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<p class="MsoNormal">Thank you all who have contributed so far to
this discussion. It is of course too early to send a summary, but
we are very pleased to see that some kind of online discussion is
possible on Ura-List. </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I quickly want to comment, strictly personally,
on several concerns raised by Annika Pasanen. These were raised
also in our seminars in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Helsinki</st1:place></st1:city>.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">First, I can live with the label old-fashioned,
but I raise my voice and object that what we intend to do is
false. As I already mentioned in the original query, this list is
NOT to become a sanctioned list nor do we intend to normalize
discourse. In a pluralistic scientific community, we have given
some of our criteria how we arrived at “our” numbers and invite
comments. And of course, nobody is obliged to use them! But as a
good scientific principle, beside criticism one should be fair and
present an alternative classification! And en passant, you
yourself have used the “old-fashioned” 350.<o:p> <br>
</o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Of course I understand your point of view
concerning revitalization and I think that the number is
compatible with revitalized speakers who have e.g. Inari Saami as
another mother tongue. They would count as “old-fashioned” native
language speakers such as a bilingual Mordvin, Mari or Enets
(perhaps not for the census as there one has only one mother
tongue but for “old-fashioned” Uralic linguists who admit daily
bilingualism for the majority of Uralic languages). Yes, we can be
criticized for discriminating speech communities but I think that
we are here in good company. To the best of my knowledge, the
Saami Parliament does not take L2 speakers with non-Saami
background as speaker of Saami. </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">An argument against L2 speakers we discussed in
the seminars in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Helsinki</st1:place></st1:city>
was based on some recent Livonian examples in Estonian newspapers.
Some time ago, the number of potential Livonian speakers was given
in one of the dailies with almost 300, because a reporter just
added all students who over the years took classes in Livonian at
the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">University</st1:placetype>
of <st1:placename w:st="on">Tartu</st1:placename></st1:place>
as new speakers. Here, I as an “old-fashioned” linguist raise
objections because this viewpoint is clearly too naïve. Comparing
it to my own courses on Forest Enets, I have taught the structure
of this language to about 60 students over the years, but I won’t
classify any of those as a new speaker of the language! I think,
here we just have to confess that there are multiple ways of
classification and as long as we make our criteria clear, there is
room for more than just one number. Still, make your criteria
clear!<o:p> <br>
</o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">And concerning the second comment by Annika
Pasanen: <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">If numbers of
speakers in this list are remarkably declined compared to
earlier estimations, there should be strong evidence about
diminishing speakers. There's no sense to replace conjectured
estimation with another, although there would be some kind of
"common feeling", that there are not so many speakers as it has
been estimated.</i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">This is precisely one of the reasons of this
query. Too many people doubt official numbers and offer their own
speculative ones. Whereas the decline of speakers of e.g. Forest
Enets, Tundra Enets, Nganasan, Ume Saami, Pite Saami, Akkala Saami
<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>is indisputable and
possible to proof, larger communities even as small as Inari and
Skolt Saami already resist such interpretations, not to speak of
larger languages like Tundra Nenets, Komi, Udmurt or Mordvin. As
there are no acceptable means and tools how to count every speaker
of Mordvin, all we can do is interpret census data with general
demographic trends. At least some assumptions from a social
scientist outside linguistics have been incorporated. Of course,
we can be accused of replacing one estimation with another, but
one should make ones principles clear!<span
style="mso-spacerun:yes"> <br>
</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">In the meanwhile another comment by Cornelius
Hasselblatt arrived. In the list under discussion Livonian is
represented as (<st1:country-region w:st="on">Latvia</st1:country-region>)
meaning used to be spoken in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place
w:st="on">Latvia</st1:place></st1:country-region>. As the last
speaker is very likely not speaking the language on a daily basis
in <st1:country-region w:st="on">Canada</st1:country-region>, we
have not intended to replace <st1:country-region w:st="on">Latvia</st1:country-region>
as the historical territory with <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place
w:st="on">Canada</st1:place></st1:country-region>. This is
going into the same direction as the comments by Michael Riessler
on how to classify the new Skolt speakers in <st1:country-region
w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Norway</st1:place></st1:country-region>.
There is only one slight difference: Skolt Saami was once spoken
in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Norway</st1:place></st1:country-region>.
I doubt that even in the heydays of the Uralic Revolution, nobody
would have assumed that <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place
w:st="on">Canada</st1:place></st1:country-region> was the
Urheimat of Livonian. Nevertheless, this point is of importance
e.g. what to do with Diasporas in capitals e.g. Saamis in <st1:city
w:st="on">Stockholm</st1:city>, <st1:city w:st="on">Oslo</st1:city>,
<st1:city w:st="on">Helsinki</st1:city>; Maris in <st1:city
w:st="on">Saint Petersburg</st1:city>, <st1:city w:st="on">Moscow</st1:city>
or in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Estonia</st1:place></st1:country-region>?</p>
<br>
<p class="MsoNormal">Again, thank you very much for participation
and we hope to gather more comments, both online and offline!<o:p>
<br>
</o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Best wishes from <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place
w:st="on">Helsinki</st1:place></st1:city>,</p>
Florian Siegl
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