Anotace
Multilingualism is a wide topic concerning all the Nordic societies – and, evidently, not only the Nordic ones – at many levels. Usage of different languages is part of the everyday life, and, therefore, multilingualism has been taken into account when designing language policies and their practical implementations. All this implies that multilingualism and parallel usage of languages are also topics of linguistic research. In the Nordic countries research on multilingual topics has been done for a long time. The field also involves other crucial matters: language teaching, and language awareness at all the levels of the societies, among others.
In addition, one of the objectives of the course is to remind the participants that natural languages are not only spoken, they are also signed. Furthermore, there have lately been awakenings regarding the statuses of the national languages in the Nordic countries: how to endorse their usage in certain contexts (instead of English), for example in certain academic fields. Offering a glimpse on the Nordic societies – Denmark, Finland, Norway and
Sweden included – from these points of view for the Czech students of Scandinavian and Finnish studies is primordial in order for them to understand deeper how the Nordic societies work – sometimes well and, sometimes, not so well.