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»Mer dialekter åt folket!»
En fallstudie av kommentarer om dialekt på sociala medier
Source system: Publicera | Published: 2026-03-07 | Pages: 107-135
Abstract
AbstractThis article investigates social media users’ attitudes towards Swedish dialects. It presents an analysis of 778 comments from Facebook and TikTok reacting to five short videos featuring a girl speaking a dialect typical of Värmland on Swedish national television. The analysis reveals that most comments express positive evaluations, describing the dialect as underbar ‘wonderful’, härlig ‘lovely’ and fantastisk ‘fantastic’. Many users also share emotional reactions, such as joy and affection for dialect use, and a desire for greater representation of dialects in Swedish media. Negative comments are few, and typically label the dialect as ugly. The Värmland dialect is frequently compared to the Scanian dialect, which tends to receive more critical assessments. These findings are discussed in relation to previous research on dialect attitudes and folk linguistics. It is noted that, despite widespread appreciation for dialects, this positive sentiment is not reflected in actual language use, as Swedish dialects continue to shift toward standardisation. In the article, this discrepancy is discussed in light of prevailing language ideologies and implicit attitudes toward dialect use.
Keywords
dialect; attitudes; social media; folk linguistics; language ideologies
