THE ICELANDIC LANGUAGE PDF, EPUB, EBOOK Stefan Karlsson,Rory McTurk | 84 pages | 20 Jun 2004 | Viking Society for Northern Research | 9780903521611 | English | London, United Kingdom The Icelandic Language | Visit Reykjavik Egill is a man's name. As you can see, most place names in Iceland are very seethrough. English also has many words that are a combination of words, although they seldom have more than two words together blacksmith, cheesemonger, heartache. And then there's Welsh. The longest town name in the world is Welsh and unfortunately there are no big news stories coming from Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch, because I would love to hear news reporters pronounce that! There are many more similarities between Icelandic and English words than just those two. According to the Icelandic sagas then hundreds of years ago, in Viking times, people in Iceland could converse with Scandinavian people as well as people living in England , without much difficulties. Iceland is an isolated country and its language has stayed pure and close to its roots and is the closest you can get to Old Norse. Icelandic is quite similar to many old words in English. On that note, everyone is also addressed by their first name, never by their surname. That would explain the names of the Orkney islands, as well as Jersey and Guernsey. New Icelandic words are frequently invented - and in theory, anyone can invent a new word. Whereas many languages use the same root of a word for new inventions and old roots for words such as chemistry, biology or psychology — Iceland is determined to make their own unique words for every word there is. There are also endless amounts of Icelandic books to choose from, 1 in every 5 Icelanders will write a book in their lifetime according to statistics. Iceland has many peculiar and fun phrases and sayings and in every Easter egg there will always be an old saying inside. Many people think that the saying inside their Easter egg is even more of a treat than the chocolate itself. Many Icelanders put in an effort to speak correctly and keep up to date on new words. And you can read about new Icelandic words on the side of your milk cartons. The language is rich in words but a lot of words have double or triple meanings, meaning word puns are popular in completely untranslatable jokes. Icelandic is known for being a hard language to learn. You might disagree! The alphabet is Latin and familiar to Western European languages. In fact, it's even possible to learn how to speak Icelandic in just one week, if you're extremely good with languages! This was proved by Daniel Tammet from the UK, back in There are some useful websites where you can learn Icelandic online, either for free or for a small fee. Their classes also include visits to galleries or band rehearsals, cooking Icelandic recipes together and much more. Get a vacation. Book your tours. Rent a car. Find stays. Read info. Contact Us. Book your trip now. Guide to Iceland. How Hard is it to Speak Icelandic? Verified Expert. Popular articles. When was Guide to Iceland founded and why? How has Guide to Iceland changed since its conception? Continue reading to learn all about the leading travel agency of Iceland Midnight Sun in Iceland When does the midnight sun in Iceland take place? How long does a sunset or a sunrise last? Due to centuries of isolation from the mainland Scandinavian languages, Icelandic developed in its own unique direction, dropping some features that the other Scandinavian languages have kept namely certain vowels , preserving others such as complex verb conjugations and noun cases and coming up with its own innovations mainly vocabulary. This has made Icelandic a different beast from both its modern Scandinavian cousins and Old Norse. Today, there are around , speakers of Icelandic in Iceland. Icelandic is used at all levels of society: in government, education, commerce and everyday life. This semi-official policy, which finds its roots in the Icelandic nationalist movement, means that Icelandic usually creates its own words for foreign concepts rather than importing a loanword. If these words are considered by Icelanders to be functional enough, then they often enter into widespread use. There have been many well-meaning suggestions that have fallen by the wayside, though. Another stand-out feature of Icelandic is its complex grammar. Icelandic verbs conjugate for person, number, tense and mood if you studied French at school, then bad memories of learning the subjunctive may come flooding back. There is also a middle voice in addition to the more familiar active and passive. Nouns and adjectives are no walk in the park either. Nouns are declined in four cases: the nominative, accusative, dative and genitive e. Adjectives also decline in these four cases, as well as for definiteness and gender. The language is truly the jewel in the Icelandic cultural heritage crown. The rich literary heritage of the sagas has been kept alive over the centuries. Icelanders have always been great wordsmiths: what they lack in classical architecture they make up for in the written word. This small nation still publishes over a thousand books a year, spanning all genres from crime fiction to poetry to recipe books and translations of foreign bestsellers. One of the greatest existential threats to Icelandic is, and always has been, the advent of new technology. The language has proven to be surprisingly resilient: an official committee comes up with names for new car parts, to name but one example. Consumption of English-language media, both new and old, is just as widespread as in the other Nordic countries, if not more so. Compared to their Nordic cousins, Icelanders are at a disadvantage in that a lot of widely-used operating systems, software and services are not available in their language, let alone voice assistants like Siri and Alexa. Things have improved slightly in this regard in recent years, however. The Icelandic government is taking steps to rectify the issue through its Icelandic Language Technology Fund, although it is yet to be seen what lasting impact this will have on the status of the language. How Hard is it to Speak Icelandic? | Guide to Iceland But the reason why Icelandic words can get so long is because all the separate words are put together to make one new word. In English if you want to describe an object in more detail you simply use separate words. But this is not the case for Icelandic. Once you can see how the word is split up, then it becomes easier to pronounce. However, there are official translations for all news words that the Language Committee devises and promotes the use of, such as mobile phones, televisions, and radios. As English has developed somewhat over the years, here is a helpful guide for Icelandic pronunciation. Visit waterfalls, glaciers and black sand beaches on Iceland's South coast in in great comfort lead by one of our experienced and fun driver-guide, run exclusively in small groups of no more than 18 people. For example, the word rafmagn "electricity" , literally means "amber power", calquing the derivation of the Greek root "electr-" from Greek elektron "amber". The complete Icelandic alphabet is:. As Icelandic shares its ancestry with English and both are Germanic languages , there are many cognate words in both languages; each have the same or a similar meaning and are derived from a common root. The possessive, though not the plural, of a noun is often signified with the ending -s , as in English. Phonological and orthographical changes in each of the languages will have changed spelling and pronunciation. A few examples are given below. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. North Germanic language. This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Language family. Writing system. Main article: History of Icelandic. Main article: Icelandic phonology. Main article: Icelandic grammar. Main articles: Icelandic vocabulary and Icelandic name. Main article: Language policy for Icelandic. Main article: Linguistic purism in Icelandic. Main articles: Icelandic orthography and Icelandic Braille. Glottolog 3. Language and Nationalism in Europe. OUP Oxford. Modern Language Association. Retrieved Based on US census data. Icelandic Ministry of Education, Science and Culture. Archived from the original on German: Biography of a Language. Oxford University Press. Overall, written Icelandic has changed little since the eleventh century Icelandic sagas, or historical epics; only the addition of significant numbers of vocabulary items in modern times makes it likely that a saga author would have difficulty understanding the news in today's [Icelandic newspapers]. Ministry of Education, Science and Culture. Retrieved 15 November Article 1; National language — official language; Icelandic is the national language of the Icelandic people and the official language in Iceland. Public authorities shall ensure that its use is possible in all areas of Icelandic society. English is often described as being almost a second language in Iceland, as opposed to a foreign language like German or Chinese. However, in terms of many Icelandic students' Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency CALP —the language skills required for success in school—evidence will be presented suggesting that there may be a large number of students who have substantial trouble utilizing these skills. Retrieved on April 25, The difference is that German sch is labialized, while Icelandic s is not. It's a pre-alveolar, coronal, voiceless spirant. Language Log. University of Pennsylvania. Retrieved 1 April Ogilvie, Sarah. Concise encyclopedia of languages of the world. Word Prosodic Systems in the Languages of Europe.