The Origins of the Estonian Language
I just celebrated my fifth year in Estonia and my fifth fruitless year trying to figure out how to correctly speak Estonian. I mean really, it wouldnt be so bad if Estonians werent so smug about it. Oh, they will congratulate you on your good Estonian even if you can only speak a few words, but deep inside they really dont want you to learn it!
They are so happy with their secret code and you can see it every time someone asks you Oh, are you learning to speak Estonian? Then comes the sly grin, Youve got a snowballs chance in hell of learning our language. This is quickly replaced by a faked look of concern as they say, Oh, its a very difficult language, isnt it? I think after this, they go off and laugh uncontrollably and give high-fives to other Estonians, but I havent actually seen it happen.
I have decided to write an expos on the Estonian language. One time I sent my brother a tape of Estonian language and he asked me if Estonians have an obsession with sex. There is terviseks and ostmiseks and kasutamiseks, teadmiseks, parandamiseks and armastamiseks. All kinds of seks. That, plus the fact that after five years, little kids still laugh when I speak Estonian has made me decide to tell all. The real story behind why Estonian is the way it is.
A long time ago, about 1000 or 1100 A.D. there were three Estonian guys sitting around the campfire. Their names were Billy, Ray and Duke (bet you didnt know that these are real ancient Estonian names). It was wintertime and they were bored. Billy spoke first. You know Ray, what we need is a new language. Darn straight! said Ray. Talking this way is getting boring and besides everybody almost understands us. We need a language thats so crazy, so complicated that nobody will ever understand whats going on!
As the idea picked up steam, Duke piped up. Lets do it this way, that you cant say he or she. That way you wont know if youre talking about a man or a woman. Also, we have to think up names for people that give no clue to foreigners about their gender, names that change with the grammar so you never know what to call somebody. Ray nodded in approval Yeah, thats it. Then we can eliminate the future tense. Think of trying to ask someone out on a date when you cant say the right name, whether its a boy or girl or when it is going to happen!
Billy, the smart one was thinking in more technical terms already. O.K., lets make it this way, that when you learn a noun, you dont have to learn just one word but 14, and instead of just saying that you are going to or from something, you have to change the noun in some weird way. Now Ray was excited and spilled his beer. Yeah yeah! Andandthe nouns cant change the same way, lets make like, a hundred different spelling groups that all change in different ways! This appealed to Duke who added slyly, You want to make it real hard, a real nut-buster? Lets make it so all the adjectives change, too. In boring old English, you say five small, red houses, small, red houses and many small, red houses. Small and red always stay the same but in our new language? Whoa Nellie!
They exchanged high-fives all around and cracked a few brews. After that they started practicing how to say, Oh, youre learning Estonian? without busting up laughing.
Thats how Estonian came to be, honest!
Center vs. Periphery in Language Studies
Originally Posted by jmm99
"I'm going town to," doesn't really cut it (translating from Finnish, "Menen kaupungille", to English).
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