LL-L "Language attitudes" 2007.12.21 (03) [E]

[Lowlands-L List]

L O W L A N D S - L  -  21 December 2007 - Volume 03
Song Contest: lowlands-l.net/contest/ (- 31 Dec. 2007)
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From: Marcus Buck <list at marcusbuck.org>
Subject: Miss beautiful language

Silent night, holy night.
It's so quiet on the list... Last message was from December 14.
Ron, are you on christmas vacation, having no time to forward messages or is
it really that hush?

Okay, I want to break the silence with a question: I just read the news on
Eurolang.net <http://eurolang.net/> and they have a news item about
Estoniaannouncing a 'Miss contest' for beautiful languages
<http://www.eurolang.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3007&Itemid=1&lang=de><http://www.eurolang.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3007&Itemid=1&lang=de>
.

There is an anecdote circulating in Estonia that once (some say it was at
the world fair 1900 in Paris) there was a contest about which language
sounds best. Italian won and Estonian was second with the sentence *Sõida
tasa üle silla *(Drive over the bridge slowly). Well, the Finnish claim the
same with their corresponding sentence *Aja hiljaa sillalla.

*Whoever did win then, today the Estonians want to repeat that contest on
the occasion of the 90th Birthday of the country (hey, just the same age as
our beloved Miss Sophie ;-) [for those who are not custom with her:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinner_for_One><http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinner_for_One>],
it's an integral part of New Year's Eve).
However, googling for this contest I can only find many many newspapers and
news portals mirroring one and the same press release on which the Eurolang
report is based too. But there's nowhere info on how to submit languages for
the contest. Would be nice, if there would be some minority languages
present. Does anybody know more about this contest or maybe somebody on the
list can read Estonian and look on the website of the Estonian Ministry of
Education on what are the conditions for that contest?

PS: Of course do I know, that comparing the beautifulness of languages is
pure point of view, subjective and from a linguistics point of view
unscientific, and I personally really don't like language comparisons like
the following:
<http://www.rp-online.de/hps/client/opinio/public/pjsub/production_long.hbs?hxmain_object_id=PJSUB::ARTICLE::271237&hxmain_category=::pjsub::opinio::/kunst_kultur/sprache><http://www.rp-online.de/hps/client/opinio/public/pjsub/production_long.hbs?hxmain_object_id=PJSUB::ARTICLE::271237&hxmain_category=::pjsub::opinio::/kunst_kultur/sprache>(German),
saying "(Upper) Saxon is unsexy", "speakers of Ruhr sociolect
shouldn't open their mouth in public if they want to be taken serious" etc.
It's often coloured by national (or subnational) sentiment. But I assume the
Estonians will make it a fair and nice contest without giving place to
sentiment and having in mind, that every language ranking is meaningless and
it's just for fun, so it's fine to me.
PPS: Has anybody a tip for a nice book on the becoming of the Estonian
language? While googling I found out some interesting facts about the
language. There was a very active group of language activists who wanted to
set the language in full right. They went so far as to invent words on pure
sound (*roim *is the Estonian word for crime. J. Aavik invented it on the
basis that the consonants r and m sound harsh to his ears and the vocal oi
clinks fearsome. pure sound, no etymological base. But the Estonians did
adopt it).

Marcus Buck
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