Name used by its speakers (Endonym): Norsk
Native speakers (estimated): 5.3 million
Total speakers, including second-language (estimated): 5.4 million
Where it’s spoken: Norwegian is the national language of Norway, where it is spoken by nearly all residents. The second official language of Norway is Sámi, spoken by the Sámi minority who live across northern Scandinavia, though these make up less than 1% of the Norwegian population. Because of proximity and a degree of mutual intelligibility, many Danes and Swedes may understand Norwegian—though it’s debatable whether these count as ‘second language’ speakers. Significant numbers of Norwegian nationals live in Sweden, Denmark, and other Western European countries.
Waves of emigration from Norway beginning in the 19th century brought many Norwegians to North America, where they settled mostly in the Midwest. No other country, except for Ireland, sent a larger percentage of their population to the United States. Of the millions of Americans with Norwegian ancestry, Minnesota and Wisconsin claim the most by total number, and Minnesota and the Dakotas the most by percentage of state population. However, only about 1% of that number report speaking Norwegian at home. Canadians of Norwegian descent are highest in number in Alberta and by percentage in Saskatchewan.
Language family: Indo-European, Germanic branch (North Germanic). Norwegian is the third most spoken Scandinavian language, after Swedish and closely behind Danish.
Related languages: Like the other Scandinavian languages—Swedish, Danish, Icelandic, and Faroese—Norwegian is descended from Old Norse. There is a high degree of mutual intelligibility with Swedish and Danish. In fact, there are actually two official forms of the Norwegian language, one of which (called Bokmål) was strongly influenced by Danish as a result of union between the two kingdoms from the 16th to 19th centuries.