Noli tacere: Mitmekeelsus Värske Rõhu luuletustes (2005–2024)

Abstract

Noli tacere: Multilingualism in the poetry of Värske Rõhk (2005–2024) This article analyzes lexical multilingualism in poetry published in the Estonian young writers’ magazine Värske Rõhk between 2005 and 2024. The corpus comprises 3,086 poems by 328 authors. Combining quantitative corpus analysis with qualitative poetics, the study examines the frequency of multilingualism, the languages represented, their structural relationship to Estonian as the matrix language, and their poetic functions. Lexical multilingualism occurs in 348 poems (11.28% of the corpus) and does not increase over time. English is the most frequently represented foreign language, followed by Latin and Russian. According to Pieter Muysken’s typology, insertional and alternational code-switching predominate, while congruent lexicalization is less common, suggesting that foreign-language elements usually remain marked and structurally distinct. In a few cases, broader hybridization can also be interpreted as stylized literary imitation of translanguaging. The analysis shows that different languages carry distinct semantic and aesthetic roles: English is associated with digital culture, pop-cultural references, and performative self-fashioning; Latin with cultural memory, elevated register, and irony; Russian with colloquial, emotional, and obscene speech; less frequently used languages mainly serve to create an estrangement effect or to introduce culturally specific vocabulary. Multilingualism thus appears in Värske Rõhk as a stable and functionally differentiated poetic resource rather than as evidence of increasing language mixing.