Norskpodden

New Year's resolutions are perfect opportunities to improve your language skills. In this week's episode Camilla shares her top 6 tips on how to realistically keep up with your goals. Become a champion, summon your inner strengths and really challenge yourself in 2020!

Study materials and a transcript of this episode are available at:

https://norskbloggen.no

Hey there! Vi er tilbake den 17.01.2020. Vi gleder oss. I mellom tiden ønsker vi deg en riktig god jul og godt nytt år!

"Mørketiden" perfectly sums up the first half of winter, which lasts from the beginning of October to early January. In these months it's still wet and often accompanied by freakish storms. Any snowfall is washed away by rain and so the only light to contrast the darkness is provided by twinkling Christmas lights from the city streets. It is oh, so dark!

In this week's episode we bring optimism and hope to the darkest month of the year as Lucy and Lucia explain the Scandinavian tradition of St. Lucia and her gruesome sister Lussi. We also investigate how light deprivation can affect your body and mind.

Study materials and a transcript of this episode are available at

https://norskbloggen.no

Norwegian Christmas food is a strong reminder of just how important traditional preservation techniques such as fermenting, pickling, salting, curing and smoking meat and fish were in order to survive the harsh winters. Before the discovery of oil, the country was poor and reliant on sustenance fishing and farming. Within that construct there was still plenty of room for innovation, creativity and the ability to ensure that everything could and should be eaten. In this weeks episode Ingrid, Elise and Jonas talk about traditional yuletide cuisine, Smalahove, Pinnekjøtt and Lutefisk. Jay, Tristan and Jimmy talk about their experiences with Nordic xmas food and the growing interest in alternatives to the traditional meat, fat and salt heavy dishes.

It may be surprising to see just how extroverted and sociable Norwegians can be with a few Aquavitas under their belts. Julebord is considered by many to be the absolute peak of drinking culture. This week's episode deals with the "do's" and "dont's" of the Christmas office party, "fylleangst", and why Norwegians often suffer the day after office festivities. Also, Urara from Osaka adds perspective as she talks about the corporate drinking culture in Japan.

It is easy to feel slightly bewildered when trying to adapt to the mannerisms of Norwegians, and it is easy to feel challenged when interacting with the people themselves for the first time. In this week's episode, Matt from Britain and Margret from Iceland talk about their experiences with being polite up north, and Pia chimes in with some sturdy advice about how to avoid mixing the word please with politeness!

Study materials and a transcript of this episode are available at

https://norskbloggen.no

Strong language is common to many cultures, but Norway has a wide variety of dialects and the same is true of their use of salty expletives. Listen to this weeks episode to find out more about how to curse in Norwegian and how Norwegians themselves feel about cursing. 

Profanity is to strong feelings what the bell is to the Pavlovian dog. Research has found that reading and writing swear words has an emotional effect, but not nearly as much as saying and hearing them.

The utterance of a singel f- word quickly indicates the state of a person - whether they are surprised, excited, angry or aroused - and the intensity of their state. Steven Pinker in the Stuff of thought, lists five different ways we can swear: descriptively, (du er en f.) idiomatically, ( det er f. meg vanskelig) abusively, ( f. ta deg) emphatically ( det var f. meg bra) and cathartically (f,!!) Absolutely none of these functions require swearing- yet we still choose to use them. This episode will give you insight into the variations of Norwegian swearing. Enjoy!

Study materials and a transcript of this episode are available at

https://norskbloggen.no

Learn Norwegian by listening to our weekly podcast delivered to you by Lingu's friendly Norwegian teacher Camilla Cahill.

Every Norwegian learner has something to gain from our podcast, whether it is pronunciation, understanding the dialects of Norway, cultural knowledge or vocabulary expansion.

In this episode a choice selection of Lingu's teachers share some of their top tips about how to gain further progress in your language learning process and it's all in Norwegian. Enjoy!

Study materials and a transcript of this episode are available at

https://norskbloggen.no

Listen, learn succeed!

Our podcast is going to help you improve your Norwegian language skills, boost your listening skills, increase your vocabulary and refine your pronunciation.

All happening when enjoying a great show with our enchanting host; Camilla!