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Nordic language

North Germanic
Nordic
Scandinavian
Ethnicity Germanic peoples
Geographic
distribution
Northern Europe
Linguistic classification Indo-European
Proto-language Proto-Norse, later Old Norse
ISO 639-5
Glottolog nort3160
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North Germanic-speaking lands
Continental Scandinavian languages:
  Danish
  Norwegian
  Swedish

Insular Scandinavian languages:

  Faroese
  Icelandic
  Norn (†)
  Greenlandic Norse (†)

Insular Scandinavian languages:

The North Germanic languages make up one of the three branches of the Germanic languages, a sub-family of the Indo-European languages, along with the West Germanic languages and the extinct East Germanic languages. The language group is sometimes referred to as the "Nordic languages", a direct translation of the most common term used among Danish, Swedish and Norwegian scholars and laypeople.

In Scandinavia, the term "Scandinavian languages" refers specifically to the generally mutually intelligible languages of the three continental Scandinavian countries, and is thus used in a more narrow sense as a subset of the Nordic languages, leaving aside the insular subset of Faroese and Icelandic. Danish, Norwegian and Swedish are also referred to as Continental Scandinavian or Nordic languages, while Faroese and Icelandic are grouped together as Insular Scandinavian or Nordic languages. The term Scandinavian arose in the 18th century as a result of the early linguistic and cultural Scandinavist movement, referring to the people, cultures, and languages of the three Scandinavian countries and stressing their common heritage.

The term "North Germanic languages" is used in comparative linguistics, whereas the term "Scandinavian languages" appears in studies of the modern standard languages and the dialect continuum of Scandinavia.

Approximately 20 million people in the Nordic countries speak a Scandinavian language as their native language, including an approximately 5% minority in Finland. Languages belonging to the North Germanic language tree are also commonly spoken on Greenland and, to a lesser extent, by immigrants in North America.


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