In The Social Register

Pronoun Choice in Norwegian and English

Abstract

Choice of second-person pronouns can shed light on the intersection of language, personality, and culture. In modern Norway a change has occurred in little more than a generation through which the polite forms De, Dem/Dykk, and Deres/Dykkar have been replaced, in all except commercial, governmental, or ultra-polite speech, by the familiar forms du, deg/dae, and din. In Brown and Gilman's terms, this change indicates that the dimension of solidarity is more important than that of power in modern Norwegian sociolinguistics, the exact opposite of what the case appears to have been with an earlier, similar change in early modern English.