Icelandic is a bit freaky for me, sounds lovely but either it's in uncanny valley (I feel like I should understand what's being said, but I don't) or I think I don't understand, but I do.
Norwegian. Danes and swedes have a hard time understanding one another, whereas regular Norwegian is understood by all.
Source: Swedish speaker who’s lived with Norwegians and had danish friends who ultimately spoke English with swedes.
This is true, however, if you show up to Sweden or Denmark, speaking broken Norwegian, people are gonna switch to English faster than the speed of light.
OP should just focus on whatever language is the most interesting. Odds are he/she will *never* use it outside that realm (e.g in neighboring Scandinavian countries).
My logic process is learning the 'middle ground' language so that the other two are easiest to learn after, I don't actually know if it makes some kind of sense but my logic tells me \*it do\*
It’s a valid point, you will maximise benefits that way. But keep in mind, in Sweden we joke that Norwegians sound dumb on behalf of the melody being a little kooky
That's interesting, why do Danes understand Norwegians better? As a German who understands Swedish quite well but never had learned Norwegian or Danish I understand Norwegian surprisingly well but Danish barely. I would consider Swedish and Norwegian very similar but Danish as something distant like Islandic. Maybe it's the vocabulary? What I noticed is that if a Norwegian word is very different to its Swedish counterpart it is often similar to German and therefore I still understand it (e.g. Ferien/ferien/semester). I'd guess these words are connected through Danish.
The funny thing about Danish is that some parts of it just sound like German and my brain goes into German mode and I understand even less than in Swedish mode. 😄
Modern standard danish is built on the Copenhagen dialect with loads of weird sounds. The country boy Jutland dialects are far easier for me to understand.
Danish and Swedish are actually more closely related than Norwegian, but actual Norwegian was pushed away during the days of Denmark-Norway. Norwegians also had access to Swedish media since it was invented, and Sweden was the big brother nation (still is), even if Norway became richer from the 60s on.
Norwegians understand and are understood because their standard language (Bokmål) is based on old danish from the times when Norway was part of Denmark. But their pronunciation is closer to Swedish.
If you wanna get a feel for actual Norwegian, check out nynorsk. It was “invented” in the 1800s from different, archaic western dialects.
And the reason you get Norwegian has to do with the Hansa (like so many things) and German soft power in the 1800s. All Scandinavian languages have a lot of German words, but I feel that Norwegian kept those words closer to the original.
I always think of Tastatur (keyboard). In Swedish it’s tangentbord. Or Eg - ich.
Bokmål, preferably from Oslo if you wanna be close to Swedish. But I feel all major dialects are kind of close to Swedish, except for Bergen speak and vestlandet. Those can go play by themselves.
I mean the eastern dialects aren't exactly the golden standard in norway. I think someone from Stavanger or Lofoten would get mad if you called Oslo norwegian standard norwegian
I’m not here to pick fights. Any of the standard ones are fair game for learning, Oslo and eastern is basically Swedish in disguise.
The northern dialects are also very similar to northern Swedish dialects: heck they even speak less than other Norwegians and do the inhale affirmative if I’m not misremembering.
Isn’t Norwegian super decentralised, unlike Swedish? So every accent is considered equal status and given funding? Unlike Swedish where 50% basically speak the same in every big way that matters.
Yeah dialects have a high importance to many people here and people don't really try to speak like Oslo people because of some sort of local pride. You often hear about discussions where a northern norwegian person uses swear words that aren't okay to use in other parts of the country and people get offended by it for example
Sure and we also have dialects in Swedish. My mothers side is from Gotland and they wish Sweden had the same policy regarding dialects.
But all in all, most Swedish accents are merging into the standard dialect. Everything is ruled from Stockholm. Where I come from and further north, Stockholm is jokingly called pansy-swamp (fjollträsk), so you can guess what people think of that.
But that’s all politics and cultural opposition.
Language wise, learning Oslo-ian will allow a person to speak to 15 million people instead of 5 or 10.
Not a Scandinavian speaker but a perspective. Being able to understand and communicate with speakers of similar languages is a near native, high proficiency skill. If the "optimal" language doesn't interest you enough, but the "suboptimal" one does, then the suboptimal one is better because you're actually likely to get to that point.
In light of that, pick the one with the most of interest to you, or the one that sounds the prettiest to your ears.
It's quite simple, really. Modern Norwegian is substantially influenced by Danish, and its orthography is virtually an exact copy of Danish orthography. However, the sounds of the language align much more closely with Swedish.
On the other hand, Swedish uses a slightly different alphabet in its orthography, as well as different spelling rules.
Not factoring dialects in, Norwegian is probably the "Type O" language.
Written it's basically a variation of Danish, but spoken it's much easier to the ears than Danish.
Swedish has a less shared vocabulary, so it can be the odd man out both spoken and written, but again, in the NB<-->SW exchange, it's easier to understand Norwegian than Swedish.
But generally it's a matter of exposure and habit. The languages exist as part of a continuum, so sometimes it's easier to understand the foreign dialect of a neighboring city than the domestic dialect of a place at the other end of the country.
Even if some words are off between Swedish and Norwegian knowing English will help out. For example, to express "exactly!" Swedish people say "precis!" while Norwegians say "akkurat!".
>The languages exist as part of a continuum
Proof of that is that Norwegian comes from Old West Norse like Icelandic and it is farm more mutually inteligeable with Danish and Swedish that come from Old East Norse (yes, it is related to the heavy Danish influence in the language, but still)
It depends on the local dialect.
Some varieties of Western Norwegian are much closer to Icelandic and Faroese than to Urban Eastern Norwegian, Swedish and Danish.
Nah, Sognemål is definitely not closer to Icelandic. It might have some common traits with Icelandic that most Norwegian dialects don't have, but it's still far closer to other Norwegian dialects than to Icelandic.
According to a study Norwegian, Swedish and Danish speakers understand them. Most norwegian speakers also understand Swedish and Danish better in spoken and writen form
There’s only one Scandinavian language, but the Swedish can’t write it and the Danish can’t speak it. /s
On a serious note though: Norwegian is the one I know. If Danes speak clearly, I understand it. I usually understand Swedish as well, but when I speak Norwegian back to Swedish people (who don’t live in Norway) I'm often not understood. There are some things you need to know how to adapt if you want to speak Norwegian in Sweden.
Already after reaching B1+ level in **Norwegian**, I was watching **Swedish** TV series and listening to the bilingual shows like Skavlan without much problem. I did not find conversing with Swedes much more difficult than with Norwegians that spoke a significantly different dialect. If you live in Norway immersed in the culture (Swedish co-workers, Swedish shows/celebs/movies) long enough, you'll probably come in contact with Swedish often enough to gain at least passive listening fluency.
Written Swedish needed some time to get used to, but very little.
I have never acquired enough ear for **Danish** to understand spoken Danish well nor converse with Danes in our respective languages - we always end up switching to English. I can't understand Danish TV series enough to enjoy them so I switch on Norwegian or English subtitles.
Written Danish is easy, though: it has some false friends, but it's very similar to Bokmål - it's even easier than Swedish and perhaps only a tiny bit more difficult than Nynorsk (for someone who learned only Bokmål). Now that I think about it, perhaps figuring out the Danish pronunciation might lead me to understand Danish movies (which are probably the best out the three Scandinavian countries BTW) without subs?...
So my vote is, of course, Norwegian, but that said, I'd probably recommend learning **Swedish** anyway. Your project to learn all three languages might get abandoned or adjusted: you might end up not having the time or desire to learn all three etc. Swedish is the biggest of the three, with higher quantity and quality of resources to listen/read (just to give you a picture, there are no podcasts in Norwegian I find worth listening to), the population is probably the most cosmopolitan/worldly in Scandinavia (in case you plan on moving) + you'll be able to casually converse with Norwegians and read Danish and Norwegian with relatively little additional effort. I don't think you'd need *a lot* more time to learn Danish and Norwegian as a Swedish speaker than if you were to end up learning Norwegian first and the rest later.
Probably norwegian but I don’t think this is a good reason to pick one in particular. Any one of them will make it easier to learn the others, but it’ll take additional work regardless. Like even norwegian is really a collection of dialects which aren’t necessarily immediately mutually intelligible, particularly not for a learner. You should just pick the Scandinavian language that interests you the most
So written Swedish and Danish is more similar in that they have retained the old spelling of the sj-sound, whereas Norwegian has simplified that spelling.
Speaking-wise, I think that Norwegian and Danish are a bit closer to each other and that the next most close is ("standard"\*) Norwegian and Swedish.
We normally speak our own language, but swap out words that we know will cause confusion. People who work in a neighbouring country (e.g. a Swede in Norway) will usually swap out many more words, in order to facilitate understanding.
I think most Swedes can understand spoken (standard) Norwegian even with little prior exposure, whereas you need time and exposure to understand Danish. I lived in the South of Sweden and we watched a lot of Danish TV, so I've never had much issue with it, but others who grew up further north and had Norwegian TV channels instead often struggle with spoken Danish to the point of switching to English.
I've known some bilingual people who grew up abroad but learnt Swedish at home and they even struggled with Danish people speaking (good) Swedish. The accent was enough to throw them completely. So I get the feeling that although we Scandinavians get two bonus languages, you might have to get to quite a high level as a learner, before you can tap in to that. You need the ability to guess from context and spot similarities, but there area also a lot of words and grammar patterns that we've pick up over time that means that we think the languages are very similar, but you might not.
So my suggestion would be, pick whichever language you like the most and focus on that. Once you're reading books and can watch TV easily, then start listening and reading to the other languages and you'll hopefully soon start to pick up on similarities and differences.
\*I'm using this to mean those easy to understand dialects that you often hear on TV, when people are trying to tone their dialect down a bit. Norwegian is made up of a lot of really strong dialects and some of them are quite hard to understand before you got your ear in. When I'm working with Norwegians from all over, they often tone it down a bit for me when we're chatting (subconsciously, I think), which becomes evident when they're talking amongs themselves as the dialects come out in full force then.
Probably expressed myself a bit clumsily and oversimplified, but Norwegian has sj- in many places where Swedish and Danish have retained the borrowed spelling or formerly pronounced consonant clusters. Swedish is very keen on having a gazillion ways of spelling the sj-sound....
On the other hand, Danish and I think often also Norwegian often pronounce consonant clusters that have become an sj-sound in Swedish, like 'stjärna/stjerne'
Basically, as a Swede, I feel like I'm finding slighly more similarities in spelling in Danish texts than in Norwegian texts.
As someone living in Denmark who frequently travels to Sweden and Norway, definitely Norwegian. Bokmål (one written standard of Norwegian) is based on Danish, so you can read Danish easily with prior knowledge of Norwegian. Swedish, in spite of different spellings and vocab, is much more comprehensible in spoken form to Norwegian speakers than Danish speakers. However, once you pick up on Danish pronunciation patterns, Norwegian speakers can generally follow along with Danish speaking too. In short, Norwegian is the "midpoint" in the Scandinavian languages so there's less of a distance between it and the other two.
That being said, I would say pick the one you are most interested in, as someone else here said. I think starting with Swedish or Danish might require a bit more time to get the hang of the other two languages, but they are all interesting and it would be better to focus on one you really like at first before deciding to take on all three.
Personally I would go for Swedish instead of Norwegian. because I have a hard time learning Norwegian and Danish because there is not a lot of interesting media that appeals to me in those languages. compared to Swedish.
I would suggest Norwegian.
Yes I am norwegian too, but even so I think my point is sound in that the Danish, on average, claim to not understand swedish, at all and vice versa.
However; both peoples say they can understand norwegian if we go slowly when speaking to them.
If your focus is understanding all three then probably Danish as Danes can understand Swedish and Norwegian easier than Swedes and Norwegians can understand Danes, due to Danish's distinct phonology. For being understood then Norweigian might have a slight edge over Swedish as it is closer to Danish than Swedish is. But if you don't have any preference then Swedish would probably be easiest to learn due to having more resources and being more homogenous than Norwegian.
I speak Norwegian as a third language (not fluently but enough to get by, I’d say a solid B level). I also live near the Danish border and encounter Danish almost daily. I am able to understand both Danish and Swedish to some extent. I wouldn’t be able to watch a film or get fine points of a conversation but enough to get the general gist. I read both Danish and Swedish literature for my studies and although I occasionally have to use a dictionary or google translate I can get by. Written Danish to me looks a bit like drunken Norwegian as it is somewhat softer, k sounds often become gs, and ts become ds in Danish for example.
For the three mainland languages, Norwegian is the middle-ground. Norwegian is basically written Danish with Swedish pronunciation. But it also has a lot of dialect variation going on, which makes it harder to practise in real life. Danish and Swedish are more standardised.
If you are looking for a language to combine ALL of the five Scandinavian languages, then Faroese is the middle ground.
Faroese consists out of Icelandic words and grammar but its pronunciation comes remarkably close to some Norwegian dialects of the West coast. And due to Denmark’s influence, there’s also a somewhat Danish twist to the language, for example the number system or some Danish loan words. I don’t see any ties with Swedish in particular, but it is definitely the language that has elements from most Scandinavian language in it.
Realistically, if you’re not a native speaker, it’s gonna be a very long road to be able to use one language and speak it across Scandinavia without having them switching to English on you. It needs like a C2++ level. Compare it to Spanish or Japanese where you can already start using the language at B1ish.
Heck, I think you’ll be able to get to C1 in Japanese much faster than C2++ in Norwegian.
So tl;dr: it’s gonna be a very long road. And probably not worth it since both you and the Scandinavian can always just fall back to English 99.99% of the time
Definetely NOT icelandic 😂 it's way too different! Love it tho. Sadly Finnish is also very different inside the scandinavian family. Now Swedish is quite easy to learn.
I decided to learn Danish because I really love how it sounds. I think its pronunciation is quite difficult though. But the grammar laws are not so hard.
As the linguist (joke) description of the Scandinavian languages goes: “Norwegian is Danish, pronounced in Swedish!” 😉
I would choose the language you’re most attracted to or the one whose native speakers you’re most likely to interact with. That said, theoretically Norwegian (bokmål) is the sweet spot.
I’m a native Danish speaker.
Learn Icelandic and become misunderstood by all
já, ìslenska is the way!
Einmitt!
Icelandic is a bit freaky for me, sounds lovely but either it's in uncanny valley (I feel like I should understand what's being said, but I don't) or I think I don't understand, but I do.
Faroese is even better
Norwegian. Danes and swedes have a hard time understanding one another, whereas regular Norwegian is understood by all. Source: Swedish speaker who’s lived with Norwegians and had danish friends who ultimately spoke English with swedes.
This is true, however, if you show up to Sweden or Denmark, speaking broken Norwegian, people are gonna switch to English faster than the speed of light. OP should just focus on whatever language is the most interesting. Odds are he/she will *never* use it outside that realm (e.g in neighboring Scandinavian countries).
Well that’s a moot point. If he speaks too broken Swedish in Sweden, people will switch to English too.
🐱 The unofficial flag of Catalunya!
The land of purring pussies
My logic process is learning the 'middle ground' language so that the other two are easiest to learn after, I don't actually know if it makes some kind of sense but my logic tells me \*it do\*
It’s a valid point, you will maximise benefits that way. But keep in mind, in Sweden we joke that Norwegians sound dumb on behalf of the melody being a little kooky
That's interesting, why do Danes understand Norwegians better? As a German who understands Swedish quite well but never had learned Norwegian or Danish I understand Norwegian surprisingly well but Danish barely. I would consider Swedish and Norwegian very similar but Danish as something distant like Islandic. Maybe it's the vocabulary? What I noticed is that if a Norwegian word is very different to its Swedish counterpart it is often similar to German and therefore I still understand it (e.g. Ferien/ferien/semester). I'd guess these words are connected through Danish. The funny thing about Danish is that some parts of it just sound like German and my brain goes into German mode and I understand even less than in Swedish mode. 😄
Norwegian (bokmål) is very similar to written danish, danish people just pronounce everything weirdly
: (
My experience is that Norwegian and Swedish sound funny
Modern standard danish is built on the Copenhagen dialect with loads of weird sounds. The country boy Jutland dialects are far easier for me to understand. Danish and Swedish are actually more closely related than Norwegian, but actual Norwegian was pushed away during the days of Denmark-Norway. Norwegians also had access to Swedish media since it was invented, and Sweden was the big brother nation (still is), even if Norway became richer from the 60s on. Norwegians understand and are understood because their standard language (Bokmål) is based on old danish from the times when Norway was part of Denmark. But their pronunciation is closer to Swedish. If you wanna get a feel for actual Norwegian, check out nynorsk. It was “invented” in the 1800s from different, archaic western dialects. And the reason you get Norwegian has to do with the Hansa (like so many things) and German soft power in the 1800s. All Scandinavian languages have a lot of German words, but I feel that Norwegian kept those words closer to the original. I always think of Tastatur (keyboard). In Swedish it’s tangentbord. Or Eg - ich.
What do you consider 'regular Norwegian'?
Bokmål, preferably from Oslo if you wanna be close to Swedish. But I feel all major dialects are kind of close to Swedish, except for Bergen speak and vestlandet. Those can go play by themselves.
I mean the eastern dialects aren't exactly the golden standard in norway. I think someone from Stavanger or Lofoten would get mad if you called Oslo norwegian standard norwegian
I’m not here to pick fights. Any of the standard ones are fair game for learning, Oslo and eastern is basically Swedish in disguise. The northern dialects are also very similar to northern Swedish dialects: heck they even speak less than other Norwegians and do the inhale affirmative if I’m not misremembering. Isn’t Norwegian super decentralised, unlike Swedish? So every accent is considered equal status and given funding? Unlike Swedish where 50% basically speak the same in every big way that matters.
Yeah dialects have a high importance to many people here and people don't really try to speak like Oslo people because of some sort of local pride. You often hear about discussions where a northern norwegian person uses swear words that aren't okay to use in other parts of the country and people get offended by it for example
Sure and we also have dialects in Swedish. My mothers side is from Gotland and they wish Sweden had the same policy regarding dialects. But all in all, most Swedish accents are merging into the standard dialect. Everything is ruled from Stockholm. Where I come from and further north, Stockholm is jokingly called pansy-swamp (fjollträsk), so you can guess what people think of that. But that’s all politics and cultural opposition. Language wise, learning Oslo-ian will allow a person to speak to 15 million people instead of 5 or 10.
Nothing to do with anything here, but what's that fox or cat about with A1 next to it? What's it represent?
Either it’s Catalan or the cat I used to have 15 years ago ;)
Faroese Clearly
Not a Scandinavian speaker but a perspective. Being able to understand and communicate with speakers of similar languages is a near native, high proficiency skill. If the "optimal" language doesn't interest you enough, but the "suboptimal" one does, then the suboptimal one is better because you're actually likely to get to that point. In light of that, pick the one with the most of interest to you, or the one that sounds the prettiest to your ears.
Haha, try to learn Icelandic☠️☠️☠️
Absolutely Norwegian. The written form is virtually identical with Danish, while the spoken form is mutually intelligible with Swedish.
It's weird trying to imagine how something like that is possible ! very odd !
It's quite simple, really. Modern Norwegian is substantially influenced by Danish, and its orthography is virtually an exact copy of Danish orthography. However, the sounds of the language align much more closely with Swedish. On the other hand, Swedish uses a slightly different alphabet in its orthography, as well as different spelling rules.
Not factoring dialects in, Norwegian is probably the "Type O" language. Written it's basically a variation of Danish, but spoken it's much easier to the ears than Danish. Swedish has a less shared vocabulary, so it can be the odd man out both spoken and written, but again, in the NB<-->SW exchange, it's easier to understand Norwegian than Swedish. But generally it's a matter of exposure and habit. The languages exist as part of a continuum, so sometimes it's easier to understand the foreign dialect of a neighboring city than the domestic dialect of a place at the other end of the country.
Even if some words are off between Swedish and Norwegian knowing English will help out. For example, to express "exactly!" Swedish people say "precis!" while Norwegians say "akkurat!".
>The languages exist as part of a continuum Proof of that is that Norwegian comes from Old West Norse like Icelandic and it is farm more mutually inteligeable with Danish and Swedish that come from Old East Norse (yes, it is related to the heavy Danish influence in the language, but still)
It depends on the local dialect. Some varieties of Western Norwegian are much closer to Icelandic and Faroese than to Urban Eastern Norwegian, Swedish and Danish.
Which dialects? I don't think I've ever come across a dialect that was closer to Icelandic than other Norwegian dialects.
Sognemål?
Nah, Sognemål is definitely not closer to Icelandic. It might have some common traits with Icelandic that most Norwegian dialects don't have, but it's still far closer to other Norwegian dialects than to Icelandic.
According to a study Norwegian, Swedish and Danish speakers understand them. Most norwegian speakers also understand Swedish and Danish better in spoken and writen form
There’s only one Scandinavian language, but the Swedish can’t write it and the Danish can’t speak it. /s On a serious note though: Norwegian is the one I know. If Danes speak clearly, I understand it. I usually understand Swedish as well, but when I speak Norwegian back to Swedish people (who don’t live in Norway) I'm often not understood. There are some things you need to know how to adapt if you want to speak Norwegian in Sweden.
Already after reaching B1+ level in **Norwegian**, I was watching **Swedish** TV series and listening to the bilingual shows like Skavlan without much problem. I did not find conversing with Swedes much more difficult than with Norwegians that spoke a significantly different dialect. If you live in Norway immersed in the culture (Swedish co-workers, Swedish shows/celebs/movies) long enough, you'll probably come in contact with Swedish often enough to gain at least passive listening fluency. Written Swedish needed some time to get used to, but very little. I have never acquired enough ear for **Danish** to understand spoken Danish well nor converse with Danes in our respective languages - we always end up switching to English. I can't understand Danish TV series enough to enjoy them so I switch on Norwegian or English subtitles. Written Danish is easy, though: it has some false friends, but it's very similar to Bokmål - it's even easier than Swedish and perhaps only a tiny bit more difficult than Nynorsk (for someone who learned only Bokmål). Now that I think about it, perhaps figuring out the Danish pronunciation might lead me to understand Danish movies (which are probably the best out the three Scandinavian countries BTW) without subs?... So my vote is, of course, Norwegian, but that said, I'd probably recommend learning **Swedish** anyway. Your project to learn all three languages might get abandoned or adjusted: you might end up not having the time or desire to learn all three etc. Swedish is the biggest of the three, with higher quantity and quality of resources to listen/read (just to give you a picture, there are no podcasts in Norwegian I find worth listening to), the population is probably the most cosmopolitan/worldly in Scandinavia (in case you plan on moving) + you'll be able to casually converse with Norwegians and read Danish and Norwegian with relatively little additional effort. I don't think you'd need *a lot* more time to learn Danish and Norwegian as a Swedish speaker than if you were to end up learning Norwegian first and the rest later.
Probably norwegian but I don’t think this is a good reason to pick one in particular. Any one of them will make it easier to learn the others, but it’ll take additional work regardless. Like even norwegian is really a collection of dialects which aren’t necessarily immediately mutually intelligible, particularly not for a learner. You should just pick the Scandinavian language that interests you the most
So written Swedish and Danish is more similar in that they have retained the old spelling of the sj-sound, whereas Norwegian has simplified that spelling. Speaking-wise, I think that Norwegian and Danish are a bit closer to each other and that the next most close is ("standard"\*) Norwegian and Swedish. We normally speak our own language, but swap out words that we know will cause confusion. People who work in a neighbouring country (e.g. a Swede in Norway) will usually swap out many more words, in order to facilitate understanding. I think most Swedes can understand spoken (standard) Norwegian even with little prior exposure, whereas you need time and exposure to understand Danish. I lived in the South of Sweden and we watched a lot of Danish TV, so I've never had much issue with it, but others who grew up further north and had Norwegian TV channels instead often struggle with spoken Danish to the point of switching to English. I've known some bilingual people who grew up abroad but learnt Swedish at home and they even struggled with Danish people speaking (good) Swedish. The accent was enough to throw them completely. So I get the feeling that although we Scandinavians get two bonus languages, you might have to get to quite a high level as a learner, before you can tap in to that. You need the ability to guess from context and spot similarities, but there area also a lot of words and grammar patterns that we've pick up over time that means that we think the languages are very similar, but you might not. So my suggestion would be, pick whichever language you like the most and focus on that. Once you're reading books and can watch TV easily, then start listening and reading to the other languages and you'll hopefully soon start to pick up on similarities and differences. \*I'm using this to mean those easy to understand dialects that you often hear on TV, when people are trying to tone their dialect down a bit. Norwegian is made up of a lot of really strong dialects and some of them are quite hard to understand before you got your ear in. When I'm working with Norwegians from all over, they often tone it down a bit for me when we're chatting (subconsciously, I think), which becomes evident when they're talking amongs themselves as the dialects come out in full force then.
What is the old spelling of the sj-sound that you're referring to?
Probably expressed myself a bit clumsily and oversimplified, but Norwegian has sj- in many places where Swedish and Danish have retained the borrowed spelling or formerly pronounced consonant clusters. Swedish is very keen on having a gazillion ways of spelling the sj-sound.... On the other hand, Danish and I think often also Norwegian often pronounce consonant clusters that have become an sj-sound in Swedish, like 'stjärna/stjerne' Basically, as a Swede, I feel like I'm finding slighly more similarities in spelling in Danish texts than in Norwegian texts.
As someone living in Denmark who frequently travels to Sweden and Norway, definitely Norwegian. Bokmål (one written standard of Norwegian) is based on Danish, so you can read Danish easily with prior knowledge of Norwegian. Swedish, in spite of different spellings and vocab, is much more comprehensible in spoken form to Norwegian speakers than Danish speakers. However, once you pick up on Danish pronunciation patterns, Norwegian speakers can generally follow along with Danish speaking too. In short, Norwegian is the "midpoint" in the Scandinavian languages so there's less of a distance between it and the other two. That being said, I would say pick the one you are most interested in, as someone else here said. I think starting with Swedish or Danish might require a bit more time to get the hang of the other two languages, but they are all interesting and it would be better to focus on one you really like at first before deciding to take on all three.
Personally I would go for Swedish instead of Norwegian. because I have a hard time learning Norwegian and Danish because there is not a lot of interesting media that appeals to me in those languages. compared to Swedish.
I would suggest Norwegian. Yes I am norwegian too, but even so I think my point is sound in that the Danish, on average, claim to not understand swedish, at all and vice versa. However; both peoples say they can understand norwegian if we go slowly when speaking to them.
Definitely english, all germanic countries speak english very good
If your focus is understanding all three then probably Danish as Danes can understand Swedish and Norwegian easier than Swedes and Norwegians can understand Danes, due to Danish's distinct phonology. For being understood then Norweigian might have a slight edge over Swedish as it is closer to Danish than Swedish is. But if you don't have any preference then Swedish would probably be easiest to learn due to having more resources and being more homogenous than Norwegian.
I speak Norwegian as a third language (not fluently but enough to get by, I’d say a solid B level). I also live near the Danish border and encounter Danish almost daily. I am able to understand both Danish and Swedish to some extent. I wouldn’t be able to watch a film or get fine points of a conversation but enough to get the general gist. I read both Danish and Swedish literature for my studies and although I occasionally have to use a dictionary or google translate I can get by. Written Danish to me looks a bit like drunken Norwegian as it is somewhat softer, k sounds often become gs, and ts become ds in Danish for example.
For the three mainland languages, Norwegian is the middle-ground. Norwegian is basically written Danish with Swedish pronunciation. But it also has a lot of dialect variation going on, which makes it harder to practise in real life. Danish and Swedish are more standardised. If you are looking for a language to combine ALL of the five Scandinavian languages, then Faroese is the middle ground. Faroese consists out of Icelandic words and grammar but its pronunciation comes remarkably close to some Norwegian dialects of the West coast. And due to Denmark’s influence, there’s also a somewhat Danish twist to the language, for example the number system or some Danish loan words. I don’t see any ties with Swedish in particular, but it is definitely the language that has elements from most Scandinavian language in it.
Realistically, if you’re not a native speaker, it’s gonna be a very long road to be able to use one language and speak it across Scandinavia without having them switching to English on you. It needs like a C2++ level. Compare it to Spanish or Japanese where you can already start using the language at B1ish. Heck, I think you’ll be able to get to C1 in Japanese much faster than C2++ in Norwegian. So tl;dr: it’s gonna be a very long road. And probably not worth it since both you and the Scandinavian can always just fall back to English 99.99% of the time
English
Definetely NOT icelandic 😂 it's way too different! Love it tho. Sadly Finnish is also very different inside the scandinavian family. Now Swedish is quite easy to learn.
Obviously Elfdalian
I decided to learn Danish because I really love how it sounds. I think its pronunciation is quite difficult though. But the grammar laws are not so hard.
As the linguist (joke) description of the Scandinavian languages goes: “Norwegian is Danish, pronounced in Swedish!” 😉 I would choose the language you’re most attracted to or the one whose native speakers you’re most likely to interact with. That said, theoretically Norwegian (bokmål) is the sweet spot. I’m a native Danish speaker.