Geographic Distribution
Today, most speakers of the Kven language are found mostly in Northeastern Norwegian communities such as Bugøynes, Neiden, Vestre Jakobselv, Vadsø, and Børselv. Also a few older speakers may still be found in the municipalities of Nordreisa and Storfjord. Bugøynes perhaps remains the most vital of all the remaining Kven communities in Norway.
In Northeastern Norway, mainly around Varanger Fjord, the spoken language is quite similar to the standard Finnish, whereas west of Alta the few remaining Kven speakers speak Finnish with more particularities, due to a deeper isolation from Finland.
In a 2005 government report, the number of people speaking the Kven language in Norway is estimated to be between 2,000 and 8,000, depending on the criteria used. However, today there are very few young people who speak the language, making it an endangered language.
Read more about this topic: Kven Language
Famous quotes containing the word distribution:
“There is the illusion of time, which is very deep; who has disposed of it? Mor come to the conviction that what seems the succession of thought is only the distribution of wholes into causal series.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)