[EDLING:298] Denmark: Au pairs ’ bad lingo influence

[Francis M. Hult]

The Copenhagen Post

Au pairs’ bad lingo influence

Working parents who hire au pairs to take care of their children during the day 
are helping to create an entire group of young people whose Danish language 
abilities are severely limited by the time they reach nursery school, reports 
24timer newspaper.

Existence of the phenomenon is supported by several language experts including 
Ulla Lahti Falkenberg, language acquisition expert at the University of 
Copenhagen, who said the problem is common.

‘We meet children that speak Danish with Thai or Latvian accents – Danish 
children with severe accents primarily because of contact with their foreign au 
pairs,’ said Falkenberg, who is also president of the Danish Speech Language 
Hearing Association. ‘It’s a problem that parents are so busy with their own 
lives and spend so little time with their children that they don’t even realise 
the child speaks bad Danish.’

The problem is most common among affluent parents that can afford au pairs and 
who themselves are well-educated and generally live in upper or upper-middle 
class neighbourhoods. Au pairs – especially those from Asia and eastern Europe -
 rarely master the difficult Danish tongue and often only learn a few Danish 
phrases and speak limited English.

Full story:
http://www.cphpost.dk/get/102546.html