Le Nord : revue internationale des Pays de Nord - 01.06.1941, Page 170

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LE NORD
special privileges for advanced study and residence in Danish
hospitals. Some of these by passing an examination in a few
extras required by Danish medical laws, have acquired the rights
of practising as physicians in Denmark.
The second institution is the “Dansk-Islandsk Samfund”
(Danish-Icelandic Society), founded in 1916. This society has
also done a great deal of work to promote mutual friendship. It
has two branches, one in Denmark and another in Iceland. Both
issue publications, — the most notable is the “Islandsk Aarbog”
(Icelandic yearbook) issued by the Danish branch of the society
since 1928, containing many excellent articles on Icelandic mat-
ters.
IV.
The recognition of Iceland as an independent kingdom in
1918 did of course alter greatly the official attitude of the other
Scandinavian countries towards Iceland. Since that date Iceland
has been represented in most of the inter-Scandinavian commis-
sions for legislative or social purposes, and also in the inter-Scandi-
navian congresses of various kinds. There is also an Icelandic
branch of the “Foreningen Norden” (Northern Society), aiming
at brotherly co-operation and friendship between all the peoples
of the North.
There are two chief obstacles to Icelandic participation in
inter-Scandinavian co-operation. Although modern Icelandic is
practically nearly identical with the old common language of the
North, it is now not generally understood by the other Scan-
dinavian nations. Icelanders therefore cannot make use of their
own language on these occasions, while Danes, Norwegians,
Swedes and Swedish-speaking Finlanders easily can understand
each other, although they use their own language. But the same
disadvantage applies to the Finnish delegates, who therefore on
such occasions as a rule make use of Swedish. Still, as the Ice-
landic delegates here always use Danish, Swedish or Norwegian,
this has so far not done much harm. The second obstacle is
more serious, namely the geographical position of Iceland. Owing
to the great distance from the European continent a voyage from
Iceland to Scandinavia is long and costly. Consequently Iceland
cannot be represented as often and as well as the other nations.
The inter-Scandinavian legislation has been of the highest