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I have read somewhere that Swedish is more conservative than the other continental North Germanic languages, Norwegian and Danish. Clearly Icelandic is more conservative then these all. But is the ...
#2: Post edited
by
Peter Taylor
·
2020-09-29T06:37:07Z (over 3 years ago)
- I have read somewhere that Swedish is more conservative than the other continental North Germanic languages, Norwegian and Danish. Clearly Icelandic is more conservative then these all. But **is the claim concerning the continental languages correct and why** is it so?
I could imagine listing a bunch of features of each language. Nynorsk (and to lesser extent Bokmål) has three genders, Swedish has common gender nouns with varying vocal in plurals (-or, -ar and -er) while the others are less varied, Norwegian has genitiv forms like «katten min», etc.- However, such an ad hoc listing seems a poor way of coming to a conclusion. A more rigorous standard for establishing how conservative these languages are would be helpful.
- I have read somewhere that Swedish is more conservative than the other continental North Germanic languages, Norwegian and Danish. Clearly Icelandic is more conservative then these all. But **is the claim concerning the continental languages correct and why** is it so?
- I could imagine listing a bunch of features of each language. Nynorsk (and to lesser extent Bokmål) has three genders, Swedish has common gender nouns with varying vocal in plurals (-or, -ar and -er) while the others are less varied, Norwegian has genitive forms like «katten min», etc.
- However, such an ad hoc listing seems a poor way of coming to a conclusion. A more rigorous standard for establishing how conservative these languages are would be helpful.
#1: Initial revision
by
tommi
·
2020-09-28T09:12:36Z (over 3 years ago)
Is Swedish more conservative than Danish and Norwegians?
I have read somewhere that Swedish is more conservative than the other continental North Germanic languages, Norwegian and Danish. Clearly Icelandic is more conservative then these all. But **is the claim concerning the continental languages correct and why** is it so? I could imagine listing a bunch of features of each language. Nynorsk (and to lesser extent Bokmål) has three genders, Swedish has common gender nouns with varying vocal in plurals (-or, -ar and -er) while the others are less varied, Norwegian has genitiv forms like «katten min», etc. However, such an ad hoc listing seems a poor way of coming to a conclusion. A more rigorous standard for establishing how conservative these languages are would be helpful.