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President of the Republic on the Festive Ceremony of the 80th Anniversary of the Estonian University in Tartu on December 1, 1999
01.12.1999

Dear Rector of Tartu University,
dear conferees and academic family,
dear Prime Minister and Ministers,
Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen!

At the age of three hundred and sixty-seven, our University celebrates its eightieth anniversary by conferring the distinguished title of Honorary Member and Honorary Doctor to five prominent persons. Allow me, in the name of the Republic of Estonia, congratulate our dear alma mater and the honourable new members - in alphabetical order - Madis Kõiv, Endel Lippmaa, Bengt von zur Mühlen, Felix Oinas and Pekka Oinonen!

I would like to deliberate the paradox inherent in the first sentence: at the age of three hundred and sixty-seven, the University celebrates its eightieth anniversary. I presume this deserves closer deliberation, at least because my generation and those older than us have also participated in the University's one hundred and fiftieth anniversary, and I am not as old as that.

As we know, the University's eightieth anniversary is associated with the Estonian-language academic life under these columns; our mother tongue's victorious arrival at the academic Parnassus. Also this country's language has sought eternity, and found it, to use the words of Kristjan Jaak Peterson, a poet and visionary from the beginning of the nineteenth century. And yet it seems that today's celebration does first and foremost elevate not this incredible linguistic achievement, but something else. On December 1, 1919, Estonian men and women we fighting the War of Liberty, the enemy had succeeded in crossing the Narva river, the land and the people were vexed of six years of war. And this, I believe, is the message of today's anniversary: for the founders of our state, the opening of the university meant self-realisation for Estonia, similar and comparable to the defence of our country. In other words, the message of today's celebration is the valuation of education, in the circumstances much harder than those of today, and the full support this policy got from the citizens of the Republic of Estonia.

In today's globalising world, this tribute to university working in our native language might seem anachronistic. But this is not the case. It is true that English has become the language of science, that the publication and exchange of information in some fields mostly goes on in English. I can see no danger there to our national culture, to our mother tongue. On the contrary, I would like to point out a fact that has so far escaped our due attention. Variety or diversity in both nature and cultures has been a factor of strengthening impact, and always accelerated development. The breakthrough of European culture and science in the world is first and foremost explained by the considerable extent of diversity in this small area. And although the death rate of languages in the world is one per month, I dare say that the Estonian language and the Estonian national culture, to which I include mathematics, genetics, physics and chemistry, have crossed the Rubicon. In many respects, Estonia is unique, as we are the smallest population in Europe, perhaps in the world, that has created and developed an academic language that adequately reflects our relationship with the world. We need not worry for Estonian; rather, it would be justified to feel concern for the English language, which is spoken in a different way in different corners of the world. This is the depressing fate of every lingva franca. Here, we can draw a convincing comparison with the Europe of early Middle Ages, where the language of scholarly communication was Latin. The Latin language did not give birth to a Latin superpower - a development which some of us seem to fear today on the basis of their recent historical experience. In Europe's oldest universities, Sorbonne and Oxford, Latin was obligatory for students during the lectures. After the lectures, the students of the same country or tribe came together and spoke their own languages between themselves. On the thirteenth century, these groups were for the first time called nationes. This was the course development took then, and we do not have the slightest reason to presume that it would take the opposite course in the future. Everything that is too big, is simply too big.

Estonia is fairly well sized, and the Estonian language, the Estonian culture, the Estonian nation will last, it is only the question of quality. As it was also eighty years ago. With this recognition, we have closed the circle of paradox. Quod erat demonstrandum.

 

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