Fieldwork:

• March 2010

• September 2010

• June 2011

• June 2012

• October 2012

• September 2013

• October 2014

• May and June 2015

Informant recordings in America 2010
In the autumn of 2009 we had advertisements in  three Norwegian American magazines: The Norseman, The Norwegian American Weekly, and the Viking Magazine. Here we asked for Norwegian speaking Americans who are descendants of immigrants who came to America before 1920, and who learned Norwegian in their family. We got 40 replies from people who still speak Norwegian. Many of these spoke Norwegian as their only language before they started school. They have in common that they are relatively old.

In March 2010, Janne Bondi Johannessen and Signe Laake went to America on a two-week trip through Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, South Dakota and North Dakota to meet some Norwegian American informants and make video recordings.

Read Janne and Signe's blog from the journey:

- First part

- Second part

- Third part

More fieldwork in 2010
In September 2010, the "Workshop on Immigrant Language in America" was arranged in Madison, Wisconsin. Before the workshop, more fieldwork was done in the Midwest. Janne Bondi Johannessen and several of the participants of the workshop visited Norwegian American informants, for example in Decorah and Westby.

Read the blog from the fieldwork
(The link is to the first part. Scroll up to find the next parts)

Fieldwork in June 2011
In June 2011 Janne Bondi Johannessen and Arnstein Hjelde went back to the United States. Both delivered lectures at the Anniversary conference of the Norwegian American Historical Association, at Luther College, Decorah, Iowa. Afterwards, they traveled around in Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota and made several recordings with old friends and new Norwegian speaking Americans.

Fieldwork in June 2012
In June 2012 Arnstein Hjelde and Janne Bondi Johannessen went on a new recording tour to the United States. The goal was to find Norwegian speaking descendants in the Western States, and to fill in some of the core areas in the Midwest. In two weeks they drove over 3000 miles and made recordings in Washington, Montana and North Dakota. This time, informants were more varied in terms of background: some were descendants of recent immigrants, others were second language learners while some were descendants of the early immigrants.

Fieldwork in October 2012
The Third Workshop on Immigrant Languages ​​in America was held in late September at Penn State University in Pennsylvania. After the workshop Janne Bondi Johannessen, Arnstein Hjelde and Eirik Olsen went on to the Midwest. There, they spent a week on the road in the core areas of Minnesota and Wisconsin and met both old and new Norwegian informants. Several students from the University of Wisconsin‒Madison and Ida Larsson from Stockholm University also participated in some of the fieldwork.

Fieldwork in September 2013
In September 2013 Janne Bondi Johannessen and Arnstein Hjelde travelled to Canada for the first time. They were about a week in the province of Saskatchewan, where they met several pleasant Norwegian-Canadians, many of them spoke Norwegian as an inherited language. During their stay they made recordings in Saskatoon, North Battleford, Outlook and Archer Will.

Fieldwork in October 2014
After the workshop "5th Annual Workshop on Immigrant Languages in the Americas" in Los Angeles in October, Arnstein Hjelde and Janne Bondi Johannessen traveled to the Midwest again on fieldwork. This time they came to Ulen, MN, Flom, MN, Coon Rapids, MN, Flom, MN, Westby, WI, and St.Paul, MN where they met a nice mix of well known informants and new informants.

For the first time, it was not just interview and conversation recordings but also various "games" or tests, which both field workers and Norwegian Americans had great fun with.

Fieldwork in May and June 2015
"The 10th International Symposium on Bilingualism" was held at Rutgers University in New Jersey on 20 - 24 May. After the conference Janne Bondi Johannessen, Linn Iren Sjånes Rødvand and Eirik Tengesdals went on fieldwork. From late May to early June they met informants from Sacred Heart, MN, Sunburg, MN, Spring Grove, MN, Harmony, MN, Westby, WI and Coon Valley, WI. They met both old and new informants and both interview and conversation were recorded together with games or tests.