NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL LINGUISTIC CHRISTMAS

now thats what i call linguistic christmas

It’s Christmas-time again – and what would this time of year be without Christmas music? A lot of us start counting the days ’till Christmas from the moment “Last Christmas” surprises us in a shopping center sometime around November 20th – and let’s just admit it: We can’t get enough of Christmas songs!

Or maybe Christmas music just isn’t your thing. Is it really possible to listen to ”All I Want for Christmas is You” throughout December without losing your mind, you might be thinking. I mean, I’d say it is, but… I get it. You need something new – something different! I’ve dug around on the internet and asked Twitter for help, and now I’m happy to present …

Describing ​NisseEngelsk​: A Brief Memoir

Nisser the Julekalender behind the scenes

A supplement to the Lingoblog-article The language of The Julekalender by Mickey Blake, the original writer of the background study for the article.

How the time flies! It seems almost impossible that it’s been over twelve years since I visited Carsten Knudsen at his home in Risskov to obtain a copy of the script from “The Julekalender” and ask him about the creation of “N​isseEngelsk​”. Little did I know that day how much work I was setting myself up for!

Peter Bakker had been hoping for years that some brave student with no clue as to what they were getting themselves into would write a description of the fictitious language, and he found his patsy – er, star

The language of The Julekalender

Nisser the Julekalender

This year, Danish television is broadcasting the daily Christmas program The Julekalender for the 10th time. It was originally produced in 1991.

In Scandinavia, there is a long tradition of television series in 24 episodes of a story that relates to Christmas, all through the month of December. This is called a Julekalender, a Christmas Calendar. The Julekalender is said to be the one that has been most often repeated.

A special type of little people, locally called Nisse, plural Nisser, usually play a prominent role in these series. They interact in different ways with the human world, and they are mostly invisible to humans. They play a role in Danish folk beliefs – especially for …