Eesti keeltest Rahvaloendustel
Languages and censuses in Estonia

Summary/Abstract: While some census categories are not devised with an academic purpose (Arel 2002), census data include many self-reported variables of languages and national or ethnic identity. Census categories have been influenced by past practices and pre-census politics in most countries involved in enumeration. The paper briefly outlines some ideological and political aspects of censuses and the history of censuses in Estonia. Based on the census data the paper focuses on two issues: 1) what (foreign) languages Estonian residents master and how the share of those languages has changed over the years; 2) what can be concluded from the 2011 enumeration of local varieties. Compared to 1934, the bigger share of Estonian residents has indicated the knowledge of foreign languages in 2011. English has remarkable prominence compared to other language, except Russian, which has gained speakers by immigration. 15% of permanent residents with Estonian as the mother tongue also claimed the proficiency of Estonian dialects. As the bigger share of speakers of island, Mulgi and Võru dialects reside outside the traditional dialect area, the question arises: whether the term „dialect” is appropriate after all. Finally we propose two terms – dominant and non-dominant languages – borrowed from Benson and Kosonen (2012) for a wider use.

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