The abundant use of English does not threaten the position of the Finnish language, according to a study by the University of Eastern Finland. The research project looked into the status of English in Finland’s public administration, business life and universities.
According to the researchers, restricting the use of English could cause significant harm to international cooperation, and would make it more difficult for international experts, workers and students to come to Finland and integrate into society.
They noted that the role and significance of English varies considerably depending on the field, task and situation.
The study was partly based on a survey that drew responses from 1,750 people in public administration, business and higher education. In these fields, English is the second-most used language, surpassing Swedish, which is the country’s second official language.
“Answers from the business community show more importance for Swedish, but even there English is slightly ahead,” said the project leader, Mikko Laitinen, professor of English Language and Culture at the School of Humanities at the University of Eastern Finland in Joensuu.
According to Laitinen, the public debate on the status of English so far has revolved around the claim that English is a threat that would restrict the use of the national languages, Finnish and Swedish.
“The discussion seems to be guided by nationalist ‘one nation, one language’ thinking, where languages have fields of use and boundaries. In reality, this is not the case, and this should be recognised in the Finnish debate,” he told Yle.
Professor: Finland still grappling with rapid change
According to Laitinen, the reasons for attitudinal rejection of English can be found in rapid societal changes.
The transition from the unified culture of the 20th century to the global, networked society of the 21st century has been astonishingly fast, he said. When Finland still had a unified culture, English was clearly a foreign language and was studied in the same way as other foreign tongues.
“We’re still struggling with that change,” Laitinen noted.
Recently, there has been discussion of the use of English in the service industry. For instance, some restaurants in Finland only offer service to customers in English.
“I think this often affects people who have just arrived in the country,” he said. “Can we assume that they can immediately manage in Finnish?”
Proposals to clarify language policy
The project’s final conclusions include proposals for moves to clarify Finland’s language policy.
As an export-driven country on the periphery of Europe, Finland needs to ensure a wide language reserve, it said.
The level of English language skills must meet the needs of international working life. On the other hand, there should also be widespread proficiency in other languages such as French, German, Spanish, Chinese, Arabic and Russian, researchers said.
The report stresses that people coming to Finland to work must have the opportunity to learn at least one of the national languages. This facilitates integration and adaptation to Finnish society.
Meanwhile the emergence of monolingual bubbles within society should be avoided. These can emerge, for example, if immigrants live and work in Finnish society without studying or using Finnish or Swedish – or if native Finns only want to use one language and demand the same from others.
“Linguistic bubbles can deepen social divisions and increase differentiation between social groups,” said Laitinen.
The report also calls for measures to encourage people in Finland to be more linguistically tolerant.
Immigrants must be given the opportunity to practice their home languages without quickly changing the language of the conversation to English.
The project is related to an updated national language strategy published by the previous government in late 2021, which was partly aimed at securing the status of national languages.
The full state-financed report is to be published in early November.
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