Native Speakers' Judgements of Second Language Danish

Abstract

L2 Danish is often negatively described in public discussions and the media in Denmark. This study examines native speakers' reactions to the L2 Danish of young bilingual Turkish-Danish school students. The respondents were asked to evaluate the quality of the Danish of the L2 speakers on the basis of tape-recorded excerpts each lasting one minute. They were also asked whether the speakers were L1 or L2 speakers of Danish. The respondents represented a wide range of ages, occupations, and places of residence, but one group of young boarding school students stood out in the data. This group evaluated the quality of the speakers' L2 Danish particularly harshly, but at the same time they were willing to accept more of the L2 speakers as native Danes. The respondents as a whole evaluated all the speakers more negatively when they considered them to be non-native Danes, but this tendency was not as strong among the young respondents. With some caution we conclude that among young people there is a measure of opposition to the attitude most often represented in public discussion and the media.