Official minority languages of Sweden
Finnish has been spoken in Sweden ever since the (then provincial) borders were drawn in the 13th century. Sweden has always had a significant migration to and from Finland. As the two languages belong to different language families it is easy to distinguish them, unlike the neighbouring languages Norwegian and Danish. The number of Finnish speakers in Sweden today has been estimated to over 460,000. Even though many current Swedes are of full or mixed Finnish descent, Swedish is the main language in practice for many bilinguals.
Sweden
In varying degrees, depending largely on frequency of interaction with English, a majority of Swedes, especially those born after World War II, understand and speak English, owing to trade links, the popularity of overseas travel, a strong Anglo-American influence and the tradition of subtitling rather than dubbing foreign television shows and films, and the relative similarity of the two languages which makes learning English easier. In a 2005 survey by Eurobarometer, 89% of Swedes reported the ability to speak English.