John Gunther Dean
Dean speaks four languages: English, French, German and Danish. He was the first U.S. Ambassador to Denmark who learned and spoke Danish, thus gaining significant respect from its people. He is married to the French-born Martine Duphenieux, and they have three grown children. He now lives in Switzerland and France but remains active on foreign affairs issues and comes to the U.S. often.
Languages of Denmark
German is an officially recognized minority language in the former South Jutland County (part of what is now the Region of Southern Denmark), which was part of Imperial Germany prior the Treaty of Versailles. Between 15,000 and 20,000 Ethnic Germans live in South Jutland, of whom roughly 8,000 use either the standard German or the Schleswigsch variety of West Low German in daily communications. Schleswigisch is highly divergent from Standard German and can be quite difficult to understand by Standard German speakers. Outside of South Jutland, the members of St. Peter's Church in Copenhagen use German in their Church, its website, and the school that it runs.