Scandinavia and the World
Scandinavia and the World

Comments #9572713:


uktana

0
Icelandic place names may sound exotic, but they're usu 29 12, 10:09pm

Strangely, a lot of people in America will state with great confidence (as we do when we don't know what we're talking about!) that Icelandic is "the most difficult language in the world". Evidently, not only do these people not know how closely Icelandic is related to English, but have also never taken a look at at Russian, never mind a non-indoeuropean language like Finnish, Japanese, or any of the Native American languages (for example). For my part, I can't read Icelandic very well, but if I walk it through Danish, I can make some sense of it. It's mostly the spelling differences and the more complex grammar, not to mention a lot of vocabulary differences, that throw me. Still, it's not so difficult that I couldn't pick up good reading skills in Icelandic if I'd put my mind to it.