"unusal" - 1 õppematerjal

Estonia topic

Language Estonia's official language is Estonian. It is spoken by about 1.1 million people in Estonia and by about ten thousand people who live in various other countries. It is a Finno-Ugric language and it is closely related to Finnish. For a small nation a language plays a key role in maintaining its national identity. Estonian language uses the Latin alphabet and it has 32 letters. An interesting feature that sets Estonian apart from most languages is the vowel. The most unusal ones for foreingers are ä,ö,õ and ü. The language also has grammar durations and declinations. There are three durations (short, long and extra long and ) and fourteen decliantions. These are possibly the hardest thing for a foreinger to learn. Also postpositions are used quite often. In Estonian no articles or genders are used. Most loans come from German language. 9