Gap between norm and usage: the case of Finnish

Abstract

Finland was a Swedish province from the 13th century until 1809, when it was annexed by the Russian Empire as an autonomous Grand Duchy. In spite of the annexation, the country preserved its administrative and legislative institutions. In connection to the new situation, it became necessary to codify the Finnish language, which from 1809 was the mother tongue of 85% of the population. The sources for the codification process were several: old literary language, different regional dialects, borrowed foreign words, etc. The result was a supradialectal norm, not spoken by anybody spontaneously but accepted by all. One of the consequences of this is a considerable gap between the standard spoken Finnish and the normative language.