Editing Scandinavia (section)

=== Uralic languages ===
==== Finnish ====
[[File:Sami languages large 2.png|thumb|Historically verified distribution of the [[Sámi languages]]]]
The Scandinavian languages are (as a language family) unrelated to Finnish and the [[Sámi languages]], which as [[Uralic languages]] are distantly related each other. Owing to the close proximity, there is still a great deal of borrowing from the Swedish and Norwegian languages in Finnish and Sámi.<ref name="Sapmi" /> The long history of linguistic influence of Swedish on Finnish is also due to the fact that Swedish was the dominant language when Finland was part of Sweden. Finnish-speakers had to learn Swedish in order to advance to higher positions of employment.<ref>{{cite book| author = Suzanne Romaine| title = Bilingualism| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=zp5xiFa_TXQC| year = 1995| publisher = Wiley-Blackwell| isbn = 978-0-631-19539-9| page = 323| access-date = 23 April 2023| archive-date = 23 April 2023| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20230423132203/https://books.google.com/books?id=zp5xiFa_TXQC| url-status = live}}</ref> Swedish spoken in today's Finland includes a lot of words that are borrowed from Finnish, whereas the written language remains closer to that of Sweden.

Finland is officially bilingual, with Finnish and Swedish having mostly the same status at national level. Finland's majority population are [[Finns]], whose mother tongue is either Finnish (approximately 95%), Swedish or both. The Swedish-speakers live mainly on the coastline starting from approximately the city of [[Porvoo]] (Sw: Borgå) (in the Gulf of Finland) up to the city of [[Kokkola]] (Sw: Karleby) (in the Bay of Bothnia).{{citation needed|date=April 2021}} The Swedish-speaking population is spread out in pockets in this coastal stretch and constitutes approximately 5% of the Finnish population.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Population and Society |url=https://www.stat.fi/tup/suoluk/suoluk_vaesto_en.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201223155742/http://www.stat.fi/tup/suoluk/suoluk_vaesto_en.html |archive-date=23 December 2020 |access-date=18 June 2022 |website=www.stat.fi}}</ref> The coastal province of [[Ostrobothnia (administrative region)|Ostrobothnia]] has a Swedish-speaking majority, whereas plenty of areas on this coastline are nearly unilingually Finnish, like the region of [[Satakunta]].{{citation needed|date=April 2021}} Åland, an autonomous province of Finland situated in the Baltic Sea between Finland and Sweden, are entirely Swedish-speaking. Children are taught the other official language at school: for Swedish-speakers this is Finnish (usually from the 3rd grade), while for Finnish-speakers it is Swedish (usually from the 3rd, 5th or 7th grade).{{citation needed|date=April 2018}}<ref>{{Cite web|last=Institute|first=Mercator|date=5 November 2020|title=The Swedish language in education in Finland|url=https://www.mercator-research.eu/fileadmin/mercator/documents/regional_dossiers/swedish_in_finland_2nd.pdf|access-date=5 November 2020|archive-date=14 April 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210414152840/https://www.mercator-research.eu/fileadmin/mercator/documents/regional_dossiers/swedish_in_finland_2nd.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref>

Finnish speakers constitute a [[European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages|language minority]] in both Sweden and Norway. [[Meänkieli]] and [[Kven language|Kven]] are Finnish [[dialect]]s mainly spoken in the Swedish part of the [[Torne Valley]] and surrounding areas,<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Winsa |first=Birger |last2=Kunnas |first2=Niina |last3=Arola |first3=Laura |date=2010 |title=Meänkieli in Sweden: An Overview of a Language in Context |url=https://phaidra.univie.ac.at/detail/o:103155 |journal=Working Papers in European Language Diversity |volume=6}}</ref> and in the Norwegian counties of [[Troms]] and [[Finnmark]], respectively.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Kunnas |first=Niina |last2=Räisänen |first2=Anna-Kaisa |title=The Kven language : An Overview of a Language in Context |url=https://phaidra.univie.ac.at/detail/o:105485 |journal=Working Papers in European Language Diversity |volume=15}}</ref> Meänkieli has held an official status as a minority language in Sweden since 2000, and Kven in Norway since 2005.<ref>{{Citation |last=Forsgren |first=Arne |title=kvener |date=2025-04-10 |work=Store norske leksikon |url=https://snl.no/kvener |access-date=2025-04-14 |language=no |last2=Minken |first2=Anne}}</ref>

==== Sámi languages ====
The [[Sámi languages]] are indigenous minority languages in Scandinavia.<ref>{{cite book| author = Oskar Bandle| title = The Nordic languages: an international handbook of the history of the North Germanic languages| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=6b7WwBC5tRAC| date = March 2005| publisher = Walter de Gruyter| isbn = 978-3-11-017149-5| page = 2115| access-date = 23 April 2023| archive-date = 23 April 2023| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20230423132203/https://books.google.com/books?id=6b7WwBC5tRAC| url-status = live}}</ref> They belong to [[Sámi languages|their own]] branch of the [[Uralic languages|Uralic language family]] and are unrelated to the [[North Germanic languages]] other than by limited grammatical (particularly lexical) characteristics resulting from prolonged contact.<ref name="Sapmi">Inez Svonni Fjällström (2006). [http://www.eng.samer.se/servlet/GetDoc?meta_id=1185 "A language with deep roots"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071005152013/http://www.eng.samer.se/servlet/GetDoc?meta_id=1185 |date=5 October 2007 }}.''Sápmi: Language history'', 14 November 2006. Samiskt Informationscentrum Sametinget: "The Scandinavian languages are Northern Germanic languages. [...] Sami belongs to the Finno-Ugric language family. Finnish, Estonian, Livonian and Hungarian belong to the same language family and are consequently related to each other."</ref> Sámi is divided into several languages or dialects.<ref>[http://www.eng.samer.se/servlet/GetDoc?meta_id=1186 www.eng.samer.se – The Sami dialects] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090120081140/http://www.eng.samer.se/servlet/GetDoc?meta_id=1186 |date=20 January 2009 }} ''Sapmi: The Sami dialects''</ref> [[Consonant gradation]] is a feature in both Finnish and northern Sámi dialects, but it is not present in southern Sámi, which is considered to have a different language history. According to the Sámi Information Centre of the [[Sámi Parliament of Sweden]], southern Sámi may have originated in an earlier migration from the south into the Scandinavian Peninsula.<ref name="Sapmi" />