In many ways, Copenhagen is a welcoming city to the
English-speaking migrant, because English is virtually the second official
language. In four months living here I have yet to come across a Dane who does
not speak perfect or near-perfect English (although this may be different
outside the Capital). Danish schoolchildren begin studying English in the third
grade, and with a new education reform, they will now start English in first
grade. Although the city offers free Danish classes to any registered foreign
resident who wants to learn, it also markets itself as a place of
English-speaking business and attracts foreign workers from across the
English-speaking world. At my daughter’s English-language international school,
many of her classmates’ parents from all over the world work in English
workplaces in Copenhagen. One mother from India who works at Carlsberg Brewing
Company, one of the world’s largest breweries based in Denmark, told me that
employees on her floor are instructed to speak English only. When I asked if
this rule also applied to the Danish employees, she said, “Yes, because we are
a global company!” Her husband, also from India, works at Danske Bank in
another English-speaking workplace. Another friend, an immigrant from Spain, speaks
English at her work in a science research unit at the University of Copenhagen.
Copenhagen is also home to Maersk Oil, one of the largest oil and shipping
companies in the world, whose operations are conducted almost entirely in
English.
The city appears to be effortlessly bilingual. And yet, as a
registered foreign national, I receive all my official correspondence in
Danish. This includes letters from the immigration department and the
Copenhagen Municipality about my residence status, about my daughter’s
childcare, and letters about my taxes and tax benefits. The first time my daughter was offered a spot
in the publicly-run after-school program near her school, we missed the
deadline to enroll her because we did not understand the instructions in Danish
that came in the letter and did not reply quickly enough. When a letter came
from the tax authority, too long and too technical to translate with Google, I
brought it to the accountant at my employer, who kindly translated and gave me
the happy news that the Danish government had decided to award me a child
subsidy. I marveled at how easy it would have been for me to miss that
important piece of news. Then came a more cryptic letter, addressed to me in
regards to my daughter, from the Copenhagen Municipality. It had only one line,
which Google translated as: "Please call within 14 days
because you failed to appear on time." Huh? Aside from being completely
baffled about the mysterious appointment, I couldn’t help but feel guilty for
failing to do something I was supposed to do. Calls to the phone number on the
letter didn’t help; they were answered by a recording in Danish. I was, as
Aihwa Ong has written drawing on Foucault, the immigrant subject being
“disciplined” by the state. In that moment, not knowing Danish was the same as not knowing. And that’s when I started
thinking about the limits of Copenhagen’s global image. Most government
services websites are likewise only in Danish. It seems clear that English
is the language of business, but not social services. I know better than to expect that a state would communicate
with foreign residents in any language other than its own. Except that I also know
how easily this one could. All of the
civil servants who write those letters in Danish could just as easily write
them in English. English would be understandable not only to foreign residents
from the West, but to the vast numbers of workers arriving from South Asia and
English-speaking Africa. In choosing not to conduct business in English, the
Danish state sends a strong message to these workers that their English is
valued in the workplace, but will not grant them access to Danish society.
‘You can work here, but you cannot belong.’
Of course, Denmark sends this message in much stronger ways
to my Arabic, Turkish, and Urdu-speaking Muslim counterparts. While Danes often
express the opinion that Denmark is “more refined” in its treatment of Muslims than
the United States, recent events prove otherwise. In the past few months, the
Dansk Folkeparti, Denmark’s third largest party, voted against a biannual
citizenship law that would grant Danish citizenship to 1,600 individuals
because there were too many Muslim names on the list. A few weeks later, senior
members of the Dansk Folkeparti expressed the opinion that “there are too many
Muslims in Denmark and border controls should be established to stop more from
entering the country.” The headline in the Copenhagen Post read: “No more
Muslims, say DF Leaders.” (January 27, 2014). In such ways, Denmark and the
city of Copenhagen practice selective globalization. Carlsberg Brewing Company
boasts 150 markets around the world and employs more than 40,000 people to
conduct business in English, the global language, but its employees in Denmark still
get their tax letters in Danish, and most work on year-to-year contracts.
Danish national identity refuses to budge. This shouldn’t surprise us. Denmark, like any
other state, seeks to position itself competitively in the global economy and
use English strategically to maximize productivity, while minimizing the
cultural impact of foreign workers on the country. But unlike many other
states, Denmark still grants benefits to the families of foreign workers (for
which I am grateful) and prides itself on being a beacon of liberal tolerance. The
gap between self-image and reality is yawning. And until there is a social movement
of immigrants here to challenge Danish national identity, that seems unlikely to
change.
