Challenges for the Estonian language: a poststructuralist perspective

Abstract

This chapter examines the specific challenges faced as part of the process of promoting Estonian as the language of wider societal, interethnic use in Estonia.These challenges are largely a result of the Soviet occupation and the ensuing ethnolinguistic divide and tensions that came about following independence. Although these social and historical contingencies have led to diverging perspectives on the status of Soviet-era Russian-speaking immigrants and their need to speak Estonian, as we will see, there is certainly evidence of a growing rapprochement between the two major ethnolinguistic groups, opening the way towards a more integrated and open society based on a new common language - Estonian. I assess the Estonian case from a poststructuralist perspective, arguing that there are sound ethical reasons to continue Estonian-based integration efforts but that more attention needs to be paid to the specific circumstances that have led to and maintain social inequalities among many of the country's non-ethnic Estonian inhabitants