4. Colons, semi-colons and ellipsis: These are used in the same way as English, although the semi-colon
is not used as often in Norwegian as in English.
5. Capitalisation: The capitalisation rules are mostly as in English, i.e. at the beginning
of sentences, and in proper names. It is not common
to capitalise each word in a heading in Norweg
ian - just the first word. No rules apply for
bullet points, but if the bullet points represent
a list of subheadings, etc. it is natural to capitalise
the first letter in each bullet point.
Section Three - Measurements and Abbreviations
1. Measurements: Official measurements are metric, although inches will be recognised.
Norway has its own mile, like Sweden: 10 kilometres equals 1 Norwegian
mile.
Numbers over 9999: separated by a space or dot i.e. 16 000 or 16.000
Time: the 24hr system is used, so 10:30 am would be 10.30, noon
would be 12.00, 4:30 pm would be 16.30, and midnight
would be 24.00
Date: use the format 20/2/04 or 20.februar 2004.
A space is normally left between the number and the measurement
abbreviation.
Decimal comma: i.e. 3,7 %. Note that there should always be a space
before a % symbol.
Degrees are measured in Centigrade. 30°C
Currency: use format 40 kr, or NOK 40 for international version.
2. Abbreviations:
N/a = - [dash]
No. = nr
e.g. = f.eks
WxLxHxD = BxLxHxD (bredded x lengde x høyde x dybde)
1st / 2nd / 3rd / 4th = 1/2/3/4
Mr. / Mrs.= Herr / Fru
Messrs.
Miss = Frøken
Dear Sir / Madam = Kjære Herr / Fru
m (for metre) = m
cm (for centimetre) = cm
lb (for pound weight) = lb (not commonly used)
g (for gram) = g
km (for kilometre) = km
yr (for year) = år (not abbreviated)
k (for 1000) = not commonly used
etc. = o.l.
among others = bl.a.
or similar = el.l.
and so on (etc.) = osv.
EMEA (Europe, Middle-East & Asia) = EMEA
Days of the week: Mon = man, Tues = tir, Wed = ons, Thurs = tors,
Fri = fre, Sat = lør, Sun =søn
Months: Jan = jan, Feb = feb, Mar = mar, Apr = apr, May = mai, Jun
= juni, Jul =juli, Aug =aug, Sep =sept, Oct =
okt, Nov = nov, Dec =des
Seasons: Spring = vår, Summer = sommer, Autumn = høst,
Winter = vinter (not normally abbreviated in English
Section Four - Hyphenation
1. Hyphenation when splitting words over a line:
- If the word has consonants/double consonants in it we usually
put the hyphen between two consonants or between
the double consonants. If the word consists of
two or more words, the hyphen should be inserted
where there is a natural break in the word.
e.g. trommel = trom-mel
skrivertrommel = skriver-trommel
fjellbekk = fjell-bekk
2. Hyphenation within words: not so common
3. Hyphenation in linking different words together: it
is common to see long, linked words with no hyphen, e.g. colour-ink cartridge
= fargeblekkpatron
4. End-of-line hyphenation: It is possible occasionally to hyphenate after a single letter as
well as after two letters when they are prefixes
such as
a-, an-, ab-, be-, in-, re-:
e.g. a-typisk, a-sosial, be-ruset, an-gripe, av-sette, re-sirkulere,
in-formere
It is also possible to hyphenate before two end letters in longer
words, if the endings are -er, -en: e.g. patron-er,
skriver-en
When dashes are used, the shorter 'N'-dash is most common.
Section Five - Miscellaneous Peculiarities
Anita Husebaek-Shaw:
Norwegian prefers never to use more than one hyphen in a word construction,
even if the English text shows a construction
with two or more hyphens.
Place names tend to follow the spelling of the place in its original
language and vary quite a lot from the English
at times.
Stylistic forms are used in the same way as English.
Names are written as in English with the surname following the first
name.
Surnames are not normally written entirely in upper case.
Section Six - Geographic Distribution
Norwegian is the national language of Norway, spoken by virtually
all of the country's 4 million inhabitants. Norwegian
is one of the Scandinavian languages and is closely
related to Danish and Swedish, especially the
former. Norway and Denmark were one country for
four centuries before 1814, and from then until
1905 Norway was under the Swedish crown. During
the years of Danish rule a Danish-influenced "city
language" began to develop in Bergen and
Oslo, and Danish eventually became the written
language of Norway.
Today there are two distinct Norwegian dialects. The Dano-Norwegian
dialect, originally called riksmål ("state
language"), is now known as bokmål
("book language"). Most newspapers and
radio and television broadcasts are in bokmål.
About 1850 a movement for the recognition of Norwegian
as a language distinct from Danish led to the
establishment of landsmål ("country
language"), which was based on the dialects
of rural Norway. Known today as nynorsk ("New
Norse"), it was intended to carry on the
tradition of Old Norse, interrupted in the 15th
century. At present bokmål and nynorsk have
equal status both in government and in schools.
Attempts to combine the two into samnorsk ("Common
Norwegian") have thus far been unsuccessful,
but most forward-looking Norwegians believe that
it is only a matter of time before they are eventually
merged.
Norwegian is spoken/used in the following countries:
Jan Mayen, Norway, Svalbard.
Language Family
Family: Indo-European
Subgroup: Germanic
Branch: North (Scandinavian)
Source: http://www.worldlanguage.com/Languages/Norwegian
- Copyright © Kenneth Katzner, The Languages of the World, Published by Routledge.
http://www.sprakrad.no/
