Emerging Language Political Agency Among Estonian Native Speakers in Finland

Abstract

Finland grants exclusive status to Finnish and Swedish as national languages and has had a relatively homogenous language situation so far. Among four bigger immigrant groups, Estonian-speakers make up the second largest community of practice in Finland; their number increased by more than thirtyfold between 1990 and 2015. We support the idea that Estonian-speakers’ practices should be looked at in the context of the emergent Estonian–Finnish transnational space. This means that their language political (LP) agency should be analyzed in terms of Estonian-Finnish transnational relations. After providing an extensive historical account of the emergence and development of Estonian-speakers’ diaspora in Finland, the paper briefly addresses the legal and institutional aspects of the Finnish state language policies. Then we go beyond both the state and the family by offering a preliminary exploration of different aspects of language management, language practices and ideologies which may affect Estonian-speaking familiesʼ choices of Estonian-language day-care and a comprehensive school with a bilingual, Estonian-Finnish program available in Helsinki. Our preliminary findings contribute to the understanding of LP as a situated sociocultural process which is however further complicated by the multi-sited nature of LP and speakers’ transnational relations.