Finland's national radio broadcaster pulls the plug on the news in Latin

[Hrvatski Noahid]

https://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=43363

"During the last few decades, I have served as the "opponent" in several Scandinavian doctoral defenses.  I wore a tuxedo, top hat, and silk socks, plus gleaming black shoes.  Much of the ritual was conducted in Latin, so I was quite aware of the high place accorded that ancient language in Scandinavian academia, especially in Finland, where all of my colleagues, no matter what their field, had received extensive training in Latin already in high school back in the fifties, sixties, and seventies.  It seems, however, that Latin education has been rapidly declining since that time.

Now, one of the last holdouts for general knowledge of Latin in Finland is being terminated:

"Requiescat in pace: Finland's Yle radio axes Latin news show after 30 years:  Public broadcaster cancels weekly summary Nuntii Latini as original presenters retire", AFP in Helsinki, The Guardian (6/24/19)


I asked a few of my Finnish colleagues whether they were aware of Nuntii Latini, what they thought of its closing, and whether Latin continues to have a presence in Finnish education and culture.

I.

Yes, indeed! The program was initiated by Tuomo Pekkanen, our Latin teacher at the Helsinki classical lyceum, and continued by his wife Virpi Seppälä-Pekkanen, his former pupil. Thereby it was on the responsibility of Dr Reijo Pitkäranta. Both Tuomo (later professor of Latin at the University of Jyväskylä) and Reijo are excellent users of Latin even in speech. In our Latin tradition the pronunciation follows the historical lines where c means always k, e.g. Cicero = Kikero. It is a pity that the program is discontinued as it was widely listened around the world.

Latin is still taught as the main subject in the few existing classical lyceums. During my school years we could also study Greek as an extra addition. In the general course of deterioration ("modernization") classical subjects are in some danger, but I firmly believe that at least Latin will persist still for long.

II.

I do know the program. Its initiator and long-time editor, Professor Tuomo Pekkanen, is a good friend of mine since my early student days. Tuomo has translated our national epic Kalevala into metrical Latin, this being one of the most exact translations into any language (Tuomo: "the greatest difficulty was in understanding exactly the meaning of the original"). The Pope has decorated him for merits in promoting spoken Latin.

Nuntii Latini requires quite a lot of work, and a very good mastery of Latin. As the old hands retire, it is difficult to find people to replace them, especially nowadays.

When I started university study (Latin, ancient Greek and Sanskrit with comparative Indo-European), there were hundreds of students in Latin classes, as very many high schools offered "short Latin" (3 years) and teacher posts were plentiful. Nowadays Latin is taught practically only in classical lyceums, where it continues to be taught for 7 years (as I had).

III.

Yes, the Finnish efforts, started by professor Tuomo Pekkanen, to reinvigorate Latin are well known, and the news programme Nuntii Latini has been an important part of them. The program has even got recognition from the Vatican. That it was axed now is simply due to the fact that the Finnish broadcasting company is a political organ, and Finland has currently a leftist-feminist-capitalist government which cares little of Latin. Of course, during the last few decades Latin has been eliminated from school curricula and university programmes as well. Uncivilized leaders raise uncivilized people.

Curious about the construction of the name of the Finnish national broadcaster, I asked:  If "Yle" means "general" (?), what is the -is- doing in the middle of the name "Yleisradio"?

Replies:

I.

Yle is an abbreviation for Yleisradio. Yleis- is a compound form for the adjective attribute yleinen 'general, common, public'.

II.

YLE is a non-grammatical truncation of yleis-, from yleinen 'general', which is ultimately derived from yli : ylä 'upper part, over'.

III.

"Yle" does not mean "general" as it is only an abbreviation of the word "yleinen" (general), The oblique stem is consequently "yleis-", e.g., in genetive "yleisen", in partitive "yleistä", as a verb "yleistää" (to generalize).

Incidentally, and by way of contrast to what is happening to Latin in Finland, one of my Finnish colleagues wrote:

I am now in Kyzyl, Tuva Republic. It is wonderful to see how Tuvinian has again got a stronger position in this formerly independent (1921-1944) republic – everyone is speaking it, though you still rarely see it written.

For my part, I am enormously grateful that I was able to take two years of Latin in my small, rural, public high school in East Canton (Osnaburg), Stark County, Ohio back in the late fifties and early sixties.  The benefits of that exposure have lasted until today.  Yet I doubt that today Latin is offered in any public high school in Ohio (maybe a handful of very special ones), and perhaps only in a few public high schools in the nation (Boston Latin School, Cambridge Rindge and Latin School [?] — are there any other public schools in America that still offer Latin?).

"And though thou hadst small Latin and less Greek…".  (For a surprising interpretation of this famous line, see here.)

[h.t. Fraser Howie; thanks to several anonymous Finnish colleagues]"


I'm not sure how I feel about this. I learned Latin for two years and I still have two Latin grammars. A knowledge of the language is useful in etymological studies. On the other hand, I don't plan to read official papal letters or hear the mass in Latin.