This is not the forum, but why do Swedes and Finns speak passable english? I don't get it. Are you taught it in school? Do you learn it on your own when you watch english movies and tv? Half this forum is you guys presumably speaking a second language. It's impressive.
GDT: Semi Final: Canada Vs Finland | 1PM EST 7PM CET | CAN 5 - 0 FIN
- Thread starter hangman005
- Start date
-
Xenforo Cloud will be upgrading us to version 2.3.5 on March 3rd at 12 AM GMT. This version has increased stability and fixes several bugs. We expect downtime for the duration of the update. The admin team will continue to work on existing issues, templates and upgrade all necessary available addons to minimize impact of this new version. Click Here for Updates
Yes to all of those.
Primary reasons would be school and technology. I'm getting old (born 88) and think it started turning around somewhere along that time, not sure when english was put as part of the education, but boomers tend to have a hard time with it.
The Cannon of Tesoma
Registered User
English lessons since 3rd grade, subtitled TV-broadcasts of English programs, computers to practically everyone since childhood (contemporary generations learn English almost as same pace as they learn The Mother Language).
That's about it pretty much.
I think not dubbing tv-programmes or movies is a big factor - we simply hear lots of English since early childhood. Swedes have the addional advantage of speaking a related language and we do have pretty good schools in Finland. My older son has been learning English since the 2nd grade and is into computer games - he now reads book in English at the age of 12 and watches unsubtitled youtube videos about history.
The weird thing in Helsinki in these last years is that we have increasingly many restaurant and other service industry workers that only use English - our work Christmas Party was held in a trendy centre restaurant where I had to order drinks in English - and had also a nice chat with the bar tender and the waitress all in English. Quite strange.
Last edited:
JustaFinnishGuy
Joonas Donskoi avi but not a SEA fan ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Mostly learned through watching YouTube in the early 2010's and stopped watching Finnish TV altogether when I went to what would be called highschool over there.
I was always interested in talking English instead of Swedish also because of how important it is in the job market.
Playing CS (Although not much, mostly helped me to get quick messages across in an understandable way), friend group is definitely very interested in international things and we use English pretty often as a means of conveying feelings sometimes, it's just a combination of actually using the language.
Nowadays I like spending time in English internet websites and since I rarely get to converse with actual English speakers, be it native or non native speakers, I'm really excited whenever I get to.
Last edited:
The Cannon of Tesoma
Registered User
I was very bad in English during comprehensive school, but gaming with C64 and PC remedied those shortcomings to some degree (thanks mainly to Sierra's text-based adventure games: King's Quest, Space Quest etc. series). But ultimately recent level of English was achieved in various net forums, not that surprisingly, by using it in practice.
It's far from perfect, but if comparing to what was the starting level... Lol! I felt fear to even comment to anything. Now I can think in "finglish" and there are usually no needs to translate English texts to Finnish in my mind. Pronounciation of English is however pretty "Rally English", but that's mostly because in my living environment speaking English doesn't occur enough often to cultivate that part of linguistic skill.
It's far from perfect, but if comparing to what was the starting level... Lol! I felt fear to even comment to anything. Now I can think in "finglish" and there are usually no needs to translate English texts to Finnish in my mind. Pronounciation of English is however pretty "Rally English", but that's mostly because in my living environment speaking English doesn't occur enough often to cultivate that part of linguistic skill.
Hey man, Malkin still struggles and he's a multi-millionaire with 10 years of opportunity to get used to it.
Anyway, go Canada.
The Cannon of Tesoma
Registered User
Brun0
Registered User
- Jul 24, 2009
- 1,390
- 224
I don't know, maybe there is something in the nature of Russian and other Slavic languages that makes English hard to learn? I remember having Russian as a D-language in high school and the grammar made no sense to me and seemed way harder than English grammar. I mean not to have the verb to be in the present tense, what is that, and only one proper past tense and then those impossible aspects... Not to speak of the pronunciation with the seven various variants of s and sh sounds - in Finnish we have only one, the unvoiced s sound.
And yeah, go Suomi!
Macbanan
Registered User
I overheard bunch of Finns badmouthing Gretzky, saying he was only a product of the true legend Jari Kurri. They also said something about Terry Fox not being a hero and that his accomplishments are overrated.
As a coincidence I also heard a bunch of Canadians talking about Selänne, saying he never deserved an Olympic gold and failed when it mattered. Also they talked about Simo Häyhä just being lucky, and they said camping as a sniper is just cowardly.
I don't agree with any of that obviously, I'm just reporting it... now let's just enjoy the game.
As a coincidence I also heard a bunch of Canadians talking about Selänne, saying he never deserved an Olympic gold and failed when it mattered. Also they talked about Simo Häyhä just being lucky, and they said camping as a sniper is just cowardly.
I don't agree with any of that obviously, I'm just reporting it... now let's just enjoy the game.
Classicnamesup
MVP Backhand Slapper
I mean, thats fine. You're likely a 16 year old kid who doesnt know much, let alone hockey. And you'll be wrong all the same.I would say you don't know much about hockey then, good offence can be controlling the game flow and long attacks, backcheking etc. Counter attacks.
Not just scoring.
Jacksonbobson
Registered User
- Feb 2, 2009
- 1,638
- 513
The Cannon of Tesoma
Registered User
I don't know, maybe there is something in the nature of Russian and other Slavic languages that makes English hard to learn? I remember having Russian as a D-language in high school and the grammar made no sense to me and seemed way harder than English grammar. I mean not to have the verb to be in the present tense, what is that, and only one proper past tense and then those impossible aspects... Not to speak of the pronunciation with the seven various variants of s and sh sounds - in Finnish we have only one, the unvoiced s sound.
And yeah, go Suomi!
These language talks are very interesting, but certainly not topical to this thread. However, Baltic-Finn may have lost Uralic s-sounds, which there was more than one, but co-evolution of Germanic branch of the Indo-European languages and Finnic branch of Uralic languages apparently caused severe changes to both language groups.
Pre-Germanic born out of a Proto-Finnic substrate in Scandinavia - Indo-European.eu
OT like hell, but as far as I can perceive, this site is one of best, most comprehensive, scientific and self-critical sites in the Internet for all of those who are interested in these topics, Finns and Canadians all a like. You can easily find myriads of other sites in the internet where you likely waste time more for nothing than time spent in this one.
Highly recommended for all hockey fans too: Indo-European.eu - Languages, Cultures & Peoples
I'd say it depends on the linguistic abilities of a person. I know a lot of Russians, Poles, Ukrainians and other Slavs who speak English well. Both in terms of grammar and pronunciation. Also, a person must himself want to learn a language at a good level, of course. Some people don't want to correct their mistakes, because they believe that since other people at least somehow understand them, then everything is fine. Kinda like that
Gold Standard
Registered User
- Sep 7, 2018
- 2,385
- 2,285
Good morning, Ladies and Gents. fire up the griddle for some pre-game pancakes.
made game day chili yesterday for the Canada v Finland game. so, I'm all set.
Should be a great semi-final Saturday.
as usual I'll ignore the GDT once the puck is dropped...as these GDTs deteriorate into a hot mess of nonsensical drivel during the game.
but Canada for the W 4-2. My least favorite player McIsaac scores the game winner on the PP.
Russia takes their game...but expect some theatrics and controversy in this one.
made game day chili yesterday for the Canada v Finland game. so, I'm all set.
Should be a great semi-final Saturday.
as usual I'll ignore the GDT once the puck is dropped...as these GDTs deteriorate into a hot mess of nonsensical drivel during the game.
but Canada for the W 4-2. My least favorite player McIsaac scores the game winner on the PP.
Russia takes their game...but expect some theatrics and controversy in this one.
Good Luck to all.
Maybe because english is heavy influed by the old Norse language... from the Vikings and Normans which all where Scandinavians.
I'd say it depends on the linguistic abilities of a person. I know a lot of Russians, Poles, Ukrainians and other Slavs who speak English well. Both in terms of grammar and pronunciation. Also, a person must himself want to learn a language at a good level, of course. Some people don't want to correct their mistakes, because they believe that since other people at least somehow understand them, then everything is fine. Kinda like that
I'm supporting them why should they bothering speak another language perfect when english speakers often doesnt give a **** to try and speak your language.
Yeah, maybe slightly off-topic
But what an interesting article - I have often wondered about those very early connections. And that image of Finnic tribes hunting and gathering in the vast northern forests is somehow very appealing. I guess it was bound to be ended by Indo-European agricultural civilization... Basically their technology supported more people per squarekilometre. Thanks for the great link!I predict Canada overpowering Finland. I've seen too many inconsistencies in attack and too many breakdowns in defence from Finland.
Yeah, maybe slightly off-topic
Finnish people are mongols from beginning! direct descendens of Djingis Himself. Thats why they are so good at battles and thats where they get their sisu from!
Finnish people are mongols from beginning! direct descendens of Djingis Himself. Thats why they are so good at battles and thats where they get their sisu from!
Well, I think we have a Siberian stratum in our DNA which separates us from other Western nations, but that's not especially pronounced, something like 10%? (Haven't really paid much attention to genetic studies but I think this is the current thinking.) It is weird that we have mainly Eastern father lines and mainly Western mother lines when one would somehow think that it would be the other way round (but these Eastern ones are of European, not Siberian origins). In any case Finns certainly are different
If Annunen and team work continue like in quarters, should be a close game. Finland is the clear underdog, though. Will be an exciting game, I hope.
It’s actually quite funny how this thread turned into a linguistic and historical forum
The Cannon of Tesoma
Registered User
Finnish people are mongols from beginning! direct descendens of Djingis Himself. Thats why they are so good at battles and thats where they get their sisu from!
I'm not too eager to go to the most extreme interpretations in these things as it is still under question was there some earlier wave of Uralic-related language groups occupying the present day geographical area of Southern Finland before historic, now extinct Sami people (and their languages) got hegemony in the area before Finns achieving that after them. Paleo-Lakelandic languages may have been very well some entirely different, now forgotten group that spoke some unknown Paleo-European languages. There are heavy and clear traces for such language(s) in present day Sami languages, but also some hints in contemporary Finnish (and in other Baltic-Finnic languages and dialects). Areal extent of Finnic (Uralic) speaking tribes in Scandinavian peninsula is far from established, but they certainly have had Proto-Germanic and Proto-Baltic speaking tribes living in their immediate vicinity already several millenia ago. That is already effectively confirmed by linguistic, archaeological, and genetic facts.
Annunen needs near perfect game to Finns emerge victorious from this.
Edit: typo
Last edited:
Latest posts
-
Transfer: 2025 - Summer Transfer Rumors and Discussion (Closed Window)- Latest: Paulie Gualtieri
-
-
-
