures, they are right'. Is that your
meaning?
Hannu Nyman
--
+--------------------+---------------------------+----------------------+
I Hannu Nyman I Hannu...@hut.fi I Errare humanum est I
I I hny...@vipunen.hut.fi I I
+--------------------+---------------------------+----------------------+
ter...@phys.anu.edu.au
(Juha Iisakka) writes:
> In article <1992Mar18...@phys.anu.edu.au> ter...@phys.anu.edu.au writes:
>
> begin (* flame *)
>
> In my totally unprofessional opinion, these are his problems:
> - taskig barndom
> - trasiga leksaker
> - asfalterad sandl}da
> - bara r|da legobitar
>
> To Jarmo: this alledged "genocide" - can you back that up with any facts?
> Any mass-graves of finns massacred in the 1950's or 1960's somewhere in
>
> Could you tell me any good reason why you wrote that?
> Only reason to flame Jarmo what I can see, is that you
> Swedes are hypocritical people and cannot see anything
> wrong in themselves.
:-) Really? Recent epidemiological studies (L.G.T. Eriksson, unpublished
results) indicate that the incidence of Swedophobia is highest among Swedes.
> You could argument his postings without any stupid flames!
Yes, I could, and I've tried. Many other tried as well. It apparently
doesn't work. Insofar as it's possible to deduce a message from his postings
it's usually either illogical or not based on facts (such as the "genocide"
thing, which I find rather insulting). Replying to his postings produce
more of the same, but no answers.
I would be happy to discuss the treatment of immigrants and local ethnic
groups in Norden in a comparative fashion without flames. But to use strange
accusations and lies about conditions in Sweden as arguments in an agitated
discussion about the status of the Swedish language in Finland is not very
relevant. (And stupid.) I'm the first to agree that Sweden is far from a
perfect country, and that the official Sweden has had an irritating tendency
to tell other countries what they should do. But when Jarmo, in Finland,
a country which have accepted almost *two orders of magnitude fewer
immigrants/refugees* (numbers refering to the 1980's) than Sweden, bitterly
complains about how terribly bad Sweden treats her immigrants, things start
to get a bit ridiculous. To be frank, I think Finland is more xenophobic
than Sweden. Obviously, some Finns doesn't even like other Finns. I think
it's likely that your average Swede likes Finns better than other Finns do,
at least if they can speak Swedish :-).
I propose a solution to all language problems: all EC countries decide to
have English as their sole official language, effective Jan 1, 2050. During
a transition period from Jan 1, 2000, all official documents, public services
etc. will be available in both English and local languages in all EC
countries. Of course, the French will go bananas, but who cares?
Tomas
(a hypocritical Swede)
P.S. There is nothing like a flamewar to keep the temperature above freezing
in Norden. D.S.
P.P.S. Queen's English (British English) of course, not American "English".
And definitely not P.C. "English". Or is that "Ynglish"? :-) D.D.S.
ter...@phys.anu.edu.au
(Hannu Nyman) writes:
> In article <WILF.92Ma...@sandman.hut.fi>, wi...@niksula.hut.fi
> (Johan W. Wikman) writes:
>
>> So one finnish speaking person is enough to make finnish an official
>> language. Seriously, I made some research and here are some figures
>> I found. Sweden:
>>
>> Finns 33929 (1930)
>> All 7044039 (1950)
>>
>> In per cent: finns 0.48
>
> What are you trying to prove with that data from 1930s? You should use
> current data!
>
> Here are some figures that I found out:
>
> Finns in Sweden over 300000
> ... My figures are from: Uusi Pikkuj{ttil{inen (1985)
>
> And don't forget those finnish immigrants who have already got the
> swedish nationality. There are over 100000 such persons.
I think it is this figure, Swedish citizen who consider themselves to be
Finnish-speaking, that is interesting, not Finns who have no intention of
ever becoming Swedish citizen. Supposing that your figures are realiable
("over x" sounds a bit like guessing, even if it comes from a book), you
should deduct finlandssvenskar from the 100 000 figure. I think a saw a
figure of 50 000 for them in another posting (or was that 50 000 out of
the 300 000?). The resulting 50 000 (correct me if you have better figures
- perhaps a few thousand Tornedalsfinnar should be added on top of this?
is "over 100 000" much more than 100 000?) corresponds to 0.6% of the
Swedish population - one order of magnitude less than the Swedish-speaking
in Finland, and rather close to the 0.48% calculated by Johan Wikman.
> Hannu Nyman
Tomas
Annika Forsten INF
> >If you speak Swedish well enough you're competing with the
> >Swedish-speaking on the same terms. So it is up to you.
> Yeah, right. Everyone is equal. Swedish-speaking people have some
> priviledges, but because it is up to you if you speak Swedish or not,
> everyone is equal. Wonderful.
If you learn Swedish you can go to a Swedish school. If I learn Finnish
I can go to a Finnish school. There are a lot more Finnish schools than
Swedish ones, including universities. And the Swedish-speaking university
has a quota for Finns who do not speak Swedish fluently. You may have a point
that it could be easier to get in at the Swedish-speaking university than at
Finnish ones. On the other hand, there aren't many other places to study at
except this Swedish-speaking university for those who do not speak Finnish
well enough. The Swedish-speaking kids who want to go to a Swedish school
often have long school journeys, since there are only a few Swedish schools,
while there are Finnish ones all around. This is hardly equal, but I don't
see it as a problem, do you?
> Ever wondered what makes Finnish-speaking people so angry about
> the language question?
Yes, I have and it seems very strange to me. Do you think you would be better
off if the Swedish-speaking university did not exist? I hardly think there
would be any more Finnish universities, there is already one in Turku.
annika forsten
p.s. If you want to continue on a personal level, please e-mail.
Annika Forsten INF
In article <AFORSTEN.92...@aton.abo.fi> afor...@aton.abo.fi (Annika Forsten INF) writes:
> >So, in practice, in some things the Swedish-speaking Finns are better off,
> >in others, worse off. It's harder work in school to have to learn one
> >language more
> Hey, waite a minute! I thought this started about the mandatory Swedish
> for Finnish-speaking Finns, right?
No, we talked about equality.
> Bot Finnish- and Swedish-speaking Finns have to study "det andra
> inhemska" plus the other foreign languages. So the Swedish-speaking
> Finns don't have to learn one language more.
In practice (I don't know whether this is stipulated anywhere),
Swedish-speaking Finns start with their first foreign language in 3rd grade,
second in 4th grade, third in 7th grade and possibly the 4th in 10th grade.
Finnish-speaking Finns (in most schools) start with their second foreign
lanaguage in 8th grade (I believe), therefore they are one language behind
when they finish school. So S-sp Finns end up with Swedish, Finnish, English
and at least one other language. F-sp Finns end up with Finnish, Swedish and
at least one other language. Correct me if I'm wrong about the Finnish schools.
> >but it sure is nice afterwards when you need them.
> Yes, I'm happy of my knowledge of Swedish. However, I think it should
> be better - and it could have become better if Swedish hadn't been
> mandatory at school so that unmotivated kids disturbed those of us who
> wanted to learn.
You may well be right. I have never advocated mandatory Swedish at Finnish
schools, I agree that motivation suffers. It will be very interesting to
see which way it goes if the new schoolplan is passed.
annika forsten
Torkel Franzen
>- perhaps a few thousand Tornedalsfinnar should be added on top of this?
Is there anybody who calls himself or herself "tornedalsfinne"?
Bertil Jonell
>i demand an apology on behalf of all the civilians swedish
>and finnish imperialist soldiers have murdered!!!
Hell, yes! And I bet I have at least one Irish ancestor who, while minding
his or her business on Ireland got ruthlessly captured by bloodthirsty Danish
Vikings and got dragged away to lifelong slavery in Scandinavia! Time for
reparations, I say!
:)
>Sven Wallman, S:t Larsg. 5, 753 11 Uppsala, Sweden, +46 1812 9237
-bertil-
Steinar Bang
> I realize that your English is as bad as your sense of logic, Jarmo,
> but perhaps you should consult a dictionary before using words you
> don't understand.
Please keep spelling/language flames of the net.
Thank You!
- Steinar
Sari A. Kajantie
Sorry (everybody's likely to fed up by now..;-), but I can't lay my
hands off the thread seeing how common sense is getting to be burned
on the stake.
The analogy between Finnish and Swedish linguistic minorities is indeed
pretty nonexistent. A bunch of newly arrived guest workers <uh, fv'rite
pc-disclaimer here> and a rural community can hardly have the same impact
on a culture than the rurels. Finland is an ex-province of Sweden with very
young written language. Where did you forget that history is always the
history of the rule?? Sure its not fair, but justness as such has little
to do with politics.
Certainly the folks in strongly monolingual areas find it frustrating to
put up with a 'useless' language. Yet the only reason for teaching it/them
is the fact that Finland is a bilingual country by constitution. The state
makes the educational plans as it damn well pleases. A 'common opinnion' may
have it's effect when spoken out, but in this case it'd require lots of
poking in the legistlation.
It's also rubbish that swedish would help learning other languages. A child
doesn't learn by reasoning and constructing on the existing data like an
adult does. At least I learned French and English as a kid by the copying
method in kindergartens (come to think of it, it comes to use again at the
University level ;-) and not proper Swedish ;-). I never particularly
liked Swedish, but that's _my_ problem not the whole of Finnish speaking
population's... And still I find it very important to maintain the minority
as much as possible.
While generally any restriction of freedom should be strongly opposed, an
extensive basic education is heck of a lot more important thing than
skipping one subject completely. And bashing+flaming the drift towards
homogeneous one track culture might be even more ;-)
--
Sari A. Kajantie / ska...@csc.fi / Centre for Scientific Computing, Finland
*358-0-4572877 / skajan@finfun / Networking group
Choosing between evils, I always take the one I haven't tried before - Mae West
Einar Traa
>> in Norden. D.S.
>
You just take I-80 east from San Francisco about 3 hrs OOPS wrong NORDEN
Jarmo Ryyti
>
> Here are some figures that I found out:
>
> Finns in Sweden over 300000
> All 8323000
>
> That makes about 3.6 per cent... Just over 7 times your figure :-)
> My figures are from: Uusi Pikkuj{ttil{inen (1985)
>
> Perhaps that gives a better figure of finns in Sweden.
>
> And don't forget those finnish immigrants who have already got the
> swedish nationality. There are over 100000 such persons.
>
>
>-johan
>
>Johan Wikman
>wi...@niksula.cs.hut.fi
HI folks,
The problem from the Finnish pont of is that the policy of Sweden has always
been to assimilate Finnish speaking minorities in Sweden.
Tha pracitse has a very long history in Sweden and deep roots also in the
minds of the swedes and what suprisingly the swedes in Finland support
the policy of Sweden too!
The similar assimilation policy practised in Finland would mean: no more
state supported swedish schools, vocationla schools, universities.
There is an organization in Finland which since some years has paid attention
to this "unbalance", "asymmetry", Suomalaisuuden Liitto.
A good begin for a monolingual Finland, Sweden as an example, would go
the following way: first swedish as an optional language at primary school
as there is now a proposal coming the parlament, secondly it would be optional
at colleges and the next step would be the elimination of swedish language
tests
for the office holders.
The other way is that Sweden changes her policy as Suomalaisuuden Liitto has
proposed. It is not very likely, because Sweden want to continue the
policy of assimilation.
A quite good picture about these problems one, who is interested in, can get
by reading for instance a journal Ruotsinsuomalainen (Swedenfinn). There is
a big change since some years in that journal in its articles. Earlier
it was a "normal" pleasure journal for the Finns in Sweden, today no more.
The attitude of the Finns in Sweden has sharpened, and you can see it for
instance from that journal. Ihave followed that journal c. 10 years.
An other interesting journal is a swedish one, Invandrare and minoriteter.
In the latest issue the I&M has got from the representatives of Finnish
organizatons in Sweden quite sharp comments.
jarmo
Jon Bell
------------------------ Included message begins here -------------------------
i find your point of view quite interesting about the article in the nordic
group. i find myself agreeing with you a lot... ALL of my granparents are
immingrants and almost all speak more than 5 langauges and english was just
another language to be learned when they came here. They made no qualms about
learning it. I myself grew up speaking Japanese and English at the same time.
i then went on to learn 9 more languages. Finnish is the latest one that i am
learning, but i am also learning Swedish as our university doesnt have finnish
, so therefore it is kinda hard for me to take it. A lot of people will wonder
what my major is ... but i am actually an engineering major. [if that makes
an ounce of difference].
I used to tutor immigrants to the usa in learning to speak english. Often i
would pick up either a smattering of their language or a lot of their language.
I dont think many people realize just how good it makes someone feel that not
only are they learning your language but you are learning some of theirs. It
makes people quite happy.
One solution to the problem in the States is that often immigrants start
"weekend schools" so their culutre and language is not forgotten by their
children or grandchildren. In this way the offspring grow up learning the
official language, but also the languages spoken at home. This is not a burden
on taxpayers, like the present system in Sweden, and it manages to solve the
problem of what to do with the Swedes in Finland. And just how long do you have
to live in finland to become a finn?
I find myself very interested in these matters since i will be moving
to Finland after graduation , and therefore i am learning Finnish... I take
great pride in trying to learn finnish even though it is not always easy
to learn a new language when you are older.
I suppose i am rambling...
i wil stop here.
anyone intereseted in contacting me can contact me at :
kkr4...@sumter.cso.uiuc.edu
*******************************************************************************
*Kimberli K Roan * "I have heard the echoes in the dark, * IRC: good *
*901 W Main -Bsmt. * dim and distant voices of the past, * luck in *
*Urbana, Il USA 61801 * and I've seen so far into the night, * finding me*
*kkr4...@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu* and lingered in the land of no light."* =} =} =} *
* * Uriah Heep, Echoes in the Dark * *
*******************************************************************************
-------------------------- Included message ends here -------------------------
The point about "weekend schools" reminds me that my best friend in high
school spent his Satudays in "Greek School" at the local Greek Orthodox church.
Jon Bell / Dept. of Physics & C.S. / Presbyterian College / Clinton SC USA
Bob Forsythe
>say that the finnish-speaking (or any other minority) in Sweden (or any
>other country) shouldn't have the same basic human rights as everybody
>else. I'm only opposing the idea that Sweden all of a sudden should have
>finnish as an other official language. I don't suppose you want
>USA to have all languages used by the immigrants coming to the US
>as official languages. In that case, how many official languages would
>USA have - 10, 50, 100 ?
>
The arguments over an "official language" can create all sorts of
headaches; they certainly have in this country over the last few years.
Mostly I think it's a bit of a red herring. There's no danger that the U.S.,
for example, is going to stop doing business in English (in general), so the
whole furor seems to be aimed at taking a shot at immigrants. That's been
done here forever; with references to a specific groups "clannishness", or to
the way they "jabber" at each other. I think Canada is on the correct track
with its multicultural outlook (but they gotta stop assuming that having a
separate culture gives a group the right to rule themselves separately). The
U.S. has a ton of different languages now. Sooner or later most groups learn
English and that takes care of the problem. In the meantime, I see no reason
to think less of them, or to think they are getting "special treatment" if
they're accomodated in their transition.
huu...@tnclus.tele.nokia.fi
> in Norden. D.S.
Where is Norden located? Does the word Norden mean anything? Is it a swedish
word if it is a word? I ask these questions because I am from a small town in
South Dakota (a state in the U.S.A in case you have never heard of it) whose
name is Lake Norden. It never occured to me that NORDEN might actually mean
something in another language. The area does have a lot of Finnish and
Norwegean heritage, but I am not sure about Swedish.
t. Dean
Bertil Jonell
>In article <1992Mar20...@tnclus.tele.nokia.fi>, huu...@tnclus.tele.nokia.fi writes:
>|> Where is Norden located? Does the word Norden mean anything? Is it a swedish
>|> word if it is a word? I ask these questions because I am from a small town in
>
>Sweden.)
Norden is also a US Aerospace corporation:)
It is not all US Aeropsace corporations that get a mention in the Swedish
national anthem, but it would sound rather silly with "F|r jag vill leva,
jag vill d| i Boeing!" don't you think?
Besides, it would probably scare the passengers too.
>Yngve K. Raustein | ``We use choicest juicy chunks of fresh
-bertil-
Bertil Jonell
>From 'Statistick }rsbok 1988'
>(Yearly statistics, Statistical Abstract of Sweden)
Well, that is the latest issue Chalmers Datorf|rening have on our
bookshelves 1.5m from the terminal:)
>1986:
>Finns in Sweden with finnish citizenship: 134234
>Finns in Sweden, grand total : 259686
>All: 8381515
I would like to object to (not your, you are just quoting official Swedish
Government figures) use of 'Swedish' and 'Finnish' here. It highlights a
larger problem.
Once upon a time, a Swede was a person with Swedish citizenship, then as
the number of immigrants in Sweden increased, the government started to
group naturalized Swedes on their own in statistics. Then, as the children
of the naturalized Swedes start to grow up, a new group is invented: 'Immigrant
background'. Immigrant background means that one parent is naturalized.
Somehow I suspect that when the children of the children of the naturalized
Swedes begin to grow up, 'Immigrant background' will be extended to having
one or two grandparents that are naturalized.
In a recent debate on racism a naturalized Swede that owns a record company
asked the rethoric question "When will you start calling us Swedes?".
>/Christer Bor{ng
Anders Andersson
> In article <1992Mar20...@tnclus.tele.nokia.fi>, huu...@tnclus.tele.nokia.fi writes:
> |> word if it is a word?
> Norden simply means "the Nordic countries" (Norway, Denmark, Iceland, Finland,
> Sweden.)
From a grammatical point of view, 'norden' means simply 'the north'.
When we talk about the opposite 'so"dern' ('the south'), we are usually
referring to the *American* south (Georgia etc)...
--
Anders Andersson, Dept. of Computer Systems, Uppsala University
Paper Mail: Box 520, S-751 20 UPPSALA, Sweden
Phone: +46 18 183170 EMail: and...@DoCS.UU.SE
Yngve Koehler Raustein
Norden simply means "the Nordic countries" (Norway, Denmark, Iceland, Finland,
Sweden.)
Yngve
--
Yngve K. Raustein | ``We use choicest juicy chunks of fresh
Lars P. Fischer
>>>>> "huumala" == huumala (huu...@tnclus.tele.nokia.fi)
huumala> Where is Norden located? Does the word Norden mean anything?
huumala> Is it a swedish word if it is a word?
Sure. Norden is the Danish (Swedish, whatever) word for the Nordic
Countries. The Nordic Council is Nordisk Raad (Well, Nordisk R}d), and
so on.
/Lars
--
Lars Fischer, fis...@iesd.auc.dk | It takes an uncommon mind to think of
CS Dept., Aalborg Univ., DENMARK. | these things. -- Calvin
Christer Borang
>In article <WILF.92Ma...@sandman.hut.fi>, wi...@niksula.hut.fi (Johan W. Wikman) writes:
[ Old statistics deleted ]
>What are you trying to prove with that data from 1930s? You should use
>current data!
>Here are some figures that I found out:
>Finns in Sweden over 300000
>All 8323000
>That makes about 3.6 per cent... Just over 7 times your figure :-)
>My figures are from: Uusi Pikkuj{ttil{inen (1985)
From 'Statistick }rsbok 1988'
(Yearly statistics, Statistical Abstract of Sweden)
1986:
Finns in Sweden with finnish citizenship: 134234
Finns in Sweden, grand total : 259686
All: 8381515
The grand total would then be 3.1 %, including the finnish immigrants with
a swedish nationality.
>Perhaps that gives a better figure of finns in Sweden.
Better, but not good enough...:-)
>And don't forget those finnish immigrants who have already got the
>swedish nationality. There are over 100000 such persons.
Well, I didn't forget them, at least.
>> I'm getting tired of this thread. If anyone wants to comment I'd
>> prefer mailing instead of posting.
>Oh yes. 'Do not comment my figures, they are right'. Is that your
>meaning?
>Hannu Nyman
>--
>+--------------------+---------------------------+----------------------+
>I Hannu Nyman I Hannu...@hut.fi I Errare humanum est I
>I I hny...@vipunen.hut.fi I I
>+--------------------+---------------------------+----------------------+
/Christer Bor{ng
--
Det finns inget som g|r kvinnor s} vackra som alkohol och st{ngningsdags...
Johan W. Wikman
Hi
In article <HANNU.NYMAN....@vipunen.hut.fi> Hannu...@hut.fi (Hannu Nyman) writes:
I wrote:
> So one finnish speaking person is enough to make finnish an official
> language. Seriously, I made some research and here are some figures
> I found. Sweden:
>
> Finns 33929 (1930)
> All 7044039 (1950)
>
> In per cent: finns 0.48
>
What are you trying to prove with that data from 1930s? You should use
current data!
No, because of your 300000 some 270000 have come to Sweden after 1950
and therefore cannot justify any special demands for the finnish
language. They are in the same position as all the other immigrant
groups in Sweden. The issue have been whether or not finnish should
be in a special position in Sweden and in that case you have to
talk about those who have "always been there".
Here are some figures that I found out:
Finns in Sweden over 300000
All 8323000
That makes about 3.6 per cent... Just over 7 times your figure :-)
My figures are from: Uusi Pikkuj{ttil{inen (1985)
Perhaps that gives a better figure of finns in Sweden.
And don't forget those finnish immigrants who have already got the
swedish nationality. There are over 100000 such persons.
Usually immigrants want to assimilate in the society they've
arrived to, not start demanding special treatment. This of course
does not mean that you shouldn't value your own culture and language,
wherever you are. The vast majority of the finnish speaking in Sweden
are in the same position as any other immigrants, anywhere.
> I'm getting tired of this thread. If anyone wants to comment I'd
> prefer mailing instead of posting.
Oh yes. 'Do not comment my figures, they are right'. Is that your
meaning?
Of course not, it simply means that I think this thread isn't
getting us anywhere, and therefore wouldn't mind ending it.
Hannu Nyman
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+--------------------+---------------------------+----------------------+
I Hannu Nyman I Hannu...@hut.fi I Errare humanum est I
I I hny...@vipunen.hut.fi I I
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-johan
Johan Wikman
wi...@niksula.cs.hut.fi
Peter Ahlskog, DC
> HI folks,
>
> The problem from the Finnish pont of is that the policy of Sweden has always
> been to assimilate Finnish speaking minorities in Sweden.
> The similar assimilation policy practised in Finland would mean: no more
> state supported swedish schools, vocationla schools, universities.
> There is an organization in Finland which since some years has paid attention
> to this "unbalance", "asymmetry", Suomalaisuuden Liitto.
>
> A good begin for a monolingual Finland, Sweden as an example, would go
> the following way: first swedish as an optional language at primaryschool as
> there is now a proposal coming the parlament, secondly it would be optional
> at colleges and the next step would be the elimination of swedish language
> tests for the office holders.
We got Your statement finally!
All You seem to want is a good excuse to do the same *genocide*-stuff You
accuse Sweden off! Right?
You are out here writing this bullshit, just harassing people, training for
good position in "Suomalaisuuden Liitto"?!??! A new Matti Siitoin (The
Fuehrer in Scandinavia for those you who he isn't known to)?
THE "Red Thread" in Your postings wasn't so hard to follow from the
beginning. All I wanted, was that You to tell us straight out what really
pisses You off!
And You did not disappoint us (me)!
Let the heads roll (it is friday, isn't it? ;^)
> jarmo
----
The Future's so Bright, I gotta wear Shades.............
Sari A. Kajantie
>A good begin for a monolingual Finland, Sweden as an example, would go
<rest of Jarmo's undeniably amusing junk deleted>
Thanks for pointing out at the same shot the reason for rather
evenly distributed income in Finland. Like your article, it has
nothing to do with solidarity. It's the good old close minded
enviness.
Hannu Nyman
> In practice (I don't know whether this is stipulated anywhere),
> Swedish-speaking Finns start with their first foreign language in 3rd grade,
> second in 4th grade, third in 7th grade and possibly the 4th in 10th grade.
> Finnish-speaking Finns (in most schools) start with their second foreign
> lanaguage in 8th grade (I believe), therefore they are one language behind
> when they finish school. So S-sp Finns end up with Swedish, Finnish, English
> and at least one other language. F-sp Finns end up with Finnish, Swedish and
> at least one other language. Correct me if I'm wrong about the Finnish schools.
Yes, you are wrong there. Finnish-speaking Finns start first foreign
language in the 3rd grade (usually English), Swedish in the 7th grade
or earlier, the second foreign language in 8th and the 3rd in the 10th
grade. (Swedish is officially not considered foreign...) So they will
also end up with Finnish, Swedish and from one three foreign
languages. For example Finnish (from 1st grade), English (3rd),
Swedish (7th), German (8th) and French (10th).
If the first foreign language is not English it is nowadays possible
in many schools to start English in the 5th grade, so that they end up
e.g. with Finnish (from 1st grade), German (3rd), English (5th),
Swedish (7th) and perhaps still French (10th).