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Q&A Why is my Danglish pronunciation much better than Danish?

For background, there exists a stereotypical Danish pronunciation of English. "Danglish" can also mean other things, but this is what I am referring to, here. I lived one year in Denmark and can r...

1 answer  ·  posted 4y ago by tommi‭  ·  last activity 4y ago by Jordan‭

#1: Initial revision by user avatar tommi‭ · 2020-11-22T09:14:02Z (almost 4 years ago)
Why is my Danglish pronunciation much better than Danish?
For background, there exists a stereotypical Danish pronunciation of English. "Danglish" can also mean other things, but this is what I am referring to, here.

I lived one year in Denmark and can read Danish fluently and manage understanding spoken language, but my pronunciation is very clumsy. I have since learned fluent and non-awful, even if non-native, Norwegian. English is not my native language either.

The other day I tried to read some English with a stereotypical Danish accent and it went surprisingly well. I then tried to read actual text and the accent is much weaker there. I should say that I can't really copy other accents of English or my native language, for that matter, and can't copy a stereotypical accent of a Norwegian speaking in English.

This seems quite unintuitive. Is there a specific reason why the Danish-like pronunciation of English is particularly easy (my native language is Finnish, if it makes a difference)? Or is this simple hubris on my part? Or is there something generally easy about the Danish pronunciation of English? Or is this simply a bizarre occurence with no systematic reasons?