Acceso usuarios
Raimo Raag
This contribution provides a historical sketch ofthe emergence andgradual elaboration of a Standard variety of Estonian seen against the background of the development of society within Estonia, and within a framework comprising the key terms of Standard language building in corpus planning:
graphization, codification, and adaptation; in addition the r öle of purism in language adaptation is illustrated. It is argued that graphization in itself need not demarcate the beginning of standardization. Standardization of Estonian started in the sixteenth Century when two written varieties emerged, one for North Estonia and another for South Estonia. The two written languages were codified in thefirst half of the seventeenth Century and existed side-by-side in different parts ofthe area inhabitedby Estonians for the following two centuries. After a major Orthographie reform implemented in the 1860s and 1870s, the modern Standard language was developed on an essentially northern basis, although allowing a number of southern characteristics to be incorporated into the Standard. Further lexical and morphological adaptation followed suit at four linguistic Conferences 1908-1911 and was continued by the subsequent ''language reform" and "language regulation" movements between 1910 and 1940, when Estonian language planning also became institutionalized. Institutionalized modern
