The article examines the phenomenon of dental mutation (also: dental umlaut), a historically poorly understood sound change attested in several North Sea Germanic languages, including Frisian, Low German, Dutch, whereby back vowels are fronted in the environment of dental consonants, as it is reflected in Middle Low German loanwords in Estonian, Latvian, and Livonian. Following an overview of the general history of umlaut in the Germanic languages and a survey of existing research on dental mutation, the study investigates whether the three recipient languages preserve traces of dental mutation that was present in their Low German source forms, but often not consistently represented in the written record of Middle Low German itself. While a clear-cut distribution of dental mutation cannot be established for the Low German loanwords in question the investigation reveals notable discrepancies between the Latvian and Livonian correspondences, which point to a potential stratification of Low German loanwords in Livonian into an older layer borrowed directly from Low German and a more recent one mediated through Latvian. Dental mutation is thus proposed as a possible diagnostic criterion for establishing the relative chronology of such loanwords. Kokkuvõte. Axel Jagau: Dentaalmutatsioonist eesti, läti ja liivi keeles. Artikkel käsitleb nn dentaalmutatsiooni (ehk dentaalmetafoonia) nähtust, keeleajalooliselt siiani puudulikult mõistetud häälikumuutust, mida on täheldatud mitmes põhja(mere)germaani keeles, sealhulgas friisi, alamsaksa, hollandi ja taani keeles. Selle protsessi käigus tagavokaalid dentaalsete konsonantide mõjupiirkonnas muutuvad eesvokaalideks. Muutus kajastub ka keskalamsaksa laensõnades eesti, läti ja liivi keeles. Pärast ülevaadet metafoonia üldisest arenguloost germaani keeltes ning senisest uurimistööst dentaalmutatsiooni kohta uurib artikkel, kas kolmes laenavas keeles leidub jälgi dentaalmutatsioonist, mis oli olemas nende alamsaksa lähtevormides, kuid mida keskalamsaksa kirjalikus allikmaterjalis endas ei ole sageli järjekindlalt kajastatud. Kuigi käsitletavate alamsaksa laensõnade puhul ei õnnestu tuvastada dentaalmutatsiooni selget levikumustrit, ilmnevad uurimuse käigus märkimisväärsed erinevused läti ja liivi vastete vahel, mis viitavad võimalusele, et alamsaksa laenud liivi keeles jagunevad mitmeks kihiks: vanem kiht, mis on laenatud otse alamsaksa keelest, ning uuem kiht, mis on vahendatud läti keele kaudu. Sellest lähtuvalt pakutakse dentaalmutatsiooni välja võimaliku diagnostilise kriteeriumina selliste laensõnade suhtelise kronoloogia kindlaksmääramiseks.
Sound symbolism – the systematic association between phonetic properties and meaning – plays a prominent role in size ratings, where particular speech sounds shape perceptions of magnitude. This paper explores two previously understudied dimensions of size-sound symbolism: (1) the impact of child-directed speech (CDS) on size judgments, and (2) the alignment between participants’ self-reported and actual rating strategies. The first section provides a concise overview of the theoretical background on sound symbolism and its relevance to size perception. The second section presents new analyses of an existing dataset, drawing on empirical data from Hungarian and German speakers. Our findings reveal a robust diminutive effect: artificial words that resemble CDS forms are consistently rated as smaller, even after accounting for other phonetic variables. Furthermore, we find that at least one explicitly named strategy – vowel-based judgments – closely mirrors the strategies participants actually employ. Kokkuvõte. László Kovács, Renáta Németh, Hilke Elsen: Helisümbolism suuruse tajumisel: lapsele suunatud kõne ja strateegia efektide koosmõju. Helisümbolism – foneetiliste omaduste ja tähenduse süstemaatiline seos – mängib olulist rolli suuruse hindamisel, kus teatud häälikud kujundavad suuruse tajumist. Käesolevas artiklis uuritakse kahte varem vähe uuritud suuruse ja helisümbolismi mõõdet: (1) lastele suunatud kõne mõju suuruse hindamisele ja (2) osalejate enda antud hinnangute ja tegelike hindamisstrateegiate vastavust. Esimeses osas antakse lühike ülevaade helisümbolismi teoreetilisest taustast ja selle seosest suuruse tajumisega. Teises osas esitatakse olemasoleva andmestiku uus analüüs, tuginedes ungari ja saksa keele kõnelejate empiirilistele andmetele. Meie tulemused näitavad tugevat pisendavat mõju: lastele suunatud kõne vormidega sarnanevaid tehissõnu hinnatakse järjekindlalt väiksemaks, isegi pärast teiste foneetiliste muutujate arvessevõtmist. Lisaks leidsime, et vähemalt üks selgesõnaliselt nimetatud strateegia – vokaalidel põhinevad hinnangud – peegeldab täpselt strateegiaid, mida osalejad tegelikult kasutavad.
In the article, we analyse the linguistic adaptation of Russian-dominant students at an Estonian-speaking international university, focusing on the students' Estonian language repertoire for both studies and communication in different contexts, i.e. in different language registers. We are trying to determine what repertoire a student with Russian as the dominant language has acquired in a general education, what problems Russian-dominant-language students face in the process of their linguistic adaptation, and what are the students' strategies to overcome these problems. Our analysis is based on the data collected through 24 semi structured interviews between February and April 2022. We use qualitative deductive and inductive content analysis as a method. We found that the Estonian Russian bilingual general education school and the lack of extracurricular social contacts with Estonian speakers do not guarantee a student with a dominant Russian language the necessary language repertoire, nor the sufficient register competence. Achieving comfort of communication requires both the speaker's own effort and the support and help of those around them.
lexicography: how helpful are large language models? In this article, we investigate whether and to what extent large language models (LMMs) can assist lexicographers in writing definitions and presenting word meaning(s). Of the LLMs tested, the GPT4o and Gemini 1.5 Pro meaning descriptions for 60 words were selected for the final evaluation. The zero shot prompting method used made it possible to identify the lexicographers' preferences and demands for the descriptions without preemptively limiting their form. The meaning descriptions were evaluated by 21 lexicographers. The overall satisfaction of respondents was relatively high: lexicographers rated 83% of the meaning descriptions as very or somewhat useful for their work. The performance of the models in Estonian was mostly satisfactory for the respondents: in 75% of the cases, the language of the meaning descrip tions was judged to be grammatically correct. Satisfaction with the semantic presentation was somewhat lower: the meanings given were considered cor rect in 56% of cases. Of the two LLMs, GPT4o's output was rated higher. Lexicographers' evaluations varied. The analysis of the comments accom panying the evaluations clarified the internal structure of the lexicographers' satisfaction/dissatisfaction and will allow the findings to be used in the future to create detailed prompts providing basis for different types of dictionary definitions.
Meanings in basic vocabulary lists are expected to be stable. In the literature, various basic vocabulary lists have been proposed that are founded on various criteria, with stability being a key criterion. However, the stability of basic meanings and to what degree popular lists fit these is rarely assessed for whole language families. In this paper, we define stability as resistance to borrowing, and we examine quantitatively how prone to borrowing the meanings in popular basic vocabulary lists are for the Uralic language family. We refine the methodology for meaning-ranking by calculating a borrowing probability for each meaning and clustering them into groups of more borrowable and less borrowable meanings. Our quantitative analysis provides a higher resolution within the basic vocabulary. While basic vocabulary lists are a good fit for the Uralic family in general, we demonstrate that not all basic meanings are equally stable or necessarily basic in the strictest sense. Kokkuvõte. Mervi de Heer, Luke Maurits: Uurali keelte baassõnavaraloendite tähenduste stabiilsus. Baassõnavaraloendite tähendustelt eeldatakse stabiilsust. Erialakirjanduses on pakutud välja mitmesuguseid erinevatel kriteeriumitel põhinevaid baassõnavaraloendeid, mille kõigi puhul on võtmekriteeriumiks stabiilsus. Baastähenduste stabiilsust ja seda, mil määral populaarsed nimekirjad neile sobivad, hinnatakse aga harva tervete keelerühmade puhul. Käesolevas artiklis defineerime stabiilsust kui vastupanu laenamisele ja uurime kvantitatiivselt, kuivõrd altid on tähendused populaarsetes baassõnavaraloendites uurali keelkonna puhul laenamisele. Täpsustame täheduste järjestamise metoodikat, arvutades iga tähenduse laenamise tõenäosuse ja rühmitades need laenatavamate ja vähem laenatavate tähenduste rühmadesse. Meie kvantitatiivne analüüs annab baassõnavara piires parema lahutusvõime. Kuigi baassõnavaraloendid sobivad üldiselt hästi uurali keelkonda, näitame, et mitte kõik põhitähendused ei ole võrdselt stabiilsed ega tingimata baatasemel selle sõna kõige kitsamas tähenduses.
The Mari languages possess a set of temporally ambivalent TAME constructions containing the particles ə̑ľe and ulmaš in Meadow Mari as well as ə̑ľə̑ and ə̑lə̑n in Hill Mari. The variation between the particles is evidential by nature: ə̑ľe and ə̑ľə̑ mark direct source of information, while ulmaš and ə̑lə̑n encode an indirect one. However, the indirect readings of the latter ones are affected by the temporal interpretation of the clause: when expressing pastness, ulmaš and ə̑lə̑n may indicate either inferentiality, mirativity or reportativity, while with present tense reference they lack the reportative function. I explain this with the notions of perspective time and perceptual field, illustrating that the perspective structure of the particle constructions with ulmaš and ə̑lə̑n is suitable for the reportative reading only on the past stratum. The results elaborate the claim that the particles form an event-level (deictic), not a propositional-level (semantic) evidential system. Kokkuvõte. Silja-Maija Spets: Refereeritud evidentsiaalsus ja ajaperspektiiv: mari partiklite ulmaš ja ə̑lə̑n tähdenduse kohta. Mari keeltes on olemas ajaliselt ambivalentne TAME-konstruktsioon, mis niidumari keeles sisaldab partikleid ə̑ľe ja ulmaš ja mäemari keeles partikleid ə̑ľə̑ ja ə̑lə̑n. Kahe partikli erinevus seisneb nende evidentsiaalsuses: ə̑ľe ja ə̑ľə̑ markeerivad otsest evidentsiaalsust, ulmaš ja ə̑lə̑n aga informatsiooni pärinemist kaudsest infoallikast. Viimaste evidentsiaalseid tähendusi mõjutab siiski lause ajaline tõlgendus: kui lause viitab minevikule, saavad ulmaš ja ə̑lə̑n väljendada nii järeldatud ja refreeritud evidentsiaalsust kui ka miratiivsust, olevikule viidates aga ei ole refereeritud evidentsiaalsuse funktsioon võimalik. Käesolev artikkel seletab seda olukorda perspektiivaja ja tajuvälja mõistete abil ja illustreerib, kuidas partikkekonstruktsioonide perspektiivstruktuur sobib refereeritud informatsiooniallika markeerimiseks ainult mineviku aja puhul. Tulemused toetavad väidet, et partiklid väljendavad evidentsiaalsust sündmuse tasandil (deiktiliselt), mitte propositsiooni tasandil (semantiliselt).
This essay stems from durational performance action "The Embassy of Utopia: Happiness for Everybody, Free of Charge, and May No One Be Left Behind!", which was led by an artistic collective (called the Institute of Meetings & Non-Meetings) at the EKA Gallery, Estonia from February 19th to 24th, 2024. The performance was created by Oliver Issak, Kairi M & auml;ndla, Jan Teevet, Taavi Teevet, and Margaret Tilk-three of whom are also the authors of the essay. This reflection is embedded in an artist-researcher's perspective as it delves into the possibilities of viewing a questionnaire as a form of art. Particularly, we explore how "Application for poetical asylum", the poetical-bureaucratic text central to the durational performance, prompted participants to share and reinterpret their personal experiences, thoughts, and narratives. By inspecting 250 visitor-completed questionnaires collected over the five days of "The Embassy of Utopia" performance, we map the inherent artistic and dialogical potential of a questionnaire as a textual form.
In the summer of 2024, a wedding took place at the international performance arts festival Baltoscandal in Rakvere, Estonia-but it was no ordinary wedding. KIBE! (conceived and directed by Robin T & auml;pp) was a performative production in the form of a wedding, where young performance artists explored the traditions, meanings, and transformations of marriage-past and present-through the rite of passage itself. The audience witnessed two wedding ceremonies, enjoyed a festive dinner filled with tradition, toasts, and joyful band music, with the atmosphere slowly shifting towards the unreal and unsettling. Thoughts of doubt start appearing through quotes from literature, visual culture and music, culminating in a state of delirium. This article analyses KIBE! as a multilayered text, primarily focusing on how the different texts interact and create new meanings. In addition, the analysis will focus on the double framing of KIBE! as a performance and as a wedding that in itself is a rite of passage and a cultural performance.
In this article, I discuss two issues: when a learner uses the assistance of a chatbot in academic writing, (1) how could the role of the chatbot be understood in this process? and (2) assuming academic writing is considered an extended cognitive process, does the chatbot extend the human mind? Studying the possible roles of the chatbot shows that the latter cannot be placed into any category that we are accustomed to in the context of academic writing: it is neither a source, a (co-)author, a conversation partner, nor a mere tool. Discussing the second question, I draw on the extended mind approach, which holds that human mental processes sometimes extend beyond the brain and body, incorporating external processes or tools as parts of the cognitive system. I argue that the extent to which the use of a chatbot meets the criteria of reliable coupling also determines its impact on the human mind. In the article, I clarify that the most crucial criterion for extending the human mind is the criterion of trust, which presupposes the user's ability to critically evaluate the chatbot's output. If the user blindly trusts the chatbot and relies on its output without any critical reflection, then the use of the chatbot may actually narrow the human mind, hindering the development of the user's writing and thinking skills.
This article provides an overview of the principles of easy language, based on the situation in Finland. Easy language or easy-to-read (Finnish: selkokieli) and plain language (Finnish: selke & auml; kieli) are closely related concepts but refer to different forms of language. Their common goal is to be a form of linguistic communication that is as accessible as possible to every member of society. Easy language is simpler than plain language, intended for people for whom standard form and even the plain language variant of Finnish are too complex. Research from Finland and other countries shows that both concepts are relevant in language planning. This overview exclusively focuses on the principles of using easy language. In Finland, easy language has been in use since the 1980s. Various texts, including informative, instructive, and fictional works, are published in easy language. This overview compares the concept of easy language with plain language and standard language concepts, briefly introduces the development and research of easy language in Finland, and describes the main characteristics of the Easy Finnish. Finally, it briefly discusses whether easy language is needed as a separate form of language.
This article provides an overview of different hedges and praise used in peer feedback. In addition, it is analyzed how their use changes during the writing process. The data was obtained from the course "Medieval History" held at the University of Tartu in the autumn semester of 2023/2024. During the semester, students gave feedback on two drafts of each other's essays in groups of 4-5. The most common hedges in the feedback were the conditional mood and the verb tunduma 'to seem'. The most common praise was hea 'good'. It seems that students prefer options that appear more neutral when hedging and praising. Comparing the two rounds of feedback, the number of hedges increased by 22 per 10,000 words, while the number of praises declined by about five. This difference may be due to a change in the format of giving feedback and an increase in the amount of text to evaluate.
A group of individuals forms a community if they have something in common (e.g. a place of residence, a hobby, an experience). Members of an active and strong community also interact with each other. For example, a community can form among students. If students share knowledge about the same topic, interact regularly and wish to improve together, this collaboration may lead to the formation of a community of practice. In this article, we describe a situation where students can work together and actively communicate to learn collectively and effectively and to develop into a community of practice. We analyzed the responses of 11th and 12th grade Estonian students (n = 189) to a questionnaire, which we used to examine whether these soon-to-be graduates and future 12th graders would like to help each other prepare for the state examination and receive support, and what kind of shared space they envision for joint preparation. The results show that both grade levels would like to form, to be involved in, and to contribute to such a group. On the whole, students wish to ask questions, share experiences, and engage in discussion within a relaxed, comfortable, and cozy environment-whether physical or online. Additionally, the article discusses why communities of practice amongst students are effective and necessary for learning in general.
Academic texts are often expected to be neutral and impersonal. However, these texts contain various linguistic devices which indicate author's subjective judgement. For example, authors use hedges to express uncertainty, make claims more vague, add their opinion to the proposition and highlight the possibility of other interpretations. The article is based on my master's thesis, where I investigated how and why bachelor's students use hedges in academic texts. I explore the use of hedges in "Linguistic Autobiographies" (written at the "Introduction to Linguistics" course, University of Tartu, Estonia) and in a collection of bachelor's theses (written at the Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Tartu, Estonia). In the article I will give an overview of how and why hedges are used. Also, I will describe how the use of hedges is influenced by the writer's experience, the purpose of the text, and the communicative situation created in the text.
The national curricula for both basic and upper secondary education in Estonia state that one of the learning outcomes for general education is the skill to create different types of texts. However, it remains unspecified what those types of texts are and how the students should learn to write them. This article examines how texts and their categorisation are represented in the currently available basic (second and third stages of study) and upper secondary textbooks for Estonian as a first language. The analysis shows that the terms & zcaron;anr ('genre'), liik and t & uuml;& uuml;p (both roughly equivalent to 'type') are used most commonly, although their usage varies and is rarely explained. The categories are usually taught through their formal features rather than the content. We argue that this kind of teaching does not develop the students' independent analysis skills and thus fails to adequately prepare them for the ever-changing world of texts. We also propose a new type of task which can guide students to notice and make sense of texts in a more meaningful way.
This article examines contemporary academic texts, with the focus on the use of interactional meta-discourse-language choices that help authors connect with their content, their readers, and other writers. In academia, where tradition continues to shape expectations, choosing appropriate language plays a crucial role. Students, as novice academic writers, are often guided by textbooks and writing manuals that urge them to be precise and to maintain a neutral, objective tone. These resources also offer advice on using the appropriate grammatical voice. This study analyses 40 bachelor's and master's theses from the humanities and social science faculties written at the University of Tartu between 2018 and 2022. It explores how these texts either follow or diverge from the expected norms. The analysis looks at students' preferences for grammatical voice and their use of other language tools that show the author's stance and influence on the reader's perspective, such as hedges, boosters, attitude markers, and engagement markers. The study also examines whether language use varies depending on the academic field or the level of study, and whether different parts of the text (i.e., chapters) affect how often these features appear. These findings are compared to earlier research on scientific articles.
This paper investigates the relationship between language exposure and Estonian competence of Estonian-Norwegian bilinguals aged 5–7. The sample includes 29 children acquiring Estonian and Norwegian (16 successive and 8 simultaneous bilinguals acquiring Estonian as a heritage language in Norway, 5 simultaneous bilinguals acquiring Norwegian as a heritage language in Estonia). Their language environments are described using data from the Q-BEx questionnaire, and scores from a Sentence Repetition Task and a Cross-Linguistic Lexical Task are used to describe Estonian competence. A correlation analysis shows significant correlations between exposure quality and amount of current exposure. Conditional inferencing trees and random forest models identify the pro portion of current Estonian exposure as the most important predictor of morpho syntactic competence. For lexical competence, both proportion and diversity of Estonian exposure play an important role. Kokkuvõte. Adele Vaks, Virve-Anneli Vihman, Jan de Jong: Keelesisend ja -oskus eesti-norra kakskeelsete laste seas. Artiklis kirjeldame 5‒7-aastaste eesti-norra kakskeelsete laste keelesisendit ning keelesisendi suhet eesti keele oskusega. Valimis on 29 last: 16 suktsessiivselt kakskeelset ja kaheksa simultaanselt kakskeelset Norras, ning viis simultaanselt kakskeelset last Eestis. Keelekeskkonna kirjeldamiseks kogusime andmeid laste keelekogemuse kohta Q-BEx ankeediga. Eesti keele oskuse kirjeldamiseks kasutame lausete järelekordmistesti ning sõnavaratesti skoore. Korrelatsioonianalüüsist selgub, et keelesisendi mitmekesisus korreleerub oluliselt ja positiivselt viimase aasta eestikeelse sisendi osakaaluga. Keelesisendi ja -oskuse suhte analüüsimiseks kasutasime tingimuslikke otsustuspuid ning juhumetsa mudeleid. Mudelite põhjal mõjutab laste morfosüntaksi oskust kõige enam käesoleva aasta eestikeelse sisendi osakaal. Sõnavarateadmiste jaoks olid olulised nii eestikeelse sisendi osakaal kui ka sisendi mitmekesisus.
Artiklis uurime, kas ja mil määral saavad suured keelemudelid (SKMid) leksikograafi aidata sõnastikuseletuste loomisel ja sõnatähendus(t)e esitusel. Katsetatud SKMidest jäid lõplikku hindamisküsitlusse GPT-4o ja Gemini 1.5 Pro tähendusseletused 60 sõna kohta. Kasutatud näitetu promptimise (zero-shot) meetod võimaldas selgitada leksikograafide eelistusi ja nõudmisi seletustele ilma nende vormi ennetavalt piiramata. Tähendusseletusi hindas 21 leksikograafi. Vastajate üldine rahulolu oli suhteliselt kõrge: leksikograafid hindasid oma töö jaoks väga kasulikuks või mõnevõrra kasulikuks 83% seletustest. Mudelite sooritus eesti keeles enamasti rahuldas vastajaid: 75% juhtudel hinnati seletuste keelt grammatiliselt korrektseks. Rahulolu semantilise esitusega oli mõnevõrra madalam: väljatoodud tähendusi peeti õigeks 56% juhtudel. Kahest SKM-ist hinnati kõrgemalt GPT-4o tähendusseletusi. Leksikograafide hinnangud varieerusid. Hinnangutele lisatud kommentaaride analüüs selgitas leksikograafide rahulolu/rahulolematuse sisemist struktuuri, millele toetudes on edaspidi võimalik luua täpsemaid prompte eri tüüpi sõnastikuseletuste tarvis. Abstract. Maria Tuulik, Ene Vainik, Esta Prangel, Margit Langemets, Eleri Aedmaa, Kristina Koppel, Lydia Risberg: Describing senses for lexicography: how helpful are large language models? In this article, we investigate whether and to what extent large language models (LMMs) can assist lexicographers in writing definitions and presenting word meaning(s). Of the LLMs tested, the GPT-4o and Gemini 1.5 Pro meaning descriptions for 60 words were selected for the final evaluation. The zero-shot prompting method used made it possible to identify the lexicographers’ preferences and demands for the descriptions without preemptively limiting their form. The meaning descriptions were evaluated by 21 lexicographers. The overall satisfaction of respondents was relatively high: lexicographers rated 83% of the meaning descriptions as very or somewhat useful for their work. The performance of the models in Estonian was mostly satisfactory for the respondents: in 75% of the cases, the language of the meaning descriptions was judged to be grammatically correct. Satisfaction with the semantic presentation was somewhat lower: the meanings given were considered correct in 56% of cases. Of the two LLM-s, GPT-4o’s output was rated higher. Lexicographers’ evaluations varied. The analysis of the comments accompanying the evaluations clarified the internal structure of the lexicographers’ satisfaction/dissatisfaction and will allow the findings to be used in the future to create detailed prompts providing basis for different types of dictionary definitions.
Põhikooli ja gümnaasiumi riiklikus õppekavas on ühe õpiväljundina kirjas, et õpilased peavad oskama luua eri liiki tekste, kuid jäetakse täpsustamata, mis need liigid on ning kuidas peaksid õpilased neid omandama. Artiklis käsitleme, kuidas on neile teemadele lähenenud Eesti põhikoolidele (II–III kooliaste) ja gümnaasiumidele sügisel 2024 kättesaadavad eesti keele (emakeelena) õpikud. Analüüsi tulemustest selgus, et tekstide kategoriseerimisel kasutatakse enim termineid žanr, liik ja tüüp. Kusjuures nende kasutus varieerub ulatuslikult, selgeid definitsioone enamjaolt ei anta ning kategoriseerimise aluseid selgitatakse eksplitsiitselt pigem harva. Kategooriate õpetamisel on enamasti kirjas teksti vormi-, mitte sisutunnused. Selline lähenemine tekstide kategoriseerimisele ei arenda õpilaste iseseisvat analüüsivõimet ega valmista neid ette pidevalt muutuvas tekstimaailmas toime tulemiseks. Artiklis pakume välja ühe võimaliku ülesande tüübi, mis suunaks õpilased tekste uutmoodi märkama ja seeläbi mõtestatumalt õppima. Abstract. Ilona Tragel, Laura Kiik, Liisa-Maria Komissarov, Kati Käpp, Markus Laanoja, Nele Karolin Teiva: Categorisation of texts in Estonian L1 textbooks – sink or swim? The national curricula for both basic and upper secondary education in Estonia state that one of the learning outcomes for general education is the skill to create different types of texts. However, it remains unspecified what those types of texts are and how the students should learn to write them. This article examines how texts and their categorisation are represented in the currently available basic (second and third stages of study) and upper secondary textbooks for Estonian as a first language. The analysis shows that the terms žanr (‘genre’), liik and tüüp (both roughly equivalent to ‘type’) are used most commonly, although their usage varies and is rarely explained. The categories are usually taught through their formal features rather than the content. We argue that this kind of teaching does not develop the students’ independent analysis skills and thus fails to adequately prepare them for the ever-changing world of texts. We also propose a new type of task which can guide students to notice and make sense of texts in a more meaningful way.
Artikkel annab ülevaate kaasõppija kirjalikus tagasisides kasutatavatest pehmendajatest ja kiitusest. Lisaks on analüüsitud, kuidas nende kasutus kirjutamisprotsessi jooksul muutub. Materjal pärineb Tartu Ülikooli 2023/2024. õppeaasta „Keskaja“ ainekursuselt, kus tudengid tagasisidestasid semestri jooksul 4–5-liikmelistes rühmades üksteise esseede kaht mustandit. Selgus, et pehmendajatest kasutatakse tagasisides enim tingivat kõneviisi ning tegusõna tunduma. Levinuim kiituskeelend on hea. Näib, et pehmendamisel ja kiitmisel eelistatakse variante, mis tunduvad neutraalsemad. Kahe tagasisidevooru võrdluses suurenes pehmendajate hulk 10 000 sõne kohta 22 võrra, kiitust jäi ligikaudu viie võrra vähemaks. Muutus võib tuleneda tagasiside andmise formaadi muutusest ja teksti sisulisest täienemisest. Abstract. Nele Novek: Praise and hedges in peer feedback: A case study of essays on medieval history. This article provides an overview of different hedges and praise used in peer feedback. In addition, it is analyzed how their use changes during the writing process. The data was obtained from the course “Medieval History” held at the University of Tartu in the autumn semester of 2023/2024. During the semester, students gave feedback on two drafts of each other’s essays in groups of 4–5. The most common hedges in the feedback were the conditional mood and the verb tunduma ‘to seem’. The most common praise was hea ‘good’. It seems that students prefer options that appear more neutral when hedging and praising. Comparing the two rounds of feedback, the number of hedges increased by 22 per 10,000 words, while the number of praises declined by about five. This difference may be due to a change in the format of giving feedback and an increase in the amount of text to evaluate.
Artikkel käsitleb tänapäeva akadeemilisi tekste, täpsemalt on vaatluse all neis esinev interaktsiooniline metadiskursus, s.o keelelised vahendid, millega autorid suhestuvad oma teksti ja selle sisuga, lugejate ning varasemate autoritega. Traditsioone hindavas teadusmaailmas on sobival keelekasutusel oluline roll. Tudengid kui alles algajad akadeemilised kirjutajad puutuvad kokku õpikute ja juhenditega, kus manitsetakse olema tekstis täpne ning hoidma neutraalset ja objektiivset joont. Seejuures kirjutatakse ette sedagi, missuguses isikus on paslik oma tekst vormistada.Artiklis uuritakse kvantitatiivselt, kuidas seesugustele nõuetele tegelikult vastavad või vastanduvad aastatel 2018–2022 kirjutatud Tartu ülikooli humanitaar- ja sotsiaal teaduste valdkondade bakalaureuse- ja magistritööd (n = 40). Selgitatakse välja üli õpilaste isikukasutuse eelistused ning kalduvus tarvitada muid autori hoiakut väljendavaid ja lugejat potentsiaalselt mõjutavaid keelendeid, nagu pehmendavad, võimendavad, suhtumis- ja kaasatusmarkerid. Lisaks uuritakse, kas lõputööde keelekasutuses eristub kogukondlikke (valdkond) ja kogemusega (õppeaste) kaasnevaid mustreid. Seejuures hinnatakse teksti retoorilise struktuuri (peatükid) mõju metadiskursuse markerite esinemusele. Tulemusi võrreldakse varasemas uurimuses teadusartiklite kohta saadud tulemustega. Abstract. Helena Lemendik: The key features of scientific language are precision, neutrality, and impersonality. Yet, how do contemporary academic texts align with these traditional expectations? This article examines contemporary academic texts, with the focus on the use of interactional metadiscourse – language choices that help authors connect with their content, their readers, and other writers. In academia, where tradition continues to shape expectations, choosing appropriate language plays a crucial role. Students, as novice academic writers, are often guided by textbooks and writing manuals that urge them to be precise and to maintain a neutral, objective tone. These resources also offer advice on using the appropriate grammatical voice.This study analyses 40 bachelor’s and master’s theses from the humanities and social science faculties written at the University of Tartu between 2018 and 2022. It explores how these texts either follow or diverge from the expected norms. The analysis looks at students’ preferences for grammatical voice and their use of other language tools that show the author’s stance and influence on the reader’s perspective, such as hedges, boosters, attitude markers, and engagement markers. The study also examines whether language use varies depending on the academic field or the level of study, and whether different parts of the text (i.e., chapters) affect how often these features appear. These findings are compared to earlier research on scientific articles.
