svenska

Svenska, or Swedish, is a North Germanic language spoken by about ten million people, primarily in Sweden and Finland. It is the majority language in Sweden and one of the two official languages of Finland, alongside Finnish.

Svenska belongs to the North Germanic branch of the Indo-European language family, in the East Scandinavian group with Danish and Norwegian. Modern Swedish developed from Old Swedish, which arose from Old East Norse in medieval Scandinavia. Standardization began in the early modern period, producing rikssvenska, the form used in education, media, and administration.

The Swedish alphabet uses the Latin script with the three additional letters Å, Ä, and Ö. There are numerous regional dialects across Sweden and among Finnish-Swedish communities, ranging from pronunciation to vocabulary, though standard Swedish is widely understood across the country.

Svenska is mutually intelligible to varying degrees with Norwegian and Danish, especially with Norwegian, depending on dialect and exposure. In Finland, Swedish is a co-official language and is used in government, schooling, and public life in Swedish-speaking communities.

The language has a rich literary and media tradition, with notable authors such as Selma Lagerlöf and August Strindberg in older literature and Astrid Lindgren in modern fiction. It continues to evolve with neologisms and loanwords reflecting technology and global influence.